Bookkeeping Built for Ontario Restaurants, Cafés and Food Businesses
Few businesses generate as many transactions per dollar of profit as a restaurant. Daily POS batches, card settlements that arrive net of fees, cash, tips, supplier invoices from a dozen vendors, payroll for a large hourly team and HST on every sale all have to be reconciled, and margins are thin enough that mistakes show up fast. BKInk provides cloud-based bookkeeping for Ontario restaurants, cafés, caterers and other food businesses so the numbers are reconciled weekly or monthly and you can see food cost, labour cost and cash position without waiting for year-end.
Common Challenges
Sales that do not match the bank. The POS reports gross sales; the bank receives card settlements net of processing fees, often a day or two later, plus cash deposits and third-party delivery payouts that already have commissions deducted. Booking the deposit as the sale hides fees, understates revenue and throws off HST.
Tips and gratuities. How tips are pooled and paid out affects payroll: tips the employer controls and distributes are generally treated differently from tips paid directly by customers. Recording them inconsistently creates payroll and year-end problems.
Labour-heavy payroll. Hourly staff, split shifts, statutory holiday pay and turnover make payroll one of the largest and most error-prone costs. Late or incorrect CRA source deductions carry penalties.
Food and beverage costs that need to be tracked as a percentage. Knowing that food cost is 34 percent this month versus 29 percent last month is far more useful than a single “supplies” line, but it only works if purchases are categorized consistently and inventory is handled sensibly.
How BKInk Helps
We set up or clean up your QuickBooks Online file with a chart of accounts built for a food business: food and beverage purchases by category, labour, delivery-platform commissions, card fees, occupancy and the rest. Each period we record sales from your POS reports, reconcile card settlements, cash deposits and delivery-platform payouts to those sales so fees and commissions are captured as expenses rather than lost, and reconcile every bank, credit-card and loan account.
We keep HST on sales and input tax credits on purchases coded correctly and prepare the return through our HST filing service. Where you want us to run payroll we handle pay runs, source deductions, statutory holiday pay and T4s through our payroll service, with tip treatment recorded consistently. Monthly reports show food cost, labour cost and prime cost as percentages of sales, so decisions about pricing, staffing and suppliers are based on numbers rather than instinct.
Key Benefits
- POS sales reconciled to bank and delivery-platform deposits, with fees and commissions recorded as the expenses they are.
- Food, labour and prime cost percentages in a monthly report you can act on.
- Payroll and HST handled with the books, so CRA deadlines are covered by the person who already knows your numbers.
- Year-end-ready records for your accountant or for our corporate year-end and T2 preparation service.
Why Choose BKInk
- Founder-led, dedicated bookkeeper who is a Certified QuickBooks Online ProAdvisor and Technician of CPB Canada.
- Built for high transaction volume, with bank feeds, rules and consistent reconciliation rather than manual entry.
- Cloud delivery that fits restaurant hours: receipts and invoices photographed or forwarded, questions handled by e-mail, phone or Zoom, including evening and weekend times when scheduled.
- Fixed monthly pricing scaled to volume. See bookkeeping pricing.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which POS and delivery platforms can you work with?
We work from the sales and payout reports your systems produce, whatever the platform, and reconcile them to the bank in QuickBooks Online. We do not need to operate your POS.
Can you reconcile daily, or only monthly?
Sales are typically recorded from daily or weekly POS summaries and reconciled to the bank at least monthly. Higher-frequency packages are available for busy locations.
We pay some staff cash and some through payroll. Is that a problem?
All employee wages must go through payroll with proper source deductions. We will set up a compliant payroll and help you move any informal arrangements onto it; that protects the business and its staff.
Our books have not been touched since we opened. Can you fix that?
Yes. Catch-up bookkeeping rebuilds the history from bank, POS and supplier records, and cleanup for QuickBooks Online repairs a file that was started but never maintained.
How much does restaurant bookkeeping cost?
It depends on transaction volume, the number of locations and whether payroll is included. See example packages on our pricing page; a consultation produces a fixed quote.
Ready for Restaurant Books You Can Actually Use?
Schedule a consultation and get sales reconciled, payroll compliant and food and labour costs visible every month.