Am I charging enough?
I am a self employed small business admin assistant and I was hired by a cleaning company to basically run the entire business but when people have found out how much I charge they think I’m short changing myself so I thought I’d ask for some opinions…
For this cleaning company I do the following:
- Accounts receivable & payables
- All bookkeeping tasks
- Filing and paying of all company quarterly taxes & I work with a tax professional gathering what’s needed for yearly taxes
- I do all contracts, price negotiations, vendor account set up and property viewings
- Scheduling of services
- Maintaining all company insurances
- Employee records and new hiring onboarding
- I’m the main point of contact via email and phone
- I create spreadsheets for monthly budgets and monitor all bank accounts to make sure the company is on track
- Any errands needed for the business and owner
- All mail correspondence
- Keep the office stocked and inventory tracking
I work about 4-5 hours per day 5-6 days per week but I’m always on call for whatever the business or owner needs. I currently charge $850.00 per week and I’m in in the state of Arizona and file my own taxes as I’m a 1099 contractor and not an actual employee.
I look forward to your opinions on the matter and thank you in advance!
You are missclassified. It’s not up to the business owner to decide how to classify you. The IRS has a document with a checklist that determines whether an employee should be classified as W2 or 1099, and you do too many things and are too tightly integrated into the business to be 1099.
As to whether you are underpaid, I think you probably are, but it all depends on whether you could get another job for more money. Fair compensation is a question for the market. I would recommend you polish up a resume and apply to sime similar jobs in your area to see if you could get a better offer, then use that to negotiate a higher salary. You also need some boundaries around time off. You should not be taking work call on vacation. I am the owner of my company, and I do not take calls on vacation. Everyone needs time off where they can recharge their batteries.
If you have the desire you could do as others have suggested and start your own company. You could make more than you do as an employee. You could also lose everything, so consider that move carefully. I’ve been self-employed for almost 10 years, and I am the first to say it is not for everyone. If you do, I would consider staying a bookkeeping business, rather than a cleaning business, as it sounds to me like your skillset might be more aligned with that.