Bookkeeping for
Financial
Advisors.
Advisory fees come out of client accounts at the custodian, planning fees come through a payment platform, and commissions arrive net of broker-dealer charges. Add tech and compliance costs and firm money mixed with personal, and the books get murky. We keep them clean so you can see what the practice actually earns.
Flat monthly pricing · Cancel anytime · Dedicated bookkeeper
Built for Every Kind
of Advisory Practice
Fee-only RIA, hybrid advisor or independent rep, your revenue comes from different places on different schedules. The books need to show all of it in one view.
Fee-Only RIAs
Most of your revenue is advisory fees debited from client accounts by the custodian, often quarterly. We match each fee deposit to its billing report and record planning fees as their own revenue line.
- AUM fees matched to billing reports
- Planning and retainer fees recorded
- Fees billed in advance or arrears
- Prorated fee refunds recorded
- Compliance consultant costs coded
- Registration and filing fees tracked
Hybrid Advisors
You earn advisory fees through an RIA and commissions through a broker-dealer. We keep the two streams apart, record broker-dealer payouts with their deductions shown as expenses, and give you the full picture.
- Advisory and commission revenue split
- Broker-dealer deductions as expenses
- Payouts matched to BD statements
- Trail commissions recorded
- Insurance commissions tracked
Solo and Growing Practices
You're the advisor, the business owner and often the operations team. We keep firm and personal spending separate, record your pay the way your CPA sets it up, and show what the practice earns.
- Firm and personal accounts separated
- Owner salary and draws recorded
- CRM and planning software costs
- Staff payroll reconciled from Gusto
- Marketing and client event costs
The Financial Headaches
We Fix
Advisory revenue is steady, but it arrives in pieces that rarely match the bank. These are the usual trouble spots.
Fee deposits with no detail behind them
The custodian debits fees from client accounts and sends you a deposit. Without the billing report behind it, you can't tell whether every account was billed, whether a new client was missed, or why this quarter came in lower than the last.
Commissions recorded net of BD fees
Broker-dealer statements show your production, your payout and a list of deductions for technology, E&O, licensing and platform fees. Book only the net deposit and those costs vanish, so you can't see what your affiliation really costs you.
Firm and personal spending mixed
When the firm card pays for groceries and your personal card pays for software, your P&L stops meaning anything and your CPA has to untangle it at year end. Owner pay and draws get lost in the noise too.
Fees billed in advance land all at once
If you bill quarterly in advance, three months of revenue lands on one day. Booked that way, one month looks great and the next two look empty. When a client leaves mid-quarter, the prorated refund muddies it further.
Every Month
Everything You Need,
Nothing You Don't
We keep the firm's books, not your clients' portfolios. Working from custodian billing reports, broker-dealer statements and your bank feeds, we record each revenue stream correctly and reconcile every account each month.
Monthly Bookkeeping
Every account reconciled, every transaction categorized, every month. You get a clean P&L and balance sheet you can read and use to make decisions.
See Full Details →Financial Reporting
A monthly P&L with advisory, planning and commission revenue split out, technology and compliance costs grouped, owner pay shown clearly, and revenue compared quarter over quarter.
See Full Details →Bank Reconciliation
Every business account and credit card matched and verified each month. No mystery charges. No unresolved transactions. No surprises.
See Full Details →Accounts Payable & Receivable
AR covers planning fees and retainers clients owe you and fees not yet received from the custodian. AP covers software subscriptions, compliance consultants, rent and other firm bills.
See Full Details →Catch-Up Bookkeeping
Months or years behind? We clean it all up before monthly service starts, at a flat price per month behind that we quote up front.
See Full Details →Payroll Support
Advisors and staff on salary run through Gusto, which files the payroll taxes. We reconcile payroll to the books, including owner salary if your firm is taxed as an S-corp.
See Full Details →"He is very personable, and if I have a question, he promptly gets back with me!"
Financial Advisors
FAQ
Questions we hear from Financial Advisors before they sign on with Tides.
Based in Greenville, SC —
Serving Clients Nationwide
100% remote bookkeeping for small businesses across South Carolina and throughout the United States.
Beyond Financial Advisors,
We Serve All These Businesses
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.
More for Financial Advisors
Related guides and pages.
Finance terms worth knowing
Plain-English explainers, no jargon.
Focus on Clients.
We'll Handle
The Books.
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
Simple, Flat-Rate Pricing
Flat monthly plans scaled to your business — no hourly billing and no surprise invoices. You always know the price up front.
★★★★★ 5.0 · 8 client reviews on Intuit's ProAdvisor directory
✔ Reviewed by Daniel Cope, Advanced QuickBooks ProAdvisor · Updated August 2026