Every spring, business owners and employers alike begin to prepare for the time of year we’ve all come to refer to as: “tax time”. News reports and newspaper articles will circulate reminding everyone it’s time to file their taxes, and a frantic scramble for receipts and accountants will begin in earnest.
For many business owners, it is all too tempting to leave their taxes until the spring. Sure, you can keep decent records and set money aside to make life easier when spring rolls around, but the heavy lifting of filing and refining information is left until March – or, at worst, April itself. This is particularly true of solo entrepreneurs who are not outsourcing the work to accountants; there’s too much to do for the rest of the year to continually update records, so it has to wait until the deadline is looming.
Unfortunately, the as-and-when method of approaching your business taxes is unlikely to produce good results. If there’s a problem in your taxes, or you have to wait for information from other parties (such as banks) in order to file correctly, then leaving the matter until the last minute can be genuinely harmful. It’s far better for you, and your business, to act as if the entire year is “tax time”, and maintain your accounts in a way that would allow you to file immediately if it became necessary to do so.
By giving yourself the entire year to fully establish your taxes, you’ll also enjoy a far greater chance to ensure your business’ finances are in good health, and ensure you have the opportunity to explore all of the possible deductions that are available to you – which you can learn more about in the infographic below.
Infographic Design By TripLog