What is the Difference Between a Dental CPA and a Standard Accountant?

What exactly does a “dental CPA” do that a traditional local accounting cannot?

I’m not sure many of us can “do” anything differently. It’s more of what we know.

They are not cheap… I’m paying $300/month for mine and then another fee for tax prep, which I cannot remember right now.

That’s cheap!

🙂

Seriously, just telling us what you pay and calling it “cheap” without telling us exactly what they do for $300 isn’t telling us anything.

I am looking around for another CPA for a real estate company I own and there are guys that are half the price of my current CPA doing my practice.

For the exact same service? That said, I have CPA friends that are more “tax only” CPAs and their tax prep fees are lower than ours, maybe half, they are solo practitioners and if they have a “tax client” that needs more than just tax they find it difficult to advise them…which is why we’re friends.

They both offer about the same stuff…monthly financial statements, tax advice….

That’s more of the “do” that I mentioned above. It’s the “know” that separates CPAs. I know CPAs that focus on car dealerships, some that focus on insurance companies, some on home construction, and more. I would be clueless if I had one of those clients and they asked me about their industry stats, benchmarks, types of contracts, how much a drywaller or mechanic should cost. Yet we can all “do” a tax return.

The same basic services that most CPAs offer and we may not be any different if all you need is someone to prepare a tax return.

I would reason that both CPAs can save the same moneys…numbers are numbers and tax laws are tax laws….I just don’t get why a dental CPA is superior over a local guy…

Will you ask your local CPA how much you should be paying for hygiene wages? How much your hygiene dept should be producing? How much to pay an associate? Are you ready to hire an associate? What kind of bonus plans have you seen? How you compare to their other clients? To the industry? What could you expect in revenue increase if you added another operation? What could you expect if you wanted to bring an endodontist into your office a day a week? What would they expect to earn? These are the issues that a Dental CPA can help you with IF you need the help, if you don’t that’s fine.

and please tell me why I need practice management/practice analysis….I am open minded and if I think something can really help me I will look into it…

Maybe you don’t “need” one, if you know that you’re doing everything properly and have no room improvement anywhere then you’re in a better spot then most people including me.