The end of the year always adds even more tasks to your already busy schedule, and sometimes it’s simply overwhelming and I have often been asked – “What do i want to do?”
Intuit has built a really good “QuickBooks Year-End Guide/Checklist” and it’s included right in your QuickBooks program by getting to the assistance Menu and selecting Year-End Guide. Over subsequent few days, we’ll cover each topic listed within the Year-End Guide, and offer some additional recommendations on each of the three sections: Tasks to organize for filing taxes, Tasks to try to if you employ subcontractors, Tasks to try to if you’ve got employees and a few Tips for the upcoming year.
Tasks to organize for filing taxes:
Reconcile all bank and Mastercard accounts – now really you ought to be doing this monthly …but if for a few reasons it has been several months since these accounts were reconciled here’s a fast thanks to reconcile multiple months all directly – accurately.
- Determine which month was the last month that was reconciled.
- Gather all of your bank or Mastercard statements and put them in order; oldest on top and most up-to-date on rock bottom. If you do not have all the statements, please do not be tempted to only “skip” that month, contact the bank and invite a replica, or if you’ve got on-line banking capabilities get a replica off the web.
- In QuickBooks attend the Banking Menu and choose Reconcile.
- In the Begin Reconciliation window
- Choose the Account you would like to reconcile (you can choose either your checking account or your Mastercard account) from the sink Account List.
- The Statement Date should be the ending date of your most up-to-date statement.
- The Beginning Balance should be an equivalent because the Beginning Balance of your oldest statement. If for a few reasons the amounts aren’t an equivalent, click the link that says “What if my beginning balance doesn’t match my statement?” and follow the instructions within the QuickBooks Help file to work out what’s wrong and the way to correct the matter.
- The Ending Balance should be the quantity shown because the ending balance on your most up-to-date statement.
- Enter any service fee for the foremost current statement only – (we’ll put the remainder in manually), please do not be tempted to “add all of them up” and put that quantity here.
- Enter any Interest Earned for the foremost current statement only – (we’ll put the remainder in manually), please do not be tempted to “add all of them up” and put that quantity here.
- Click the Continue button which can bring you to the Reconciliation window.
- To enter Service Charges and/or Interest Earned for extra months, leaving the reconciliation window open, from the Banking Menu – choose Use Register and enter the transactions individually using the deadline of the statement because the date of the entry. Additionally, you would possibly want to make “Other Names” called Bank service fee and Interest to use within the Payee Field when recording these transactions, just to form reconciling easier.
- Working from the statements, oldest one first, just undergo and check each deposit and check until you’re finished.
- If you discover checks or deposits on the statements that aren’t in your QuickBooks file, attend the Banking Menu and choose Use Register, record the transaction with its original date, assigning the quantity to either Uncategorized Income or Uncategorized Expenses – In order that later you’ll run a Year so far Profit and Loss Report, concentrate on those accounts and find the text of the first transaction and proper the entry or entries.
Verify fund entries for the tax year – again, this is often something that you simply should be doing monthly, but if you’ve got several months that you simply got to reconcile, it is often accomplished following the instructions above.
Tip- Sage Tax Codes Update Manually
Make year-end accrual adjustments and corrections – I usually suggest that you simply work together with your accountant on these matters.
Close your books – I usually suggest that you simply close your books for the financial year with a password – only the QuickBooks Administrator can do that, but it does prevent accidental changes to already reconciled transactions by others. in fact, the QuickBooks Administrator can make changes to transactions as needed and a deadline exception report are often generated by getting to the Reports Menu, choosing Accountant & Taxes, then selecting the deadline Exception Report. With QuickBooks 2011 you do not got to worry about this effecting non-Posting transactions like Estimates & Purchase Orders.
Adjust Retained Earning – QuickBooks does this automatically, so there should be no need for you to possess to try to this manually.
