Overheard my accountant say 'just estimate' on a vendor invoice figure

I was on a call last Tuesday with my bookkeeper going over quarterly numbers. She paused on a supplier invoice from a place in Ohio and said 'we don't have the paper copy so just estimate the amount and move on.' I stopped her and said no, we need the actual number. She seemed annoyed like I was wasting time. But here's the thing - if you estimate wrong by even a few hundred dollars, it messes up your cost of goods sold for the whole year. I found the original email with the invoice PDF in under 10 minutes. Has anyone else caught their own finance person trying to fudge small numbers like that?

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1 Comment

lee.casey29d ago

I used to be more like your bookkeeper honestly. I figured if the number was close enough it wouldn't kill the books but then I had a year where the estimates stacked up and my gross profit looked way off during tax season. Took me forever to backtrack and fix all the little guesses that added up to a big mess. So yeah I get it now, tracking down the real number even for small stuff is worth the time. Saves headaches later when you're trying to explain to an auditor why your COGS looks like a rounded guess.