Word.ws English Dictionary

off-the-books

off-the-books is the alternative form of off the books.

Meaning of off the books

Prepositional phrase

  1. (colloquial) With regard to income, undeclared for taxes and social insurance purposes, etc.
    • His company was fined for paying staff off the books.
    Antonyms:
    on the books

Questions about off-the-books

What is off-the-books the alternative form of?
Off-the-books is the alternative form of off the books.

Words near off-the-books in the dictionary

  1. off-staging
  2. off-street
  3. off-target
  4. off-the-air
  5. off-the-ball
  6. off-the-books
  7. off-the-charts
  8. off-the-cuff
  9. off-the-grid
  10. off-the-gridder
  11. off-the-gridders

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: off-the-books (page history and authors); off the books (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “off-the-books.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/off-the-books. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.