How To Get Started On Bookkeeping For Your Small Business

OK, you’ve started your business. You will have cash receipts, otherwise known as income (someday), and you already have cash disbursements or expenses. You need a system to keep track of all of your transactions- it’s called an accounting system.

Now we all know that it would be much better if you could just hire a bookkeeper to do all this accounting, but you’re just starting out and don’t feel you can afford to hire one. Besides, it’s hard to find a good bookkeeper. They are notorious for saying they can do more than they are capable of, then proceeding to make a mess of the books of the unsuspecting small business owner. So we’re going to have to struggle along without one for now.

Although it would be better if you could spend all of your time doing whatever it is you do best, you’re going to be doing the accounting until you can afford to hire a bookkeeper. Besides, you never want to put yourself or your business in the position that you are so dependent on another person to do your accounting, that you have no idea what they are doing. By taking responsibility from the start for your own accounting you will be in a better position in the future to review the work of others in a short period of time each week (or day) and know whether or not it was done properly.

Things to Buy:

There are a few things that you’ll have to buy to accomplish the setting up of your accounting system. You’ll need the most recent QuickBooks accounting program. Of course, you’ll need a computer to go with that. You must check the QuickBooks specification requirements for the computer system and make sure that your computer will meet the minimum specification requirements, such as, have enough ram memory, for example.

Yes, there are many other accounting programs out there. But QuickBooks is the easiest, most user friendly accounting software in existence today. QuickBooks also generates many different types of reports, which is the whole purpose of doing your bookkeeping- so you can generate accurate reports showing your financial situation and the history of your transactions. QuickBooks does have its problems- for example, it does not provide a good audit trail, that is, after you have recorded transactions, reconciled the bank account and even closed the books, you can always go back and change things. This is not good, because then you may not be able to trace the transaction (hence the lack of audit trail.) However, if you follow the procedures set out in this book and discipline yourself not to stray, you will not get in trouble. And don’t be cheap and try to save money by buying Quicken. Quicken is useless for businesses because it does not generate many of the reports you will need, like a balance sheet.

How To Save Money

When Hiring a Lawyer

Alot of people are afraid to even call an attorney because they think it will cost too much money. I'm an attorney and I'm afraid to hire an attorney. But there are some things you can do to make sure you don't get ripped off or over-charged.

1. Get a Referral- Ask someone you trust if they can refer you to the type of attorney you need. Either a friend or someone who works with attorneys on a regular basis, like a financial advisor, certified public accountant or banker.2. Interview at Least Two Attorneys- Find at least two attorneys who will tell you about themselves, their practice and the type of work they do. Make it clear when you call that you are interviewing to choose an attorney, that you are not asking for information about your case or legal issues, and confirm that there will be no charge for the call.

2. Interview at Least Two Attorneys- Find at least two attorneys who will tell you about themselves, their practice and the type of work they do. Make it clear when you call that you are interviewing to choose an attorney, that you are not asking for information about your case or legal issues, and confirm that there will be no charge for the call.

3. Ask If They Give A Free Initial Consultation- Many attorneys give a free half-hour initial consultation. Ask for it. Sometimes the attorney will talk about your legal issue for one half hour or an hour and will credit it towards your job if you hire them. Example: talk for 30 to 45 minutes about your estate planning, then just pay the flat fee for the estate plan if you hire them. If you don't hire them you pay for the 30 to 45 minutes at the attorney's hourly rate.

4. Ask For A Flat Fee- Many kinds of legal jobs can be done for a flat fee, that is, not at an hourly rate. Things like incorporating your business, creating estate planning documents, or writing a buy-sell agreement can be done for a pre-arranged amount. Even jobs that are normally billed based on a percentage of assets, like probate, can be done for an agreed upon amount.

5. Set A Time Limit- Even if the job is the type that is normally charged at an hourly rate you can limit the amount of time to be spent on your job. Just ask!

Self Employment Tax Is A Killer!

Many people who go from being an employee to working as an independent contractor have sticker shock when they file their first tax return- it’s the self employment tax that’s the killer! This is an additional tax that is added on to your regular tax. It is your Social Security tax- FICA and Medicare tax that was withheld from your wages when you were an employee. But when you were an employee you only paid one half (7.65 % of your gross wages) and your employer paid the rest.

When you become an independent contractor you pay the whole thing. The bad part is that it’s based only on your self employment income which is the net income from your business. That means your itemized deductions don’t reduce the self employment tax. Another item is an IRA or 401(k) contribution- those don’t reduce the self employment income either.

So it becomes extremely important to allocate as many expenses as you can to your Schedule C- Profit or Loss from Trade or Business. That’s why we always try to deduct things like office in the home, auto expenses, equipment, etc. to get the self employment income down as much as possible. Oftentimes we see clients with little or no regular income tax due to large home mortgage interest deductions- but they still end up with a large self employment tax. So watch out!

Independent Contractor or Employee?

The IRS and California Franchise Tax Board are very aggressive in maintaining that everyone is an employee- but that doesn’t make it true! There is a lot of case law about this issue and criteria have been established over time that shows independent contractor status. Some of those are: more than one customer, letterhead and business cards, advertising product or services, use of own equipment, unsupervised, expertise in the field enabling person to work on their own, no set hours, can come and go as they please, to name a few.

Employers usually want workers to be independent contractors so they don’t have to pay the payroll taxes and do payroll tax reporting or cover the worker with employee benefits. The taxing authorities want to put the responsibility of paying the payroll taxes on the employer. It can be to your advantage to be independent if you have a lot of business-related expenses to be deducted from income. But have your tax professional do a projection to make sure it’s not going to cost you more money to be self employed than to be an employee.