by Blair Butters | Jun 27, 2017 | Uncategorized
If you own or lead a business and you are planning to host a party or picnic for your employees this summer, you are probably simply hoping it will be a fun way to bring your staff together. But, you may also be able to take a large or full tax deduction for the expenses related to the gathering. Deductible Expenses Typically, your business is limited to deducting 50% of allowable meal and entertainment expenses. But some expenses, like those associated with your summer party or picnic, are 100% deductible. This includes meals, recreation, social activities, and entertainment at the summer or holiday party or picnic you are holding for your employees. But, to qualify for the 100% deduction, your entire staff has to be invited. They don’t have to attend, but all of your employees must be given the opportunity to come to the party or picnic. Here are a few other examples of expenses that may be fully written off: Food, water, and coffee provided at your business for employees Meals provided at your business to more than half of your employees as part of working extra hours, weekends, or holidays Food or beverages provided to the public for promotional purposes Tracking Expenses Ready to move forward with your summer party or picnic? There are a number of IRS requirements, including certain records you’ll need to keep to prove your expenses are 100% deductible. You must be able to prove: Amount of expense Time, date, and place of expense Purpose for expense Who benefited from expense (employees, public) You will find your company can reduce its tax...
by Blair Butters | May 4, 2017 | Uncategorized
Do you struggle to try and save money? If you are a business owner, pursuing financial goals should be a priority, but it can be difficult to stay on track. The good news? You don’t need to have a substantial income to get your savings underway. Here are 5 simple tips to support your journey as you work to grow your savings, and boost your dreams Determine your goals: Goal setting is an essential habit if you want to win in the saving money game. Writing down your financial goals and keeping the list somewhere you can see it, such as on your refrigerator, will get you to stick with it, versus not having any goals at all. Make sure your goals are S.M.A.R.T.: specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and time oriented. Figure out how long it might take you to save for each goal with a tool like Bank of America’s savings goal calculator. Create small steps for each goal to make achieving it less scary and more manageable. And celebrate when you reach each milestone…you deserve it! Make a budget …And stick to it! You need to establish where you are — before you determine where you are headed. It’s not as scary or difficult as it may seem. And when you get control over what you are spending vs. saving, it will add freedom to your life and help you make the best choices to benefit your long-term goals. Saving money is not about depriving yourself, but rather empowering your efforts. Cut excess spending Do you carefully track your expenses? Each and every one, from your daily...
by Blair Butters | Jan 27, 2017 | Uncategorized
Owners of small businesses have many hats to wear. You may be salesman, operations manager, credit and collections manager and financial officer all in one business day or even hour. Some small business owners are happy with this as they have control over all aspects of their business and want privacy in their business affairs. However, if your small business has a good product or service, inevitably word gets around and the volume of your business increases. When this happens you may become overwhelmed with certain aspects of the work involved and may wish to delegate some of the duties to a third party. One of those duties is the accounting role, which is often paperwork and compliance-heavy and tends to be very detail oriented. However, hiring a full-time employee to do this accounting work may be prohibitively expensive for a small business. The alternative is to delegate some of the duties to an independent accountant. So when might be good times to work with an accountant? There are a number of situations where it would be appropriate to work with an accountant, but here are several: Starting a business When starting a business, there are a number of variables with regard to the legal structure of your organization. An accountant will be able to explain the difference in the taxation and requirements of the different types of legal structures such as sole proprietorship, partnership, limited liability company, corporation, and subchapter S corporation and will be able to assist you in determining which structure is most suitable for your business. The accountant will also be able to tell you...
by Blair Butters | Jan 27, 2017 | Uncategorized
Every year tax accountants mail, or e-mail, tax organizers to previous year clients usually containing a listing of questions to be answered, some basic personal information and a series of pages for the client to provide current year information for wages, investment income, itemized deductions and various other activities, deductions and credits that were applicable in the prior year. It all looks so long, so boring, and for many people the tax organizer is not understandable. I get it – it’s not interesting to the average person. Some clients complete the organizer and provide all of the information requested. For those of you that are in this category, you can skip the remainder of this article. For those still reading, here are three good reasons to complete the organizer that you may or may not be aware: -It may save you time as your accountant will be less likely to contact you to request additional information. The organizer helps you make sure that you do not forget to provide relevant current year information to the tax preparer. Many tax organizers not only ask for information for the current year, but also provide your prior year information which will remind you to provide similar information this year if it applies. If the prior year item does not apply it also gives you the opportunity to indicate that it does not apply this year. Answering the list of questions will provide your tax preparer with information to complete certain portions of your tax return without additional questions. This is especially important now with questions regarding health care coverage, identity theft and...
by Blair Butters | Jan 13, 2017 | Uncategorized
Whether you are starting out a new business or have been in business for many years, you may decide it is time to hire an outside accountant. You may wish to offload mundane tasks or to focus your energy on growing your business or you would rather spend more time with your family. The reasons are many and varied. However, as with working with any trusted advisor, being able to effectively communicate with your new accountant is most important. So now that you have made the decision to hire an outside accountant, how do you pick the right outside Madison, WI accountant? There are a number of factors that go into the decision as there are accounting firms of all sizes from a sole practitioner to multinational CPA firms, each serving different sizes of business and perhaps a specific business clientele. So what factors should go into your choice of the right accountant for your business? Size of firm – This depends on the size or ambitions of your company. If you are a small company and the firm you choose is too large, you may be overlooked because you are a small client. However, if you are a larger company, a smaller firm may not have the skills or personnel to meet your requirements. Services offered – Does the firm offer all of the services that you are looking for? Larger firms tend to offer a wider variety of services such as data entry/bookkeeping, payroll processing and compliance, sales tax reporting, financial statement preparation/compilation, financial statement audit/review, governmental compliance auditing and tax preparation just to name a few....
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