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The simpleWhirks Blog

Run a tighter small business.

Practical guides for small businesses and home service firms. Written by Garrett Truman, CPA and Travis Sutphin.

Proposals · Winning Jobs

Quote vs Estimate vs Proposal: What to Send a Customer

A quote is a fixed price, an estimate is a guess, a proposal is the scope plus the price. Here's which to send, and how a signed one becomes an invoice.

Travis Sutphin · · 8 min read
Three documents fanned on a work table — a short slip, a ruled page and a blue proposal card with a check mark — beside a pencil and tape measure, representing the difference between a quote, an estimate and a proposal
A kitchen table with a stack of blank forms under a navy coffee mug, an emerald paperclip, a desk calendar and a folded ledger — representing getting 1099 paperwork in order before the January deadline
Books · Tax & Year-End

1099 Filing for Small Business: A CPA's 2026 Guide

Who gets a 1099 in 2026, the new $2,000 threshold, NEC vs MISC, the Feb 1, 2027 deadline, and a step-by-step filing walkthrough from a Florida CPA.

Garrett Truman ·
A clipboard with a Florida-shaped icon and an emerald sales tax stamp resting on a service-business work surface (pipe wrench, business invoices, calculator), representing Florida sales tax obligations for home service trades
Books · FL Local

Florida Sales Tax for Home Service Businesses (What You Must Collect)

Most Florida home service work isn't taxable, but a handful of trades collect sales tax on labor. A CPA's guide to who owes, who doesn't, and the DR-15.

Garrett Truman ·
A clean, ordered visual flow showing QuickBooks data files exporting into simpleWhirks Books with reconciled opening balances and ten numbered migration steps as glowing emerald markers along the path
Books · Switching from QuickBooks

How to Switch from QuickBooks to simpleWhirks Books in Under an Hour

The complete 10-step migration playbook for moving from QuickBooks Online to simpleWhirks Books, written by a CPA and a CTO. Export, import, reconcile, file.

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A simplified ledger on a clean wooden desk beside a coffee cup and laptop, with a soft emerald-tinted ribbon of categorized line items rising out of the ledger, representing plain-English bookkeeping for a home-based business owner
Books · Bookkeeping Basics

Bookkeeping Basics for Non-Accountants

A plain-English bookkeeping primer for owner-operators. The five terms, three reports, and one daily habit that cover 90% of what you actually need.

Travis Sutphin ·
A cozy stylized home workspace by a window, a simple clean ledger floats above the desk in glowing emerald, while a faded, cluttered QuickBooks-style dashboard recedes into the corner, representing home-based businesses moving past QuickBooks complexity
Books · Home-Based Business

Why Home-Based Businesses Are Outgrowing QuickBooks

QuickBooks Online was built for businesses ten times the size of a home-based operator. Here's how to tell if you've outgrown it, and what you actually need.

Travis Sutphin ·
An open paper ledger beside a coffee cup and a small wall calendar with a date circled in green; ivory background, mid-century editorial illustration.
Books · QuickBooks Alternative

QuickBooks Alternatives for Small Business in 2026

An honest, builder's-eye comparison of the best QuickBooks alternatives for small business in 2026: pricing, fit, what transfers, and what doesn't.

Travis Sutphin ·
Editorial illustration split into two scenes — left, an open cardboard box labeled 'MAY EXPENSES' overflowing with crumpled receipts on a wooden surface; right, a wall calendar with the second week of May circled in emerald and labeled 'TAX PREP WEEK', a clean ledger with pen and a coffee mug below, and the caption 'THE WORK IS DOABLE'.
Books · Tax & Year-End

The Mid-Year Bookkeeping Cleanup Guide

Five-day mid-year cleanup sequence for home-based and small-service businesses behind on the books — get current before Q2 estimated taxes hit June 15.

Garrett Truman ·