Accounting and advisory for Professional Services
Law firms, architecture studios, recruiting shops, and boutique consultancies sell time and expertise — not inventory. Laya streamlines your back office so you can focus on client delivery, with clean books that connect billable work to the cash that actually lands in the bank. Whether you're a solo practitioner or a 30-person partnership, you get timely financials and the visibility to run a profitable practice.
The financial challenges Professional Services face
Billable utilization and realization you can't see
Your firm lives or dies on how much of your team's time is billable and how much of what you bill you actually collect. When that data sits in a separate practice-management or time-tracking tool, it never connects to your financials — so you're flying blind on the metrics that drive the business.
AR and collections that stretch for months
Project and retainer clients pay slowly, and a few large invoices outstanding can quietly drain cash. Without a clean, current accounts-receivable picture and disciplined aging, it's hard to know who to chase, how much is at risk, or whether you can make payroll next month.
Trust, retainer, and partner-draw separation
Many professional firms hold client retainers or advance fees that aren't yet earned, and partners draw against profits rather than take a salary. Commingling those flows or booking draws as expenses distorts your numbers and creates real compliance and partner-equity headaches.
Year-end that turns into a scramble
Pass-through firms — partnerships, S-corps, and PLLCs — face K-1s, partner allocations, and owner returns that all depend on accurate, reconciled books. When the year-end records are messy, tax prep stalls, costs balloon, and partners wait on numbers they need to file.
How Laya helps Professional Services
Books built around your billings and cash
We structure your QuickBooks Online chart of accounts around service revenue, reimbursable costs, and direct labor, then reconcile your billing and payment processors back to the bank every month. The result is a P&L that ties the work you delivered to the revenue you recognized and the cash you actually collected.
Accounts receivable and collections visibility
Every monthly close includes a current AR aging so you can see exactly which client invoices are outstanding and for how long. We keep receivables and revenue accurate as invoices are raised and paid, giving you and your partners a clean, real-time picture of what's owed and what's at risk — the foundation for getting paid faster.
Clean separation of retainers, draws, and equity
We track unearned retainers and advance fees as liabilities until they're earned, and record partner draws and distributions against equity — not as expenses. That keeps your income statement honest, your partner capital accounts straight, and your books defensible at tax time and in any partner-level review.
Year-round readiness, not a year-end fire drill
Because your books are closed by the 10th business day each month and reconciled all year, year-end is a handoff, not a rebuild. Through our licensed CPA partner network we connect your clean records to your firm's pass-through return and partner or owner filings, so K-1s and allocations come together without the usual scramble.
What's included
- Monthly close by the 10th business day
- Full transaction categorization across all accounts
- Accounts receivable aging and AP visibility
- Retainer, draw, and partner-equity tracking
- Billing- and payment-processor reconciliation
- Clean books for end-of-year tax filing
- Strategic advisory sessions (Peak and Vista plans)
Frequently asked questions
Do you connect to my practice-management or time-tracking software?
We work from QuickBooks Online as your financial source of truth and reconcile the billing and payment data that flows from tools like Clio, Harvest, or your invoicing platform. We don't replace your practice-management system, but we make sure the dollars it produces — invoiced, collected, and written off — land correctly in your books.
Can you handle partner draws and distributions correctly?
Yes. We record partner draws and distributions against each partner's equity rather than as business expenses, and we keep unearned retainers booked as liabilities until the work is performed. That keeps your profit-and-loss accurate and your partner capital accounts clean — which matters for both decision-making and your year-end pass-through return.
Can Laya help me see utilization and realization?
We don't run your timekeeping, but we structure your financials so the revenue side of utilization and realization is visible: billings, collections, and write-offs reconciled to cash. Paired with the time data from your practice tool, your monthly financials give you the realized-revenue picture you need to manage profitability per client and per engagement.
What does it cost, and what's included?
Laya is fixed-fee and cloud-first. Base is $500/month for monthly accounting, Summit is $1,000/month and adds tax, and Peak is $1,500/month and adds advisory; Vista is $1,000/month for advisory only. QuickBooks Online is included in every plan, and there's a 10% discount when you pay annually.
How do you handle my firm's taxes?
Tax is delivered through our licensed CPA partner network on the Summit and Peak plans. We prepare your partnership, S-corp, or PLLC return from books we've kept clean all year. Owner individual returns are available as an add-on at $100–$200/month per return, and multi-state sales or services tax filing is $100/month where you have an obligation.
Do I have to use QuickBooks Online, and is everything remote?
Yes on both. Laya runs on QuickBooks Online as the single source of truth, with your bank, billing, and payment accounts connected digitally. We're remote-only and work entirely over email and video, so there's no office visit required — your books close on schedule no matter where your firm is based.
Ready to get your books in order?
Book an intro and we'll show you exactly how Laya works for Professional Services.
Book an Intro