17th July, 2024
Tax season is upon us. While it may seem daunting, there are innovative ways to make life easier for both you and your accountant — something they’ll love you for!
Kyelie Baxter, Managing Director of IQ Accountants, joined me to explore five ways to streamline your EOFY process and make life easier for everyone involved.
The main way you can aid your accountant this tax season is to be as prepared as possible and start working on your documents as soon as possible.
“Preparation means finalising your Single Touch Payroll, paying superannuation, and ensuring there are no clearing accounts left on your accounts (e.g., Electronic Clearing Account, Payroll Clearing Account, and Suspense),” Kyelie says.
Kyelie also suggests considering assets you’ve purchased.
“If you’ve bought a new car or any other asset, you should include a copy of the tax invoice and finance document with your tax paperwork for your accountant.”
“If you’ve been busily invoicing all year, it’s time to make sure all the payments have come in and invoices have been made and reconciled,” Kyelie says.
“You need to review any old invoices that haven’t been paid, because they may need to be written off for this financial year. Remember that all these amounts can make a difference to your bottom line.”
Plus, Kyelie suggests entrepreneurs check they’re correctly allocated all of their payments to cause fewer headaches for their accountants.
“Look through your profit and loss and make sure everything makes sense,” she suggests.
“For example, if you pay for an accounting solution, ensure the fees are coded to subscription fees.
“It pays to check where these were coded last year too.”
While many people associate stocktakes with retail businesses, many firms actually need to do stock counts at this time of year, such as builders, manufacturers, tradespeople, wholesalers, and more.
Stock counts are crucial in providing info to your accountant.
It really helps to have inventory solutions to help you with tracking this, plus it pays to start with a stock count report that you can cross-check as you go.
Entrepreneurs should pay attention to the information accountants ask for if they want to reduce headaches.
Too many times I’ve seen accountants send out their well-oiled checklist to their clients, only to find that the business owners didn’t actually end up ‘checking’ the checklist!
Failing in this task just makes a job for an accountant longer and more arduous than it needs to be. In fact, picking up and putting down jobs due to lack of information is one of the most costly challenges an accountant faces in their practice.
Kyelie agrees. “Read your accountant’s year-end emails carefully and remember that processes change,” she says.
“Check whether the accountant has included a request for you to complete a list of tasks or otherwise given you a guide of what to provide,” she suggests.
“If you follow their requests, this will help keep your fees to a minimum, so it’s a win-win.”
You can make life easier for yourself and your accountant if you take advantage of the great tech tools these days that help streamline financial processes.
For example, accounting software, rather than a full box of paper documents, can help you save hours of work and cause far fewer headaches for your accountant.
It will enable you to capture all the requirements for your business throughout the financial year and make reviewing your tax easier for your advisors.
To get all the data ship-shape for your accountant, you can also automate your bank information.
Your banking details can feed straight into digital platforms so your accountant won’t have to chase up paper bank statements from you.
Plus, some apps will take photos of your receipts and paperwork and upload them straight into your records, linked with the transaction.
This means your accountant will be able to easily substantiate your claims and get his or her job done faster.
A good accountant will be happy to help with your business management solutions and also advise you on the best way to provide information to their practice.
What you do either side of the 30 June deadline can make a huge difference to your tax payable position so it’s crucial you plan around this to control the outcome.
With a proactive approach and innovative tools at your disposal, you’ll navigate EOFY with confidence and make for a less stressful tax time.
Information provided in this article is of a general nature and does not consider your personal situation. It does not constitute legal, financial, or other professional advice and should not be relied upon as a statement of law, policy or advice. You should consider whether this information is appropriate to your needs and, if necessary, seek independent advice. This information is only accurate at the time of publication. Although every effort has been made to verify the accuracy of the information contained on this webpage, MYOB disclaims, to the extent permitted by law, all liability for the information contained on this webpage or any loss or damage suffered by any person directly or indirectly through relying on this information.
MYOB is not a registered entity pursuant to the Tax Agent Services Act 2009 (TASA) and therefore cannot provide taxation advice to clients. If you have a query concerning taxation including filing your BAS return or annual tax statements then you should consult with your accountant or other registered tax adviser.