Your bookkeeper can only work with what you send. When the packet arrives complete and on time, the books stay clean, the VAT return goes out without a scramble, and you always know where the business stands. When pieces arrive late or not at all, the whole month slips. Here is the packet that should reach your bookkeeper every month, and what each part does.
Bank statements
Send the statements for every business bank account, for the full month, with no pages skipped. The bank statement is the spine of your books: every payment in and out is checked against it. If a statement is missing, your bookkeeper cannot confirm the balance, and the month cannot be closed properly. Online banking exports work fine, as long as they cover the whole month. Flag anything unusual when you send the statement, so it is recorded correctly the first time.
Sales invoices
Send every invoice you issued during the month, including invoices you later cancelled or corrected. Sales invoices are how your income is recorded. They also feed your VAT return: VAT is due on the sale in the tax period when the invoice was issued, so a missing invoice can mean VAT reported late, and late VAT returns carry a fine of AED 1,000 for a first offence and AED 2,000 after that. A short note is enough for the odd ones, like a credit note or a refund.
Expense receipts
Send receipts for every business expense, whether you paid by card, bank transfer, or petty cash. A bank line on its own is not enough: it shows an amount, but not what you bought or why. Without the receipt, the expense may not be recorded at all, or it may be recorded in the wrong category. A photo of the receipt taken the same day is fine. A bag of paper receipts handed over three months later is not. The worst case is a receipt that never arrives at all: the expense stays unrecorded, your profit looks higher than it is, and the tax on that higher profit is real money.
Payroll records
If you have staff, send the payroll summary each month: who was paid, how much, and any deductions. Include new joiners and leavers, and any changes to salaries. Payroll feeds both your books and your WPS records, so missing payroll details can throw off two sets of records at once. If you pay anyone outside the monthly run, like a one-off bonus or an end-of-service amount, send that separately with a note, so it is not missed or counted twice.
VAT documents
Send any VAT-related paperwork for the month: tax invoices received from suppliers, import documents, and any notice from the FTA. Supplier tax invoices matter because the VAT you paid on business purchases is only recoverable when the paperwork is in order. An FTA notice should always reach your bookkeeper the same week it arrives, never the week a return is due. If a supplier has not sent a proper tax invoice, say so, so no VAT is claimed on that purchase until the document is in hand.
What happens when something is missing
A missing document does not just delay one entry. The bank reconciliation stalls, because your bookkeeper cannot match a payment to a receipt they never saw. The VAT return gets held up, because an invoice cannot be reported if it never arrived. And the monthly report you rely on comes late, or with gaps you have to explain later. Most of the clean-up work at year end is really just the missing documents from months ago, finally chased down.
A simple monthly routine
Pick one day each month to send the packet, for example the 5th, and stick to it. Keep one folder for the month, and drop each document in as it arrives instead of sorting it all at month end. At the end of the month, run through the five items above and send the folder. If something is missing, say so in the same message, so your bookkeeper knows what is still coming. Ten minutes of packing each month beats a weekend of searching later.
At BizNex Consulting, we act as a complete outsourced finance department for businesses in the UAE: accounting, bookkeeping, VAT, corporate tax and audit, under one monthly arrangement.