Hello all, just found this forum and would love to hear from anyone who would like to share any experience working with musicians and performing artists. I am particularly after a chart of accounts for Sage 50. If anyone can point me in the right direction I would be really grateful! Thank you in anticipation!!!
The views expressed in this post are my own personal (HRA protected) views, and are not representative of any organisation I have any involvement with.
Where abouts in Sussex are you, we are neighbours!
The thing you have to watch on musicians etc is royalty payments etc but apart from that, its all the same. It depends if you have any specific questions?
Hello, I am not sure where you are but I am based near Lewes. I presume you mean that the royalty payments should be separately coded from any advance for recording or touring? What I want Sage to do is work out how profitable each gig is given the income and costs associated. I have just got Sage 50 and even though I know Instant Accounts this is different. Usually I just do it on a spreadsheet - any thoughts?
I'm in Sussex too, near Brighton, so not far away at all.
You say you've just got Sage 50, have you got a period of free support from Sage with it? You often get a month or 45 days, so it's worth making the most of it and calling them if you'd like help with getting it set up as you need it and ensuring you know how to get the information that you want.
How far along have you got with setting it up? You mention using Instant and a spreadsheet, if you haven't done it already probably the best place to start is to set up the accounts you have always used in Instant, with the same names, in Sage 50. You can check in Instant what each account is categorised as if you aren't sure.
From there you can set up the other items, you could always set up a few dummy ones to have a bit of a practise and see how it all works, then rebuild and start properly once you're happy with how you post the various different items.
It alld epends on how many gigs they do as you can departmentalise everything of use lots of nominal codes to differentiate the same type of cost. However, it sounds to me as if spreadsheets for each individual gig would be better, using Sage to hold the full data for accounts purposes.
Thank you everyone, great advice. Really appreciate it. Good to know there are other bookkeepers in the area and if I can help or advise in any way I would be delighted to do so. Also looking at cloud based software eg Xero which at first glance looks pretty good and could be particularly helpful when on tour for long periods.
I would use departments - give each tour/project/gig a department number and code all the expenditure to do with it to that department. In Sage 50 you can do department P & Ls so it's relatively easy.
When on tour I give the tour manager a spreadsheet to complete - I usually advance her cash by putting it in her account and then she accounts for it on the spreadsheet which I then put on Sage.
Sheila
-- Edited by semsley on Wednesday 11th of August 2010 09:05:52 PM
