Athens law firms, engineering shops, marketing agencies, and consultants run on billable hours, retainers, and project P&L. We build a clean bookkeeping system around how you actually bill — so partners see real margin, not just invoiced revenue.
No setup fees · Cancel anytime · Dedicated bookkeeper
Athens's professional services bench runs deep — and the books behind these firms look nothing like a retail P&L. Here's how Tides fits the partners, principals, and owners building practices across Clarke County.
Law firms, consulting agencies, marketing firms, and other professional service businesses across Athens share a common challenge: their revenue is tied to time and expertise, not products. Retainer agreements, project-based billing, hourly rates, and milestone payments all need to be tracked against actual work delivered. Without proper client-level accounting, profitable engagements and money-losing ones look the same on your P&L. We track revenue and costs by client and by project so you always know your true margins.
Partner distributions, equity draws, and guaranteed payments add another layer. Whether you're a two-partner firm or a growing agency with multiple principals, the books need to handle distributions, retained earnings, and individual tax implications cleanly. We set up your chart of accounts to handle multi-partner economics the right way. Serving firms across Athens and Northeast Georgia.
And for growing firms across Clarke County adding staff and expanding into Watkinsville, Bogart, Winterville, Oconee County, the bookkeeping needs to scale. Employee payroll, contractor 1099s, benefits administration, software subscriptions, professional liability insurance, and CE expenses all need proper categorization. We build books that grow with your firm — clean, organized, and ready for your CPA at year-end.
Professional services firms face financial challenges that general bookkeepers routinely miss. Here's what we hear from nearly every new client.
Retainers get drawn down differently each month. Without a system, it's easy to over-bill, under-bill, or lose track of what's been used vs. what's still in trust.
You're billing clients, but after labor, overhead, and contractor costs — which projects are actually making money? Most firms have no idea without a proper cost structure.
IOLTA rules are strict. Commingling funds, even accidentally, can have serious professional consequences. We maintain clean separation and reconciliation every month.
Chasing down expense receipts, sorting contractor payments for 1099s, and trying to reconstruct the year for your CPA. We eliminate all of it with clean monthly records.
Every Tides plan includes all seven core services. Professional services clients get specific treatment for retainer billing, trust accounts, and project-level profitability.
Every account reconciled, every transaction categorized, every month — without exception. You receive a clean P&L and balance sheet broken down by client or project so you always know where you stand.
Monthly reports showing revenue by client, project margins, and overhead costs — so you can make smarter business decisions every month.
Every business account and credit card matched and verified each month. No mystery charges. No unresolved transactions. No surprises.
We track contractor payments, client invoices, and outstanding balances so nothing gets missed or paid twice.
Months or years behind? We clean it all up before we start your regular monthly service — no matter how far back the backlog goes.
If you have employees or pay contractors, we coordinate payroll processing and keep your tax filings clean and on schedule.
"As a consultant, I never had clean books. Tides changed that in the first month — now I actually know which clients are my most profitable."
Questions we hear from Athens law firms, engineering shops, consultants, and agencies before they sign on with Tides.
Athens's professional services bench runs deep — and the books behind these firms look nothing like a retail P&L. Here's how Tides fits the partners, principals, and owners building practices across Clarke County.
The Athens metro's pro services density is substantial. Engineering firms here support the corporate, logistics, and technology corridors anchored by Delta Air Lines, Home Depot, UPS, and Coca-Cola — a multi-billion-dollar market for consulting, IT, and commercial engineering work. Alongside them, law firms handle corporate matters for the Fortune 500 base, IP work tied to tech and media, and a flood of real estate and construction law driven by the building boom.
Then there's downtown. The Five Points corridor, West Five Points, and Eastside are now home to a dense mix of marketing, branding, PR, and creative agencies serving regional and national clients. Architects and design studios fill out the picture, working on everything from mixed-use towers to the next wave of restaurants opening along the BeltLine. See our full local breakdown on the Athens bookkeeping services page.
The bookkeeping reality for all of these firms is the same: revenue ties to billable hours, retainers, or project milestones — not invoice dates. We integrate with Clio, Harvest, Toggl, and similar time systems, build a chart of accounts that throws off real project and client P&L, handle IOLTA reconciliation for law firms, and clean up the moving parts behind partner distributions, equity draws, and billable utilization so the principals know exactly what each engagement is actually earning.
100% remote bookkeeping for small businesses across Georgia and throughout the United States.
Tides Bookkeeping specializes in bookkeeping across 12 distinct industries. Industry-specific expertise means fewer errors, better categorization, and a bookkeeper who already understands how your business makes money.
Schedule a free 15-minute call. We'll review your current setup, answer your questions, and give you a flat monthly quote — no pressure.
No credit card required · No long-term contracts · Cancel anytime