“I work hard but don’t know where my money is”

• Owners who are busy and profitable on paper, but always tight on cash.
• People who mix business and personal spending in one account.
• Businesses that grew quickly — more stock, more staff, bigger jobs — and the cash never caught up.

• Money comes in and seems to disappear before you can pay yourself.
• You check the bank balance to decide what you can afford.
• Tax, GST and super arrive as a shock because nothing was put aside.
• You are not sure which jobs, clients or products actually make money.

Questions worth asking — we’d rather ask than assume.

• Could clients be paying you later than you are paying everyone else?
• Is some of the money in your account actually GST, PAYG withholding or super that belongs to someone else?
• Are loan repayments, stock or equipment soaking up cash that never shows up as an “expense”?
• Is there no simple view that separates what is yours from what is already spoken for?

• It tends to bite at quarter end (BAS), when a large supplier bill lands, or when tax is due.
• The best time to look is now — patterns are easier to fix early than in a crunch.

• Your bank statements for the last three to six months.
• Your accounting software’s list of who owes you money (debtors) and who you owe (creditors).
• Your loan and finance statements.

1. 1

   Follow the money

   We trace where the last few months of cash actually went — in plain categories you recognise.

2. 2

   Separate what is spoken for

   We show how much of your balance is tax, GST and super, so you can see what is genuinely yours.

3. 3

   Find the leaks and the lags

   Slow payers, thin-margin work and costs that crept up — named, not guessed.

4. 4

   Give you one simple view

   A short regular snapshot you can actually read, so you stop running the business off the bank balance.

This is how we would start with you — general information, not a do-it-yourself checklist or personal advice.

• We start from your bank account, not from a template — the explanation has to match what you see.
• Bookkeeping and advice sit under one roof, so the numbers you are shown are the numbers we work from.

• You talk to Graham Chee FCPA, the principal — the same person from the first conversation onwards, with 25 years in public practice. About Graham
• Local Knowledge Pty Ltd is a CPA public practice and a registered tax agent — you can check us on the Tax Practitioners Board public register. TPB register
• Finalist, Accountants Daily Australian Accounting Awards — Multiservice Firm of the Year (2025 and 2026) and Marketing Program of the Year (2025).
• We show our reasoning in the open, so you can see how we think before you ever pick up the phone. Watch it think