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End-of-Year Tax Moves for Business Owners The end of the year always sneaks up on us.  There’s the holiday rush, closing the books, and planning for next year, so tax planning doesn’t usually make it to the top of the list. But here’s the truth: December 31 is the finish line for many of your best tax-saving opportunities.  Once the calendar flips, so does your chance to make these moves. Here are five smart strategies to consider before year-end: 1. Buy Needed Equipment or T

Let’s face it—payroll isn’t why you started your business. But unless your dream involved IRS penalties and frustrated employees, it’s a corner of your operations that deserves attention.  As a CPA who works with small service-based businesses every day, I’ve seen some common payroll pitfalls that sneak up on otherwise savvy owners. The good news? These mistakes are avoidable—and we’ll show you how.  1. Missing Payroll Tax Deposit Deadlines   If payroll taxes had a motto, it

To clarify – not talking about your personal library here. If your business books are a mess and you want to do better in 2024, it’s important to understand what exactly makes your books (accounting records) “good.” Here are the fundamentals of good bookkeeping. They are practically interdependent, each one supports the others, so you need all of these to have good books: 1. Timeliness . A basic requirement of good bookkeeping is maintaining up-to-date records. Your financ

If you work with contractors/vendors/attorneys/landlords and you typically pay them more than $600 during the year, then you know that you have to send them a 1099 at the end of the year. Trying to chase them down in January to fill out their W-9, in addition to calculating how much you’ve paid them to put on the 1099, is the worst way to spend the start of a New Year. And your accountant is probably especially fond of doing this for you, too (sarcasm). So let’s not do that

You’ve probably seen it by now if you have any type of business and receive electronic payments from your customers–credit cards, Venmo, PayPal, etc. You will also receive one even if you’re not self-employed if you use cash transfer apps like Cash App. The 1099-K is issued by third party payment processors and it reports all of the payments and transactions that were processed through them over the past calendar year. You should receive your copy early in the following year–

It’s a very popular question: how long should a business keep their receipts/records and what constitutes good support? It’s also a touchy subject. What most of us don’t realize is that “innocent until proven guilty” simply does not apply in the case of a tax return audit. It’s the opposite. When you file your return, you are asserting that you received a certain amount of income, and that a certain amount of that income should not be taxed because of your deductions. If

As a self-employed tax payer, and as an accountant and advisor to many small business owners, I am well acquainted with the shock and disgust of what I call the “April First-year Tax Sucker Punch”. Perhaps you are familiar – it’s that first tax return you file that shows a profit on your Schedule C, your independent business activity, for which you probably have not paid any withholdings or estimates during the year. That’s when you learn your first hard lesson about self-e

Co-written by Kevin Clark Everyday people get phishing or scam phone calls from someone impersonating an IRS official, but it may get even worse during and right after tax season. It can really help to know how to spot the difference, so you don’t find yourself in a panic or handing over valuable financial information to a scam caller. The forms of payment they request are often unretrievable and the stress from their threats can be overwhelming. We don’t want to see good peo

“Just skip the payroll taxes and expenses, pay your worker’s straight pay and send them a 1099!” I’ve even heard other accountants say those exact words to employers, so when I’m advising a small business owner and they recite this money-saving strategy, I have to blow the whistle and at least throw out a caution flag (is that soccer, or NASCAR?). That’s what accountants do; we can’t help it. But seriously – did you know that there are rules and guidelines that the IRS uses

Do you ever get the feeling that common sense just isn’t very common after all? If you think the tax code is logical and reasonable, you may find yourself claiming expenses for your business that just aren’t deductible. Here, for your information, frustration, and amazement, is a list of the most common attempted deductions that the IRS disallows on a frequent basis. It is possible that some of these expenses could properly be shown on your financial statements and reports

Part 3 of 3: Easy Targets - Meals, Mileage, and Home Office deductions, soft audit targets for the self-employed. “Soft target” is a military expression, referring to something that is relatively unprotected or vulnerable to an attack. An audit on your tax returns by the IRS is clearly not a military attack, but it can be quite brutal if your business expenses are… “open to interpretation”, or not well supported. This is the 3rd of 3 articles we have posted to help busines

Part 2 of 3: Easy Targets - Meals, Mileage, and Home Office deductions, soft audit targets for the self-employed. “Soft target” is a military expression, referring to something that is relatively unprotected or vulnerable to an attack. An audit on your tax returns by the IRS is clearly not a military attack, but it can be quite brutal if your business expenses are… “open to interpretation”, or not well supported. This is the second of 3 articles we will be posting (see Can I

Part 1 of 3: Easy Targets - Meals, Mileage, and Home Office deductions, soft audit targets for the self-employed. “Soft target” is a military expression, referring to something that is relatively unprotected or vulnerable to an attack. An audit on your tax returns by the IRS is clearly not a military attack, but it can be quite brutal if your business expenses are… “open to interpretation”, or not well supported. This is the first of 3 articles we will be posting to help b

How they work, and one big “Gotcha” to avoid Coming up soon – the extension deadline for income tax returns, which is October 15th for individual returns and September 15th for most business returns. (Sorry if you thought this post was about beauty tips or hair accessories). If you’re one of the millions of American taxpayers who, for various reasons, simply could not complete and file their tax returns back on April 15th, you were wise to take advantage of a simple and free

Owning your own business can be exciting, but it can also mean you are responsible for absolutely everything. Payroll and taxes can get complex and may overwhelm as you start up or as your business grows larger. That’s where a CPA, Certified Public Accountant, can help take a big part of the stress out of your professional ventures, leaving you time for what you really want to focus on. There are many reasons to consider having a CPA help but here are some for today: 1. A