Budgeting

4 Reasons Businesses Need To Track Their Money

Some months ago we wrote in this space about the art of bookkeeping, offering some tips on how businesses might make the practice easier to do. We didn’t go into why it’s important to do, and we’re going to rectify that now with 4 reasons why it’s important, since we gave 4 tips the first time around.

1. You need to know if you have enough money to do what you need to do. Forget having enough money to go on vacation for the moment. If you don’t have enough money to cover your expenses from month to month, your business will be in trouble. Unfortunately, none of us is the federal government, which means we can only spend whatever money we happen to have. Without budgeting, you might find yourself buying something, only to realize that you needed that money for something else.

2. You need to know where the bulk of your money is coming from so you know where to concentrate your efforts. If most of your money is coming from certain products or services, it would be smarter to try to get more clients for those things and put other things on hold for awhile. This of course touches upon the Pareto Principle, and yet it seems to be true for so many things.

3. You need to know where the bulk of your money is going. Tracking expenses is never fun, but it’s the only way you know if you’re spending too much money on the wrong things, or if something might be amiss. I had a client who was spending a lot of money on a supply item that wasn’t crucial to the business. He found that his employees were ordering this item and either using it for purposes it wasn’t designed for or taking it home for their personal use. Yearly it was a lot of money going out the door that, once it was pointed out to him, was an immediate savings to his company once he shut it down.

4. You need to know where your business stands financially. You can’t plan for the future if you don’t know where you are now. If you need special certifications that have to be paid for, you need to plan for that. If you need to pay quarterly taxes you might need to plan for that. If you have employees you pay weekly or bi-weekly, you need to plan for that. Knowledge is power and safety, and if tools or people like accountants are available for you, it’s smart to use them to your advantage.
 

Finances

Increasing Income

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In our previous post we talked about the importance of decreasing debt. Now we’re going to talk about the importance of increasing income.

Most of the time when you hear about businesses trying to get control of their finances, you only read about them laying off workers, cutting back on benefits, or raising prices. In our post on debt, we talked about ways you could save money.

Nothing works if all you try to do is cut and slash expenses. Even the federal government realizes that at some point you have to raise revenue; that’s what taxes do. For individuals or small businesses, it’s not as simple as raising prices, or even going in and asking for a raise. If you think about a raise, how much does a 3% raise help you when food costs have gone up 5%, insurance has gone up 10%, etc?

This means that you have to think about ways to increase your income. There’s not a single person in the world that needs money who wouldn’t want this to happen, and yet very few people take a shot at it. I’m going to help you out by offering some ideas on how you might be able to not only increase your income, but maybe even find a new career at the same time:

* Set up a website and sell stuff. This can seem scary but most of the time you can find low cost ways to get started. There are also known systems where, if you follow them to the letter, you can find ways to generate an income. It’s not easy, and it does take work, but it can be done. Think about it this way; once you get it set up properly, you might be able to make anywhere from $100 to $500 a month in the right field, and you make money at all times of the day. Just don’t be scammed by anyone who tells you that you’ll be making thousands in a few months; that almost never, NEVER, happens.

* Figure out what your knowledge base is and then figure out how and whom to market it to. In The Millionaire Messenger by Brendan Burchard, he talks about how everyone has a skill and has something to share with others who are willing to pay for it if you can figure out how to reach them.

* If you have a hobby you’re good at, you can make money at it. Have you been to a craft show and seen creations made by other people? Have you gone to a seminar of any kind where the person is talking about something they did or figured out how to do better than others, such as grow the biggest roses, train dogs to get the mail, or fly robotic helicopters? There are always people interested in the same thing you are and if you’ve mastered even one small piece of it, someone will be willing to pay you for it.

* Get a part time job. When all else fails or you can’t think of anything, this is always a viable option. Even a minimum wage job at 20 hours a week would give you an extra $145 a week, or almost $600 a month in extra cash. That’s a car payment, more food, the movies, or just paying off debt quicker, either for a short or long period of time. If you make more, even better. Yeah, there will be taxes to deal with, but less with a part time job.

These are just some ideas to think about, but it’s important that you do think about these ideas if you want to pay off bills or have more money for other things.
 

Budgeting

Decreasing Debt

This is the first of a two part series on managing your money. It goes beyond just thinking about budgeting your money, something we feel strongly about. Instead, it’s looking at debt, why you want to reduce it and how, and then looking at why you need to also think about increasing revenue. That’s for next time; right now, let’s talk about debt.

Having too much debt can be debilitating. Sometimes people come up with some radical ways of attacking it. There was a recent story on CNN where a young man just out of college with around $26,000 in debt decided he was going to pay it off in 2 years. How he did it was to go extremely austere. He didn’t turn on the heat in the winter, and he lived in Minnesota. He bought a lot of foods at discounted prices and ate much of the same thing over and over, even when it expired; that put him in the hospital a few times. He bought few clothes, and when he did he went to discount places. He didn’t drive a car for those 2 years so he wouldn’t have any expenses related to that.

