Building my own accounting solution

In 2022, I started working as an independent developer. But rather than conventionally handling my bookkeeping through an accounting firm or using established software solutions, I created a bespoke solution.

Why did I go down this path? Shouldn’t I know better than to reinvent the wheel? What is this “independent” thing all about, and why does it mean I need to bookkeep?

Going independent

Employed vs. independent

In Sweden, it’s not uncommon for senior developers to go independent to earn more. While “egenkonsult” – which translates literally to “own/self consultant” – is the term, most of us, including myself, are contractors. We augment existing staff. The main difference is that we run a company to bill our “employer,” and pay our salary through that same company.

How exactly does this setup make one earn more? The short answer is that it’s hard to let people go in Sweden – that “employer” pays a premium for flexibility. It’s an Americanization of the Swedish system, where you become at-will employed of your own volition.

Because you’re independent, there’s little to no overhead. Additionally, you pay a portion of your salary through dividends, taxed lower than pure income.

Besides having no job security, another trade-off is that you must handle everything that comes with running a company. You need to record revenues and expenses. Hold onto receipts. Submit reports to government agencies. There’s a lot to learn and many things to keep track of.

Not going for an accounting firm

Typically, you’d call up a firm for help. They ask you questions, provide you with instructions, and take care of all mundane tasks. If you’re an independent developer, the cost of using one is insignificant.

In my case, I started my company in 2020, two years before I started looking for work. In other words, there was a long stretch where little administrative work was needed. Instead, I paid for a software solution tailored to small business owners.

All this meant my learning curve wasn’t as steep. Once my business took off in 2022, I felt like continuing with the software solution I used was manageable.

Timeline of events

Issues with off-the-shelf solutions

So why build my own? The solution I used worked, but it wasn’t great. You had to do repetitive things. It handled certain receipts laughably bad, and I ran into edge cases. The interface was also cluttered, in large part because I only needed 10% of their features.

One lackluster solution doesn’t mean all of them are as bad. However, if one of the better ones tailored to companies like mine were this lacking, it certainly wasn’t a good sign. To be fair, I think the truth is that I set the bar higher by being a software developer – any manual steps that seem unnecessary grind my gears.

I’ve also found that accounting solutions cannot solve a particular user experience: obtaining and organizing invoices and receipts before they even get uploaded into the solution. It’s simply not scalable from an engineering perspective.

If I make my own solution, I can reduce all the repetition. My previous edge cases will become use cases, and anything non-scalable becomes scalable if I’m the sole user. And while I recognize accounting solutions are far from trivial, those 10% of features feel within reach, especially if I take shortcuts.

I also have a confession to make. I’ve built software professionally for a decade, but I’ve never been an actual user of the things I’ve created over the years. This time it’ll finally be different.

Building an online portfolio

Remember that zero job security thing I mentioned?

I’m technically an employer now, and I sympathize with them. It’s hard to find, let alone discern, good developers. We overstate our accomplishments and embellish our qualities. Self-awareness isn’t really in abundance, and there’s the Dunning-Kruger effect.

I’ve learned over the years to “show, not tell.” That’s also one of my ambitions with this project. If you follow along, you can judge how I learn, approach problems, communicate, code, and reason about software. Whatever qualities I claim I have will hopefully come across.