Updated August 2026
Do it yourself, hire a firm, buy software, outsource it cheap, or have it done.
The honest comparison for a $1M to $10M business on QuickBooks Online. Every cell below is true, including the ones where Luca is not the answer.
Who closes the month
- Yourself, on QuickBooks
- You, or your office manager, at night
- Traditional firm
- The firm's staff, partner reviewed, usually by the 15th to the 20th
- AI software
- AI drafts it, you review and approve every week
- Outsourced
- A pooled offshore team entering transactions; you rarely know who
- Luca
- An accountant. It arrives closed
Where your books live
- Yourself, on QuickBooks
- Your QuickBooks
- Traditional firm
- Your QuickBooks, or the system the firm prefers
- AI software
- Their own ledger. You migrate off QuickBooks
- Outsourced
- Usually your QuickBooks, worked in bulk passes
- Luca
- Your QuickBooks. Nothing moves
Who explains a strange number
- Yourself, on QuickBooks
- You, to yourself
- Traditional firm
- Your account manager, on the next scheduled call
- AI software
- You, to your board
- Outsourced
- Nobody. Watching the numbers is not in the scope
- Luca
- Your accountant, in writing, before you ask
The monthly report
- Yourself, on QuickBooks
- A P&L export
- Traditional firm
- Statements by email, commentary if you ask for it
- AI software
- Real-time dashboards, no commentary
- Outsourced
- Standard statements by email, no commentary
- Luca
- Written commentary plus the statements, branded, by the 5th
Cash visibility
- Yourself, on QuickBooks
- The bank balance
- Traditional firm
- The monthly statements, weeks after the fact
- AI software
- Live burn and runway metrics
- Outsourced
- The bank balance, same as before
- Luca
- Live founder metrics in your portal, plus a weekly 8 week forecast
A bank or investor asks for numbers
- Yourself, on QuickBooks
- A weekend of spreadsheet work
- Traditional firm
- Prepared on request, billed by the hour
- AI software
- You assemble it from the dashboards
- Outsourced
- You assemble it yourself; packages are not the product
- Luca
- A board or lender package, prepared for you, under your logo
Questions
- Yourself, on QuickBooks
- Google and hope
- Traditional firm
- Email to the office; answers in days, sometimes billed in six minute increments
- AI software
- A chatbot about the software
- Outsourced
- A ticket queue, answered by whoever is on shift
- Luca
- A person who knows your books, answering in writing the same day
Your tax preparer in January
- Yourself, on QuickBooks
- Gets a shoebox
- Traditional firm
- Often the same firm: filing under one roof is their real strength
- AI software
- Gets an export from a ledger they may not know
- Outsourced
- Gets categorized transactions; their questions start there
- Luca
- Gets a year-end tax package: full-year statements, 1099s with W-9 status, and notes. The back and forth with them is included
Price
- Yourself, on QuickBooks
- Your evenings
- Traditional firm
- $500 to $2,000+ a month for bookkeeping, hourly for everything else
- AI software
- $30 to $360 a month, plus your review time, plus the accountant you still hire
- Outsourced
- $300 to $500 a month, the honest price of data entry done elsewhere
- Luca
- $1,200 to $5,000 a month, flat, published, all of it included
| Yourself, on QuickBooks | Traditional accounting firm | AI bookkeeping software | Outsourced bookkeeping | Luca | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Who closes the month | You, or your office manager, at night | The firm's staff, partner reviewed, usually by the 15th to the 20th | AI drafts it, you review and approve every week | A pooled offshore team entering transactions; you rarely know who | An accountant. It arrives closed |
| Where your books live | Your QuickBooks | Your QuickBooks, or the system the firm prefers | Their own ledger. You migrate off QuickBooks | Usually your QuickBooks, worked in bulk passes | Your QuickBooks. Nothing moves |
| Who explains a strange number | You, to yourself | Your account manager, on the next scheduled call | You, to your board | Nobody. Watching the numbers is not in the scope | Your accountant, in writing, before you ask |
| The monthly report | A P&L export | Statements by email, commentary if you ask for it | Real-time dashboards, no commentary | Standard statements by email, no commentary | Written commentary plus the statements, branded, by the 5th |
| Cash visibility | The bank balance | The monthly statements, weeks after the fact | Live burn and runway metrics | The bank balance, same as before | Live founder metrics in your portal, plus a weekly 8 week forecast |
| A bank or investor asks for numbers | A weekend of spreadsheet work | Prepared on request, billed by the hour | You assemble it from the dashboards | You assemble it yourself; packages are not the product | A board or lender package, prepared for you, under your logo |
| Questions | Google and hope | Email to the office; answers in days, sometimes billed in six minute increments | A chatbot about the software | A ticket queue, answered by whoever is on shift | A person who knows your books, answering in writing the same day |
| Your tax preparer in January | Gets a shoebox | Often the same firm: filing under one roof is their real strength | Gets an export from a ledger they may not know | Gets categorized transactions; their questions start there | Gets a year-end tax package: full-year statements, 1099s with W-9 status, and notes. The back and forth with them is included |
| Price | Your evenings | $500 to $2,000+ a month for bookkeeping, hourly for everything else | $30 to $360 a month, plus your review time, plus the accountant you still hire | $300 to $500 a month, the honest price of data entry done elsewhere | $1,200 to $5,000 a month, flat, published, all of it included |
Software pricing reflects published AI accounting tiers. Our prices are the same ones published on the pricing section of this site, which is not how this industry usually does it. Every claim on this page was last reread against each vendor's own site in August 2026.
When the software route genuinely wins
Pre-revenue, or under roughly $500k a year, with a founder who likes doing their own review: AI-native accounting software is cheap, fast, and impressive. At that size the books are simple enough that drafts plus your own eyes can be enough.
When doing it yourself genuinely wins
A very small operation with a handful of transactions a month. QuickBooks alone, categorized on Sunday, is honest work. The cost is only your time, and at that volume the time is small.
When the traditional firm genuinely wins
You want bookkeeping, tax filing and maybe an audit under one roof, you like scheduled calls, and hourly billing for the extras does not bother you. Integrated tax is their real strength; Luca hands your preparer clean books instead of replacing them.
When cheap outsourced bookkeeping genuinely wins
Transactions entered, bank feeds categorized, statements out the door for a few hundred dollars: if that is truly all you need, those services deliver it and the price is real. What the price does not include is anyone reading the numbers: no forecast, no commentary, nobody planning your cash. You are buying keystrokes, not judgment.
When Luca wins
From about $1M a year the books stop being a chore and start being decisions: accruals, margins by line, cash that has to be planned, a board or a bank that asks questions. What you need is not a faster draft. It is a closed month, an explanation in plain English, and one person responsible for both.
Not sure which one you are? The diagnostic answers with data.
Connect read-only QuickBooks and get your books graded 0 to 100, with an ordered cleanup plan you can take anywhere, including to the software.