Review details of all new equipment purchased during the year – if you’re using QuickBooks Premier (including Premier Contractor, Manufacturing, etc.) you ought to and may enter details about your fixed asset purchases by getting to the Lists Menu and selecting Fixed Asset Item List – otherwise you’ll need to track these things on an Excel Worksheet, a Word Document, or in QuickBooks itself by adding Sub-Accounts to your main Fixed Asset account for every piece of kit that was purchased and adding the maximum amount detail as possible within the Name, Description, and Notes boxes.
Make all asset depreciation entries and adjustments – I usually suggest that you simply work together with your accountant on these matters.
Review fringe benefits that require to be reported on Form W-2 – Fringe benefits can include Health and life assurance, public transportation subsidies, expense reimbursements, employer provided vehicles, educational reimbursements plan, group-term life assurance, employee loans that are forgiven, and Union Fringe Benefits. If you are not sure if any of the advantages that you simply offer your employees should be included on their W-2’s consult your accountant.
Take a physical inventory and reconcile with book inventory – it’s important that you simply take a year end physical inventory; I usually suggest that you include a replica of that physical inventory sheet for your accountant and allow them to offer you the acceptable adjusting entries to record in QuickBooks.
Print financial reports – from the QuickBooks Year-End Guide/Checklist click on this subject for reports to print. confine mind that these reports won’t have adjusting entries from your accountant which amounts will change. I might recommend that once you create the suggested reports that you simply modify them and add a report subtitle called “Prior to Adjusting Entries”. After you’ve got entered the adjusting entries from your accountant, rerun these same reports adding a replacement subtitle called “After Adjusting Entries”.
Print tax reports to verify tax tracking – from the QuickBooks Year-End Guide/Checklist click on this subject for an evidence of what’s involved for this action item. you ought to ask your accountant for help in fixing the right tax tracking for every item on your Chart of Accounts.
Import your tax-related data to Turbo Tax or Pro Series – from the QuickBooks Year-End Guide/Checklist click on this subject for an evidence. If you are doing not prepare your own tax returns, you’ll definitely skip this section.
Print and mail forms W-2, W-3, 1099, 940, 941, and 1096 – remember you not got to buy pre-printed W-2 and W-3 forms as QuickBooks will print these forms on plain paper; you’ll still got to purchase pre-printed 1099 and 1096 forms.
Archive and copy your data – backing up your data are some things that you simply should be doing on a really regular basis as a part of a disaster recovery plan within the event of bug, computer failure, etc.
Archiving your data are some things that you simply should do if your file is large – contains quite 3 years of knowledge – although some businesses will have extremely large files after only 2 years. Creating a replacement company file annually isn’t necessary and not recommended for contractors; you almost certainly have jobs that span over the course of two calendar years or more and you’ll want access to finish details concerning those jobs for job costing reports. There are, however times when creating a replacement file is acceptable, like you’ve got several years of knowledge with early years containing many data entry errors, or your file has become damaged and can’t be repaired.
How to make sure that Your Tax Data is Filed Properly by an income tax return Preparer
From accountants to tax preparers, you’ll find many checking out one. you’ll get confused on who to interact to try to up your tax and ensure its accuracy.
Firstly, hiring the proper professional will make your job easy also as protect your financial data. you’ll actually ask your resources like family, friends and colleagues for recommendations. likelihood is that that they could are employing a professional service right along. If you’re unable to urge any reference, prepare to try to an in-depth due diligence.
Once you’ve got found your match, make sure that you gather all of your needed records to facilitate the preparer. And do make certain you recognize exactly who are going to be preparing your tax returns. Lack of proper information could actually be under-filing your returns which could come under scrutiny do you have to be nominated for an audit. last item you would like immediately within the midst of recovering recession is an audit trail.
Once your preparer has wrapped your tax report, make sure that you undergo equally of details and scrutinize carefully. make sure that the info matches correctly. Also make sure that all reliefs claimable are claimed. most significantly, check if your personal particulars are up so far. albeit your data is ready, signed off and filed by knowledgeable preparer, the onus is on you to make sure accuracy. Therefore, don’t come short here.
If all is well, ensure proper preparer signatures are in situ before you give the green light to file the income tax return with the Inland Revenue.
