Navigating the World of Production Accounting on-set and in corporate set-up: Interview with Amy Chew
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July 5, 2023
Kirsten: We first used Revolution in the spring of 2019. I was hands-on with the payroll and project setup until 2021, when we hired a production accountant. He’s been the hands-on person since then.
But we have anywhere from 3 to 10 projects a year, depending on how busy we are. Because we shoot digital media for Gen Z: network-like shows but for YouTube without the cable subscription. And since it’s shorter form, those productions last about anywhere from two to four weeks, with multiple shows throughout the year.
Kirsten: Because the production windows are very similar to 20-minute sitcoms and, because there’s no distributor, we’re in full control of the creative. That’s really cool - we get to make whatever we want with whatever storylines we want.
Kirsten: I love it. I'm a huge nerd and I love math. So accounting really spoke to me, but when I was looking at jobs like right out of college, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to work in a corporate space. I didn’t know if many industries were right for me, so I took a leap of faith and entered the entertainment industry.
And now I’m the happiest I've ever been, being a finance professional in a creative industry. There are new challenges every day – a talent payment problem that has to be solved, finding a new creative workaround because of what's in the script, etc. Of course, I'm not hating on corporate America – it just wasn’t for me. And I wanted to be at one of those fun, creative companies where something new is happening every day.
Kirsten: That's a good question. I would say probably the items that are needed in a talent green room. It's just never what you expect, like a specific brand and flavor of gum or water, or a specific brand, size, and colour of blanket.
You actually learn a lot about who they are - what creature comforts are. You're very behind the scenes, learning weirdly personal things about like how their brain works.
Kirsten: It’s true that I have to keep track of [where] we're doing production and the tax laws, minimum wage, any employee versus independent contractor legislation that gets passed and when they go into effect. [Often times] I’ll read the actual law because an article about it is just someone’s interpretation of the law. But a lot of times I will find out about these new laws or legislation through an article, and then I have to go do my own research.
Kirsten: When I first started at Brat, I was told by production and the CEO of the company that they just weren't happy with the current payroll provider. They asked me to go out and interview all the payroll companies and find the one I liked best that I thought would work best for Brat.
I had a lot of meetings and a lot of demos, and I really liked that Revolution gives you a dedicated payroll person. You don’t get assigned an email address that goes to a team of people, and you never really know who you're talking to each time - I liked like the small business, personal touch aspect of Revolution.
I also really enjoyed that they have a budget cost-tracking software ProBooks. We had already been using our own internal budgeting stuff, but I liked that we were able to import [our previous budget into ProBooks] when [we started using Revolution for payroll]. The payroll journals were automatically added in. I just had to check them and match it accordingly. And suddenly, I had a really current, up-to-date cost report.
That was really intriguing because a lot of the other payroll companies [often have] a delay or inconsistency in when things were getting posted. Sometimes things would be posted to the wrong project - that was one of the pain points I was looking to resolve.
Kirsten: I would say, like other companies, they try to make it the norm, but because of high turnover, it isn't the norm, and so you get the sense that you're just being passed from person to person. And that's not to say that there hasn't been turnover at Revolution, but it has been a lot fewer.
Even when they go out of town or they're sick, they say “Hi, this is the person that will be covering for me.” They don’t surprise you with an out-of-office email directing you to someone else.
There was a period where we weren't super satisfied with [payroll person] assigned [to our company]. I was able to reach out to some of the higher-ups at Revolution and say this isn't really working for us, but we love you as a company. Is there any way that you can get us a different payroll person? It was mostly like a time zone thing – east versus west coast - and we wanted someone on the West Coast so that our days matched up better. And they were so accommodating. They said sure, we’ll find someone on the west coast. Here they are, let us introduce you.
Big fan.
Kirsten: Occasionally I do. I do get to interact with them on more of an HR level or about taxes. I still interact with them when we're doing 1099s, 1095s, and W2s. It's not that I don't interact with them - it's just evolved.
Also, because of my history with Revolution, I trust their work, so I don't feel like I need to be involved with my employees’ interactions with them.
Kirsten: I say absolutely do it, especially if you're going to have more than one project in the next year, because they make it so easy to set up new projects. You don’t have to pay a fee every time you set up a new project once you're a client. You're only charged based on how you use it. They make it very easy to not only work with them but continue to work with them in new and differing ways.
Emily Winters
Customer Experience Manager
