Hi! I'm Sona Wegner, the owner of Percentology. It's so lovely to meet you! I'm always fascinated by what has led people to their career paths. It's incredible how something in their lives sparks their interest in a field or subject, changing their lives forever.
So, what brought me to the dental accounting industry? Sheer. Dumb. Luck. 🤪
Summary of my credentials:
Four-year accounting degree
Masters in business degree (MBA)
Been in business doing dental bookkeeping for 10+ years
Previously a tax accountant for dental industry in CPA firms for 5 years
(That makes a total of 15+ years experience)
Mother of two beautiful boys
Married to a handsome man who cooks for me. Swoon.
I love, love, love sunshine. 🌞 All day, every day.
Coffee is medicine. ☕
Books and spreadsheets are my happy place, and I own it. 🥰
I recently completed 75 Hard!!! (2024)
Becoming a dental practice bookkeeper:
I was in college full-time, working on my bachelor's degree in accounting while working full-time as a shampoo girl in a hair salon to support myself since I was living on my own. I knew I needed an internship before graduating because accounting firms don't hire graduates without experience. Interesting. I thought that was what college was for. 🤷♀️
So, I started applying to internship programs with a wide range of large CPA firms, hoping they were paid so I could continue supporting myself. Unfortunately, that's not exactly how it worked then, and I couldn't make an accounting internship fit with my paid full-time shampoo girl schedule.
Feeling pretty disappointed but not ready to give up, I started searching Craigslist (back when it was popular) for smaller firms looking to hire entry-level accountants. I thought maybe I could convince them to give me a chance to learn from them for minimum wage since they would have less formality around hiring policies like the larger firms had.
And then there it was. The sheer dumb luck. I found a full-time, paid job posting from a small CPA firm specializing in dentistry. They were looking for a college intern. I didn't even know specializing in dentistry was a thing then. Wasn't all accounting the same? 😅
Needless to say, I got the job, and from then on, I was hooked. Dental practice accounting is nothing like general business accounting. It's so much better. I haven't left the dental industry since. I hate to age myself, but I understand experience is what brings credibility, so I'll just say... 15 years later.
While I moved up in the ranks over approximately five years working in CPA firms as a tax accountant for dental and medical practices, I recognized my obsession and passion for the details rather than the tax returns. I loved bookkeeping for dental practices and, more specifically, the practice overhead benchmarking that comes from doing it right for a dental practice.
But CPA firms don't make money from bookkeeping services, so I wasn't allowed to do much of it as a tax accountant. I managed a few large practices, but otherwise, my time was put into tax work. My hourly billable rate at the firm was too high for the lower-level work.
However, our clients struggled with the quality of their bookkeeping. Big time. Good bookkeepers for dental practices are few and far between, and dentists trying to do it themselves couldn't use their bookkeeping to see the health of their practice because it was just too messy. I had to spend a lot of time fixing mistakes before I could prepare the tax returns.
So, after five years of dental accounting, I left the CPA firms behind in 2013 and started my company doing only dental practice bookkeeping. Dentists needed better bookkeeping, and bookkeeping for dentists is my happy place. Win-win. 🙌
Since then, the company has multiplied from just lil' old me to a team of full-time accountants (with accounting degrees) who love the details just like me and manage the bookkeeping and overhead benchmarking for over 150 dental practices.
Sona Wegner, MBA, CEO
Download our free Dental Overhead Benchmark Template:
Discover how your practice spending compares against other practices without paying the high cost of a Dental CPA. Just drop your numbers right from your Profit & Loss report into the spreadsheet.
