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System Six vs Bookkeeper360

Side by Side

System Six and Bookkeeper360, attribute by attribute
AttributeSystem SixBookkeeper360
What It IsOutsourced bookkeeping, payroll and part-time CFO work, with a service page written for acquisition entrepreneurs specifically. Its own pitch is the month after close: taking over books kept by the seller, closing them on a schedule, and producing statements a lender and an owner can both read.A full outsourced accounting shop for small businesses: monthly or weekly bookkeeping on QuickBooks Online or Xero, business and personal tax, payroll administration, sales-tax filing, and fractional CFO and forecasting. It covers the whole back office a new owner inherits, from the first clean close to ongoing payroll and tax.
CategoryOperating ResourcesOperating Resources
Pricing ModelCustom PricingSubscription
What It CostsNothing published. Scope is quoted after a call, which is standard for bookkeeping engagements priced on transaction volume and the state of the books being inherited.Bookkeeping from $399/mo (monthly) or $599/mo (weekly), plus onboarding and catch-up from $1,000; business tax from $1,000/yr and business-plus-personal from $1,500/yr; payroll administration from $200/mo; sales-tax filing from $125/mo; fractional CFO from $2,000/mo. Works on QuickBooks Online and Xero. Verified on bookkeeper360.com/pricing.
Best ForA new owner who inherited the seller's bookkeeping and a lender who wants monthly statementsAn owner who wants bookkeeping, payroll, and tax handled by one team on QuickBooks or Xero
Where It FitsOperate & Grow the BusinessOperate & Grow the Business
Our VerdictThe clearest fit in this category for a buyer inheriting a seller's books, and the one question to ask on the call is what a month costs once the cleanup is done.The most complete single-vendor back office here: books, payroll, and tax on the platform you already run.
Pros
  • The acquisition-entrepreneur page states a client count, a transformation window and a retention figure, which is more than most firms in this category publish
  • Its chief executive bought the firm himself through a self-funded search, so the failure it describes is one it has been through
  • Bookkeeping, payroll and CFO advisory come from one firm, which matters when the question is whether the numbers a lender sees are the numbers the owner runs on
  • Bookkeeping, payroll, tax, and CFO advisory from a single vendor, so the whole back office is one relationship
  • Supports both QuickBooks Online and Xero rather than forcing a platform switch post-close
  • Published, itemized pricing for each service line
Cons
  • No published pricing, so the engagement cannot be sized before a call
  • The figures on its own page are the firm's own, unaudited and undated
  • It is a sponsor of the main acquisition podcast, so its name recurs there as advertising rather than as a buyer's account of using it
  • Costs stack quickly once bookkeeping, payroll, tax, and advisory are added together
  • Higher-tier pricing signals it targets established businesses, not the smallest or simplest
  • Weekly bookkeeping, the plan it markets hardest, is a real step up in monthly cost

Our take

Choose System Six when the handoff itself is the problem. Its service page is written for the month after close: taking over books kept by the seller, closing them on a schedule, and producing statements a lender and an owner can both read, with bookkeeping, payroll and part-time CFO work coming from one firm. Its chief executive bought the firm through a self-funded search, so the failure it describes is one it has been through. Two things its row records. It publishes no pricing at all, so scope arrives by call. And the client count, transformation window and retention figure on that page are the firm's own, unaudited and undated.

Choose Bookkeeper360 when you would rather see every number before committing to anything: bookkeeping from $399 a month, payroll administration from $200 a month, business tax from $1,000 a year and fractional CFO from $2,000 a month, run on the QuickBooks Online or Xero the business already uses rather than on a platform you have to move to. What you give up is the aim. It is built for small businesses in general rather than for a set of inherited books, and the cost stacks quickly once bookkeeping, payroll, tax and advisory are added together, which is the shape of it that surprises a new owner.