Industries · Electrical Contractors
CPA Services for Electrical Contractors
You measure everything in your trade to the amp, your margins deserve the same precision.
South Florida keeps its electricians busy: condo recertifications, EV charger installs, panel upgrades on aging housing stock, and a commercial pipeline that runs from Doral warehouses to Fort Lauderdale office build-outs. Most electrical contractors here run two businesses at once, service calls billed same-day and contract work billed on draws, and the accounting for each is completely different. When both streams flow into one undifferentiated ledger, nobody can tell what is profitable.
Contract work brings progress billings, retainage, and the risk of underpricing labor on multi-month installs. Service work brings truck-stock inventory that walks away, flat-rate pricing that must be tested against actual tech hours, and warranty callbacks that eat margin invisibly. Copper and fixture prices move between bid and purchase. Meanwhile, licensing and insurance requirements mean your business entity, owner compensation, and qualifier arrangements deserve more thought than most electricians ever get from a tax preparer.
Integris Accounting works with trade contractors every day. We separate your service and contract divisions in QuickBooks, track gross margin per job and per truck, keep retainage from distorting your receivables, and run payroll that survives scrutiny. Year-round tax planning, not a once-a-year filing, means equipment purchases, vehicle decisions, and entity elections happen with the numbers in front of you.
The landscape
30,000+
electricians and electrical contractors working in Florida
30+
municipalities in Miami-Dade County issuing electrical permits
2
revenue streams, service and contract, each needing its own numbers
Core services for electrical contractors
The challenges
What makes electrical contractors accounting hard
Two businesses, one blurry ledger
Service calls and commercial contracts have different pricing, different cash cycles, and different risks. When both are lumped together, a profitable service division can quietly subsidize contract work you should be repricing or walking away from.
Material costs that move under your feet
Wire, panels, and fixtures are quoted weeks before they are bought. Without committed-cost tracking against each estimate, price creep between bid and install erodes margins you never see until the job closes.
Truck inventory nobody reconciles
Tens of thousands of dollars in breakers, wire, and fittings ride around in vans. Unreconciled truck stock inflates your material costs, hides shrinkage, and makes per-job margins unreliable.
Retainage and slow-paying GCs
General contractors hold retainage and stretch payments while your suppliers want net 30. Without a receivables system that ages contract balances separately, cash gaps surprise you mid-project.
Our approach
How we help
Divisional books for service and contracts
We configure QuickBooks classes so service revenue, contract draws, and their respective costs report separately, giving you true margin for each side of the business every single month.
Per-job and per-truck profitability
Labor hours, materials, and permit fees post to individual jobs and trucks, so you can test your flat-rate book against reality and find the techs and job types making you money.
Progress billing and retainage control
Draw schedules, retainage receivable, and unbilled work tracked properly, so contract cash flow is predictable and nothing earned goes unbilled at month-end on your commercial and multifamily jobs.
Equipment and vehicle tax strategy
Vans, lifts, benders, and testing gear are planned purchases, not April surprises, we time Section 179, bonus depreciation, and financing decisions against your actual income picture.
Compliant payroll for licensed trades
Journeymen, helpers, and apprentices on clean W-2 payroll through ADP, with certified payroll support when public work requires it and documentation ready for any audit.
FAQ
Electrical Contractors accounting, common questions
How do I know if my flat-rate pricing is actually profitable?
Compare the billed rate for each task against fully loaded cost, tech wages, burden, truck expense, warranty callbacks, and unapplied time between calls. Most shops have never run that math with clean data. We build job- and truck-level reporting so your price book gets tested against real hours, and you can raise or restructure rates on evidence instead of gut feel.
What is the best entity structure for a licensed electrical contractor?
For most established contractors, an S corporation election layered on an LLC balances self-employment tax savings against reasonable-salary requirements, but licensing and qualifier rules add wrinkles a generic answer misses. We look at your license arrangement, profit level, insurance, and growth plans together, then handle the election and payroll mechanics so the structure actually delivers the savings on paper.
My GC clients pay in 60 to 90 days. How do I manage the cash gap?
First, bill everything you have earned, unbilled work is the most common self-inflicted wound. Then age contract receivables and retainage separately, negotiate deposits or stored-material billings where contracts allow, and build a 13-week cash forecast so you see the squeeze coming. We set up that reporting and review it with you monthly, before the gap becomes a crisis.
Can you clean up books that mix personal, service, and contract activity?
Yes, that is one of our most common starting points. We untangle owner draws from business expense, rebuild your chart of accounts around divisions and jobs, reconcile bank and credit card history, and document opening balances. You end up with books a lender or bonding agent can rely on, and a monthly close that keeps them that way.
Where we serve electrical contractors
Talk to a CPA who knows electrical contractors
Get job-level clarity on every panel, rough-in, and service call, schedule a consultation at (305) 497-0552.