{"id":196962,"date":"2020-03-12T07:43:46","date_gmt":"2020-03-12T14:43:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/?p=196962"},"modified":"2026-04-06T17:16:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T00:16:08","slug":"small-business-tax-accountant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/small-business-tax-accountant\/","title":{"rendered":"What&#8217;s the Cost to Hire a Small Business Tax Accountant?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The average small business tax return for a Schedule C costs $187, according to the <a href=\"https:\/\/higherlogicdownload.s3.amazonaws.com\/NSACCT\/725010a8-142f-4092-8b5d-077c2618c728\/UploadedImages\/IncomeAndFees2019Highlights.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">National Society of Accountants<\/a> (NSA). A personal income tax return costs an additional $294 (or $188 if you take the standard deduction and don&#8217;t itemize).<\/p>\n<p>But what you actually end up paying could be different. For instance, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/hiring-accountant\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">if you hire an accountant<\/a> just for tax season, you&#8217;ll face different fees versus hiring an accountant year-round, so it depends on your depth of need.<\/p>\n<h2>How Much Will an Accountant Cost?<\/h2>\n<p>How much does an accountant cost for a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/small-business-owner-characteristics\/\">small business owner<\/a>? It depends on a variety of factors:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Type of Business<\/strong> \u2013 While a simple Schedule C return for a sole proprietorship or single-member LLC only costs $184, more complicated small business tax returns cost much more: $656 for a partnership, $809 for an S-corp and $826 for a corporation, according to a previous <a href=\"https:\/\/connect.nsacct.org\/blogs\/nsa-blogger\/2017\/01\/27\/national-society-of-accountants-reports-on-average-tax-return-preparation-fees#:~:text=NSA%20member%20tax%20preparers%20typically,Schedule%20A%20and%20state%20return\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">NSA report<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Location<\/strong> \u2013 Accountants in the Pacific, Mountain and East Coast regions are the most expensive and charge significantly more than other parts of the country.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Additional Services<\/strong> \u2013 If you need other services, like managing payroll and preparing W-2s, expect to pay an additional fee; the typical accountant charges $88 per hour for payroll work.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Late\/Disorganized Tax Files<\/strong> \u2013 72% of accountants charge a fee when clients bring in disorganized or incomplete tax files. They could also charge a fee if you miss deadlines to send in your documents, need to expedite submitting your return, or file an extension.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" title=\"Two women organize small business tax files.\" src=\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/secretaryandpurchasingma_771391.jpg\" alt=\"Employees organize the small business tax records.\" \/><\/p>\n<h2>How Can You Manage Accountant Costs?<\/h2>\n<p>Knowing your tax return expenses ahead of time can help you budget accordingly, but there are also other methods for managing costs. Besides putting money aside, one of your best moves is to keep your records in order, which will help you avoid that average $133 penalty for submitting disorganized tax files.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/6-small-business-accounting-tools\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Small business accounting tools<\/a> can help you handle some of the work on your own, like managing payroll, so you can hire an accountant solely for your returns.<\/p>\n<p>Finally, learn to see hiring an accountant as an investment: The money you spend now could come back several times over by helping your business qualify for extra tax breaks and avoid IRS penalties.<\/p>\n<p><em>If you need to bring on an accountant for tax season, you can lean on a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/solutions\/short-term-business-loans\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">short-term business loan<\/a> to cover some of the upfront costs. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The cost of an accountant may depend on your type of small business tax return and other factors. We walk you through the fees so you can budget them in.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":196961,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[88,98,103],"class_list":["post-196962","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-taxes-regulations","tag-accounting-for-small-business","tag-accounting-tools-for-small-business","tag-tax-software-tools"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>What&#039;s the Cost to Hire a Small Business Tax Accountant?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The cost of an accountant may depend on your type of small business tax return and other factors. We walk you through the fees so you can budget them in.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/small-business-tax-accountant\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"What&#039;s the Cost to Hire a Small Business Tax Accountant?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The cost of an accountant may depend on your type of small business tax return and other factors. We walk you through the fees so you can budget them in.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196962\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Bottom Line by National Funding\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/national.funding\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-03-12T14:43:46+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-04-07T00:16:08+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/blog.nationalfunding.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/mancheckingstockandorder_771392-e1584024213605.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1439\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"601\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"David Rodeck\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@NationalFunding\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@NationalFunding\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"David Rodeck\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/small-business-tax-accountant\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/small-business-tax-accountant\/\",\"name\":\"What's the Cost to Hire a Small Business Tax Accountant?\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/small-business-tax-accountant\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/small-business-tax-accountant\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/blog.nationalfunding.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/mancheckingstockandorder_771392-e1584024213605.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-03-12T14:43:46+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-04-07T00:16:08+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.nationalfunding.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/1331f1725b23029b91ec2349e92e6154\"},\"description\":\"The cost of an accountant may depend on your type of small business tax return and other factors. 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