It’s almost Halloween and that means 4th quarter estimates, year-end payroll tax returns and forms, and income tax return due deadlines are all right around the corner for small business owners. Getting ready now for these important deadlines is extremely important. Not only will it save you headaches, but you may also find some additional deductions with things fresh in your mind! Below are some quick tips to help start the process early for your small business:
- Review your expenses. For those with book-keepers already employed, take a review of their input of transactions to ensure accuracy. If you haven’t started looking at your books yet, begin by gathering all of your banking and credit card transactions. Next, begin categorizing expenses by type. In all cases, notate specific transactions that your tax accountant should pay special attention to when preparing your taxes. Usually this would be large transactions or expenses you do not know how to categorize correctly.
- Organize your receipts. Make sure you have all of your supporting documents in order just in case your tax accountant asks for details.
- Reconcile, Reconcile, Reconcile! Ask your book-keeper to provide you cash and credit card account reconciliations to ensure all income and expenses are accounted for in full. If you do not have a book-keeper, take a look at your records vs. your bank and credit card statements to ensure the balances match. If you need additional help on this, please follow this link to a prior article I wrote: https://thequantifygroup.com/reconcile-reconcile-reconcile.
- Gather all important tax documents to date. Such items include payroll tax returns, invoices from large capital purchases, charitable donation support, etc. At a minimum, keep these items in a folder. Better yet, organize them in folders by type of document.
- Review the year. Sometimes taking a few moments to look back at the year will help you think of deductions. Think about any large purchases the business made. How about significant changes to your income or deductions? Did you enter into any different business agreements or combinations during the year? There are so many examples that can help you, but you MUST tell your tax accountant, or they won’t be able to take advantage of them.
If you have any questions or need assistance getting your books or taxes in order, please feel free to contact me directly!
