Free Simple Business Books Workbook
You're checking the bank account, saving receipts, and maybe keeping a running spreadsheet.
Sales came in. Bills got paid. A credit card got used. You made a loan payment. Maybe you put money into the business or took some out.
At the end of the month, the cash balance changed — but that alone does not tell you what was a sale, an expense, a loan, an asset purchase, a credit-card payment, or owner money.
A clean-looking spreadsheet is not the same as complete or accurate books.
The Simple Business Books Workbook gives a very small business one structured place to enter opening balances and log up to 50 transactions using 20 fixed transaction types. From those entries, it builds a simplified monthly income statement, year-to-date summary, balance sheet, cash summary, and a set of warnings to review before you rely on the numbers.
Free Excel workbook. No account required. Anything you download is yours to keep.
Created by Josh Keller, CFO and business owner.
You entered the month's activity and the workbook produced the reports. At first glance, they look finished. Then the balance check tells you something is still wrong.
That is what this check is there for.
The workbook does not force the balance sheet to work by plugging a number into owner equity.
It shows the balance check as-is so an unresolved problem stays visible.
If the check is not zero — or another warning still says Review — there is something to resolve before you rely on the reports.
Fictional illustrative example.
When this helps
You have the information, but it is scattered across places and the spreadsheet logic changes depending on what happened that month.
Use one consistent transaction structure instead of rebuilding the process every time.
A loan principal payment is different from loan interest. A credit-card purchase is different from paying the credit-card bill. An owner draw is different from an operating expense.
Use the fixed transaction types to keep those differences visible.
A transaction list alone does not show profit, financial position, and cash movement as separate things.
Use the same entries to review all three instead of treating them as if they mean the same thing.
It is easier to ask for help when you can point to the opening balance, transaction, warning, or report that does not look right.
Use the workbook to identify what is entered, what still looks wrong, and what needs another set of eyes.
What you get
Start by entering the business name, reporting year, report-through month, opening-balance date, and up to 15 opening accounts.
Then record up to 50 transactions on one Transactions sheet.
Instead of designing your own accounting logic, choose from 20 fixed transaction types covering common activity such as:
What it does — and doesn't do
A simple management workbook is useful because it stays simple. This workbook is designed for a very small business with a manageable number of transactions that is still keeping its books manually. It gives the owner a consistent way to record common cash-basis activity and produce a simplified management view without having to build the spreadsheet formulas from scratch. It does not connect to your bank, import or automatically categorize transactions, reconcile bank accounts, run payroll, calculate depreciation schedules, calculate sales or payroll taxes, prepare tax returns, maintain a full double-entry general ledger, or replace professional bookkeeping. If you already use proper accounting software, keep that system as the source for your books. The Simple Business Books Workbook is not meant to recreate books you already maintain somewhere else.
Before you put information in the file
Enter account names, categories, dates, amounts, counterparties, references, and short notes.
Do not enter bank-account numbers, card numbers, Social Security numbers, employer identification numbers, passwords, credentials, or other sensitive identifiers.
The workbook should help organize the financial activity without becoming another place where sensitive financial information has to be protected.
See what's inside
The file has eight sheets.
Keep the month's activity in one consistent list.
Enter the date, what happened, the transaction type, category, account, amount, counterparty or source, reference, and any short note you need later.
Enter amounts as positive numbers. The transaction type tells the workbook how the entry should affect the reports.
Set the reporting period and enter the opening balances for the accounts you are bringing into the workbook. The workbook calculates opening owner equity from those assets and liabilities and shows an opening balance check.
Review sales, direct costs, gross profit and margin, overhead, business taxes or licences, loan interest, and net profit across the year.
Review profit together with owner contributions and draws, asset purchases, borrowing, principal payments, ending cash, and uncategorized activity.
Review cash and other assets against credit cards, loans, other liabilities, and owner equity. If the balance check is not zero, the workbook leaves the problem visible.
Review opening cash, money received, money paid, net cash movement, and ending cash month by month.
The workbook checks for several common setup and transaction problems, uncategorized activity, unusual liability balances, and a nonzero balance-sheet check.
Know what the fixed transaction types do, what should and should not go into the file, when a warning needs attention, and when it is time to ask a bookkeeper or accountant for help.
All names, amounts, dates, businesses, and scenarios shown in the previews are illustrative.
Start with the opening balances, then keep one transaction list
The goal is not to create accounting software in Excel. It is to give a very small business a disciplined starting point for simple books — and make it easier to see when something still needs attention.
Set up the reporting period and opening balances.
Enter the basic reporting information and the accounts the business already has.
Record each transaction once.
Choose the transaction type that best describes what happened and enter the amount as a positive number.
Review the statements.
Look at the income statement, year-to-date summary, balance sheet, and cash summary together.
Finish with Review Warnings.
Resolve incomplete, uncategorized, negative, or inconsistent entries before relying on the reports.
Workbook details
Related Business Guides
The workbook helps organize the numbers. These guides help you use them in a business review.
See how financial performance, financial position, cash, obligations, and other business measures fit together instead of reviewing one report in isolation.
Understand revenue, direct costs, gross profit, overhead, and operating results — and what changes deserve attention.
Understand what the business has, what it owes, and what its financial position looks like at a specific point in time.
Understand why profit and available cash can move differently and what can create cash pressure even when sales are healthy.
No. It is a simplified manual ledger for a very small business with a manageable transaction volume. It is not full accounting software and does not replace professional bookkeeping or accounting review.
No. It only means those particular automated checks did not identify one of the problems they are designed to flag. It does not mean the books are complete, reconciled, professionally approved, tax-correct, generally accepted accounting principles compliant, or audit ready.
The workbook has 50 transaction rows. If the business regularly needs more than that, a manual workbook may no longer be the right primary bookkeeping system.
No. There are no bank feeds, transaction imports, automatic categorization, or bank-reconciliation features. You enter the transactions yourself.
No. The 20 fixed types are part of how the workbook knows what each entry should affect. You can use Detail category and Notes when you need more description.
Use Uncategorized cash in or Uncategorized cash out temporarily if nothing else fits. Then resolve that entry before relying on the reports. Review Warnings keeps count of uncategorized rows.
No. It does not calculate tax-return figures, depreciation schedules, sales tax, payroll tax, or other tax filings. Confirm tax treatment with your accountant or tax professional.
Keep using it as the source for the books. If you already have proper financial statements, the Monthly Financial Review Workbook is the better Owner Advisor tool for reviewing those reports rather than rebuilding them in another spreadsheet.
Simplified management-use financial statements only; not double-entry bookkeeping, payroll, or tax software, and not a substitute for a bookkeeper or accountant.
Know what money came in.
Know what money went out.
Know whether a transaction affected your profit, your cash, or something else entirely.
Know which entries still need attention before you rely on the reports.
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