What! Every January?

What! Every January?

While January is the beginning of a brand new year for us all, for those of us who run our own businesses it's also the deadline for our tax return.

Now, if like me, you have an accountant who does this for you, then it's not so much of a pain, but whether you are a "do it yourselfer" or a number avoider, like me, you still have to have all the relevant information available for that all important form to be filled in.

I guess it's a bit late to get super organised for this year, but it's the perfect time to sort out your system for next year.

If you're a do it “yoursefer” this will make life so much easier and if you a pass the problem over to a book keeper or accountant, then it will save you money. As your accountant won't then have to wade through the proverbial carrier bag of receipts and try to make sense of it all.

My advice would be to get a system in place now and stick to it.

I have a ring bind folder that contains twelve clear plastic wallets...each is labelled with a month of the year, in order.

Each month I put together my outgoing receipts in date order and fasten them together with a paper clip so the accountant can easily work through them. I then do the same for my incoming receipts, again in date order. These are then put into the correct months wallet alongside that month's bank statement. And so it goes on for each month of the year.

This is the techno phone method and so far it works for me. I know there are lots of far more tech savvy methods out there and one of these days I'll probably adopt one of them, but for now I'm sticking to what I'm comfortable with 😊