Bookkeeping and Payroll for Ontario Trucking, Warehouse and Logistics Companies

What Ontario trucking and logistics books need to track

A trucking or logistics company in Ontario has more moving parts than most businesses. Each truck is its own cost center. It burns fuel. It pays tolls. It needs repairs and maintenance. Each load it carries has a price you charged and a set of costs it took to move it. Your warehouse has its own costs too, from the lease to the equipment to the people who move the freight on and off the trucks.

Logistics company bookkeeping only works when you track all of that by truck, by load and by location. When you do, you can see which trucks earn their keep and which routes pay the best. When you do not, you get one big pile of fuel and one big pile of repairs, and no way to tell where the money went.

The lines that cause the most trouble are fuel, tolls, maintenance and driver pay. Fuel and tolls move fast and land in lumps. Maintenance comes in waves. Driver pay is the biggest people cost most of these companies carry, and it has to tie to the books the right way every run. We handle all of these the same way every month so your numbers stay clean.

You can read more about how we handle the trucking side in our post on reconciling fuel cards and factoring payments.

How fuel and tolls show up in your books

Fuel is the cost that moves the fastest. A fuel card sends one big bill every week or every month, and that bill covers every fuel stop every truck made. The charge lands in your bank as one lump, or it sits on a card balance you pay off. Tolls work the same way. A toll pass racks up charges by the mile, and the bill comes in one batch.

The problem is that one lump is five trucks worth of fuel and a hundred miles of tolls. If you book it all as one cost, you lose the picture of which truck used what. You also can not tell if one truck is burning more than it should. A truck that burns too much might need a repair. A truck that burns less is saving you money. You can not see either one when the fuel sits in one bucket.

Here is what a clean fuel and toll entry looks like.

When you split the fuel and the tolls by truck, you can see what each truck cost to run. That number feeds right into your profit per load.

How maintenance and repairs get booked

Trucks break down. They need oil changes, tire replacements and bigger repairs at times. Some of these are small and happen on a schedule. Some are large and happen when you least expect them. Either way, each repair has a truck it belongs to.

The clean way to book maintenance is by truck. When the shop sends a bill, it has the truck number or the unit number on it. You match the bill to the truck, the same way you match the fuel. When the month is done, each truck has its own repair total.

The tricky part is telling a repair from a big purchase. A new set of tires is a repair. A whole new truck is not. One keeps the truck running. The other adds a new asset to your books. We help you draw that line so your books stay right.

Here is how to keep it straight.

• **Routine maintenance by truck: ** oil changes and tires, booked to the truck they serve.
• - **Larger repairs by truck: ** a transmission or an engine fix, booked to the truck.
• - **New trucks and trailers separate: ** a purchase that adds a vehicle goes on its own line.
• - **Shop supplies separate: ** small parts and fluids that serve more than one truck.

How driver pay connects to the books

Driver pay is the people cost that trucking and logistics companies carry the most. It is also the cost that gets booked wrong the most. A driver runs a load. The load pays the driver. The driver cost has to land in the books in the right line, tied to the right run.

Trucking payroll Ontario runs work best when the payroll and the books talk to each other. When the same team runs the payroll and keeps the books, the driver pay lands in a wages line, the employer taxes land in a tax line, and each piece lands where it belongs. When two different services do the two jobs and never talk, the driver pay sits in a general line or does not show up at all.

We do not describe the details of how your payroll runs, because every company has its own pay setup. What we do is make sure the payroll numbers land in your books the right way each run, so the people cost shows up where it should.

Here is what a clean driver pay entry looks like.

Warehouse and logistics costs in your books

A logistics company is more than trucks. You have a warehouse or a yard where the freight comes in and goes out. That space has costs too. The lease is one. The equipment is another. The people who move the freight are a third.

Logistics company bookkeeping needs to track the warehouse costs the same way it tracks the truck costs. The lease goes to a rent line. The forklifts and pallet jacks go to an equipment line or a repairs line, depending on whether you bought or fixed them. The warehouse crew goes to a wages line, the same way the driver wages do.

