What exactly does a bookkeeper do? Well, first of all, we do not keep books (as in the ones you read) for other people. While that may seem silly to state, I once had two young women approach me and ask me what a bookkeeper was after they saw the sign on my car. When I explained, they smiled and one said, "Oh, that's not what I thought." Granted, I don't believe English was their first language, but even so, maybe it does need defining.
A bookkeeper basically takes care of all Accounting functions for a company except for the high level functions such as corporate taxes and final financial statements. There are three basic areas of bookkeeping: Accounts Payable (paying bills), Accounts Receivable (invoicing customers), and Payroll (paying employees). A bookkeeper may perform all three or any combination of these functions. For example, some companies have a bookkeeper that processes Accounts Payable and Accounts Receivables, and an outside company processes the Payroll.