There were a few other things he did, but he did end up paying off his debt. It was a pretty extreme way of doing it, and I’m not sure it’s worth going to the hospital, especially if your insurance isn’t as good as his apparently was. What it did point out though was how well things can go if you have a plan, even if it’s not as extreme as his was.

How do you increase debt? Obviously you stop spending too much money. However, you still have to live, and if you have kids, you still need to address their needs. Here are some ideas:

* Cut down on snack foods

* Buy foods that allow you to cook large meals that you can eat many times.

* Buy some items in bulk or on sale and freeze them if you have to

* Cut down on eating out

* Plan your trips out for the day ahead of time and plot a course so you’re not driving all over town, out of order, and wasting a lot of gas

* Instead of going to the movies pay for a service like HBO, which offers 13 channels (2 in Spanish) for only $7.99 a month, which offers movies for children and adults alike at a reasonable price. You can cook your own popcorn for less than 30 cents a bag.

* Plan what you want to buy before you leave the house, and stick to that

* Leave the house with a specific dollar amount in mind and don’t go over that amount, no matter what

* Pay a bit more on at least one of your bills every month, and concentrate on the one with the highest interest rate

* If you must use a credit card, wean yourself down to only one and monitor how much you spend on it

If you can follow most of these rules, you’ll be able to pay down debt without increasing more, still be healthy, and possibly be able to afford one fun day every couple of months or so, which helps make staying in control much easier to deal with. Give it a shot; you might surprise yourself.
 

Tax Preparation

The Four States Of Taxpayers

How do you prepare for your taxes? Strange as this may seem, it’s not necessarily true that people who are expecting big refunds are always the people who file their taxes fast and early. It’s also not true that people who feel that they might have to pay something are always waiting until the last minute either.

Dealing with taxes is a much more mental process than that. As it is with business and employees, you find that not everything concerning taxes has to do with money. It has a lot more to do with personality and the perception of it all. Let’s take a quick look at the four states of taxpayers.

1. Energetic. Those people who are energetic are ready to get things out of the way, no matter if they’re getting a refund or not. Those who are getting refunds look forward to their return and how they’re going to spend the money. Those who aren’t sure or know they’re not going to get a refund want to know what their liability is and also want everything to be over so they can get on with life. There’s no hiding with these folks; good for them.

2. Distracted. Distracted people mean well, but they keep putting things off because they have other pressing matters to deal with. Sometimes those pressing matters are as minor as getting something to eat, but who doesn’t think eating is more important than taking care of their taxes?

3. Stressed. Just like the energetic people, it doesn’t matter whether they’re getting a refund or not. They see the entire process of taxes in the first four months of the years as a major challenge. Numbers are confusing to them, or maybe past history has put them on edge. If you’re married, you might have had problems getting refunds so many times that this is an unpleasant time of year, no matter how much in taxes you paid out.

4. Laid back. These folks don’t really care one way or another; they’re just not in the mood to be bothered by any of it. I’ve known people who didn’t file their taxes for a couple of years in a row who, if they had, would have reaped thousands in refunds, and even after they eventually file and learn about the penalties, they’re not bothered by any of it. I know others who haven’t filed taxes, ended up owing money, and set up payment plans and got on with life.

For all of these states, it can help to have an accountant who knows you and is prepared to get you through the process. Accountants obviously prefer to get everything early, and if they know your pattern they’ll work with you for your benefit and theirs as well. Many people need the extra boost, and they like knowing that their accountant cares about their needs. It’s something to think about at tax time when you have to decide between one of those tax agencies or an accountant you’ve worked with before.
 

Tax Preparation

Preparing For Tax Season

True, it’s still 2012, but that doesn’t mean that you need to wait until the last minute to prepare for your 2013 tax returns. Before we get into that, we’d like to remind you of our previous posts Trip Expenses You Can Deduct and Are You Preparing For Next Years Taxes Yet.

Here are some highlights we’d like to remind everyone about:

Child Tax Credit is $1,000 per child now, but decreases to $500 in 2013.

Earned Income Credit up to 3 children has a maximum credit of $5,891. This year there’s certain proof you have to provide to qualify for the credit which includes school records, medical records, utility bills, and property tax records. Check out the new form to see what’s specifically required of you.

Business mileage for 2012 is 55.5 cents a mile, and in 2013 it goes up to 56.5.

There’s no increase in capital gains taxes for 2012, but in 2013 it increases to 20%.

Student loan interest gives a deduction up to $2,500.

The electronic filing date has been pushed back until January 22nd in 2013; no real idea why, but last year some people waited longer than normal for their refunds so maybe it’s related to that.

If you had a lot of medical expenses and kept all your receipts, make sure to bring them in to see if you might qualify for some write-offs.

More changes for 2013? No one knows yet. You’ve probably heard “fiscal cliff” until you’re sick of it but no one knows what’s coming just yet. We know that someone will have increased taxes but unsure of who. We also know that more changes will come to health care in 2013, though the bill officially doesn’t kick in until 2014, and we’re unsure what that might mean financially right now either.

Overall, just be prepared for anything, and of course don’t wait until the last minute to get your information to your accountant or tax professional, as corporate taxes this year are due on March 15th.
 

Accounting & Financial Advice from the Syracuse NY area