When the truck costs and the warehouse costs are in the same books, you can see what the whole move really cost. A load that looked profitable on the road might look different when you add the warehouse cost that touched it. That is the picture your books should give you.

Here is what to track.

• **Warehouse lease: ** the rent for the space, on its own line.
• - **Warehouse equipment: ** forklifts, pallet jacks and the like, bought or repaired.
• - **Warehouse crew wages: ** the people who move the freight in and out.
• - **Utilities: ** power and other costs for the space.

How bookkeeping and payroll tie together

The reason we keep bookkeeping and payroll Ontario CA work together is simple. Your people cost is one of the biggest costs you carry. When it sits in the books the wrong way, your reports are wrong. When it sits in the books the right way, your reports tell the truth.

Trucking payroll Ontario and the books should never be two separate piles of paper. The payroll run creates the numbers. The books record them. When the two connect, the driver cost and the warehouse crew cost land in the right lines the first time. When they do not, the cost hides or shows up in the wrong month.

We keep them connected on purpose. The wages go to a wages line. The employer taxes go to a tax line. The benefits go to a benefits line. The net pay ties to the bank. Each piece lands where it belongs, and the reports you get back show the real cost of your people and your trucks.

Ontario business basics

Ontario has its own rules for business licenses. The city licenses each business location separately. If your business is based outside of Ontario but you do work inside Ontario, you may need an Ontario license too. Renewal dates can differ by license, so a license you renewed in January might come due again at a different time than one you renewed in March.

Rules change, so before you rely on any one detail, check the City of Ontario page.

We do not give legal advice, and we do not prepare income tax returns. For the legal side of a license or a permit, talk to the city or your attorney. For tax, talk to your CPA. We keep the books and run the payroll, so the people who do the rest start with clean numbers.

You can read more about how we work with local businesses on our Ontario area page, and more about each side of the work on our bookkeeping and payroll pages. If you want to talk, call us at 909-324-8880.

A situation we clean up

The fuel that never split by truck

An Ontario logistics company runs five trucks. The owner pays the fuel card bill every month, but the whole bill lands in one fuel line. The toll pass bill does the same. The books show a big fuel number and a big toll number, but no way to tell which truck burned what.

The owner can not tell which trucks are earning their keep and which ones cost too much to run. One truck is burning more fuel than the rest, but the books do not show it because all the fuel sits in one bucket.

Here is how we handle it. We pull the fuel card statements for the month. We split each charge by truck, using the truck number on the statement. We pull the toll pass statements and split those the same way. We move the fuel and the tolls out of the one bucket and into a line for each truck. When we are done, the owner can see what each truck cost to run, and the one that burns too much shows up right away. We set up a rule so the next month splits the same way from the start.

Mistakes we fix

• Fuel and tolls booked to one line with no split by truck
• Maintenance booked to a general repairs line with no truck tag
• Driver pay that never landed in the books or sat in a general line
• Payroll and books kept by two people who never talk
• Warehouse costs mixed in with truck costs with no way to tell them apart
• A month that looked too profitable because the people cost was missing
• Toll pass fees booked as fuel with no way to pull them out

Common questions

Do you handle bookkeeping and payroll together for Ontario trucking and logistics companies? Yes. We keep your bookkeeping and payroll Ontario CA records tied together, so the truck costs, the warehouse costs and the driver pay all land in the right lines in the same books.

How do you split fuel and tolls by truck? We use the truck number on the fuel card and toll pass statements to tie each charge to the truck that burned it or ran it, so each truck has its own fuel and toll total each month.

Do you know the Ontario business license rules? We keep an eye on the local rules, but rules change. Ontario licenses each location separately, and out of city businesses may need an Ontario license too. For the legal side, check the city page or talk to your attorney. We do not give legal advice.

Do you prepare taxes? We do not prepare taxes. We keep your books and payroll records clean, and we answer your CPA's questions about them.