QuickBooks

The most important thing you need to know about sales tax is that administering it correctly can be challenging.

If you sold only one type of product to customers in one city, collecting and paying sales tax would be easy. But most businesses have a wider reach than that.

QuickBooks Online offers tools that allow you to set up sales tax rates and include sales tax on sales forms. Further, it calculates how much you must pay to state and local taxing agencies.

This is one of the most complicated areas in QuickBooks Online because you may have to deal with numerous taxing agencies. If you’re not already working with sales taxes, we strongly recommend you let us help you get everything set up correctly from the start. Taxing agencies can audit your recordkeeping and you want to make sure it is set up correctly.

That said, here are five things we think you should know.

QuickBooks Online calculates sales tax rates based on:

• Where you sell. Every state is different. If your business is located in Florida and you sell to a customer in Minnesota, you’ll be charging any sales tax levied by the state of Minnesota and possibly the city and county and other taxing authorities – if you have a connection, a “nexus” in that state (a physical location, active salesperson, etc.).
• What you sell.
• To whom you sell. Some customers (like nonprofit organizations) do not have to pay sales tax. You’ll need to edit their customer records to reflect this in QBO. Open a customer record and click the Edit link in the upper right. Click the Tax info tab and make sure there’s no checkmark in the box that says This customer is taxable. The Default tax code will be grayed out, and you can enter Exemption details in that field.

Customer records for exempt organizations should contain details for that exemption. You’ll need to see their exemption certificate or at least know its official number.

Intuit now offers a revamped version of QuickBooks Online’s sales tax features.

At some point, you’ll be asked if you want to switch to the new, more automated system. The actual mechanics of the process are simple, but you’ll be moving historical and in-process data to a new structure. If you have sales tax set up right now and your situation is at all complicated, you’re going to want our help with the transition.

This enhanced feature only supports accrual accounting.

You can combine individual tax rates.

If you are required to pay city, county, and state sales tax rates for a particular customer, for example, you can create a Combined tax rate that contains all of the individual components. The customer will only see the total on an invoice or sales receipt, but QuickBooks Online will track each one accordingly for payment and reporting purposes.

You can combine sales tax rates in QuickBooks Online (image above from current Sales Tax Center in QuickBooks Online, not the enhanced one).

Product and service records should contain sales tax information.

This is another area that will require some research. Just as some services are subject to tax, some products are not (like groceries in Arizona). So, you’ll need to find out what the rules are for what you sell. You can find this information on the website of the state’s Department of Revenue (sometimes called the Department of Taxation).

Once you know, you can record that status in QuickBooks Online. Open a product record by going to Sales | Products and Services and clicking Edit in the Action column or create a new one by clicking New in the upper right. Scroll down to Sales tax category in the record. You can choose between Taxable – standard rate and Nontaxable.

There’s a third option here: special category. This gets complicated. We can help you determine whether it applies to you.

QuickBooks Online tracks the sales tax you owe.

You can see what you owe to each agency by running the Sales Tax Liability Report, and record payments when you’ve made them. Summary and detail versions of the Taxable Sales report are also available.

Once you get sales taxes set up in QuickBooks Online, it’s easy to add them to the relevant sales forms. Getting to that point, though, takes time, study, and careful attention to detail. If you’re getting ready to sell, or you’re already selling and struggling with sales taxes, let us know. We can schedule an initial consultation to see how we can be of assistance.

Make income tax preparation easier by tracking all the deductions you can take.

You’ve heard it said before: Tax planning should be a year-round process. It’s so true. Your life will be a lot easier early next year when all your tax forms start rolling in.

Forms like 1099s and W-2s do a lot of the tracking for you. You only need to transfer data over to your IRS tax forms and schedules. But what about the daily stuff, the expenses you incur as a part of your workday that no one else is documenting? There are a lot of tax-deductible costs that can really add up when it’s time to file.

The IRS has two criteria for evaluating the validity of business expenses. First, is it ordinary? Is it something that other companies in your trade or profession would commonly buy? Second, is it necessary? Is it “…helpful and appropriate?”

Warning: Some expenses that you think might be deductible are not. Obviously, you can’t claim the costs of personal items. The IRS specifies two other types of expenses that can’t be deducted: Capital Expenses and those used the calculate the Cost of Goods Sold. Questions? Ask us.

Pulling together all that numbers required for the IRS Schedule C can be challenging. Let us know if you have questions.

Here are some examples of expenses that you might not consider, but which should be recorded as they occur so you don’t forget about them come tax time.

Advertising and promotion

Some of these expenses are obvious. For example, you might report printing costs for brochures, ad space bought, and postage for mailers and other business correspondence. But there’s much more that fits into this category. Think about everything you do that helps promote your business, like expenses related to:

• Business cards
• Team sponsorships
• Your website (including startup and maintenance fees)
• Graphic design
• Workshops/webinars

Insurance

Do you have any kind of business insurance, like liability or malpractice? Your premiums are deductible.

Car and truck expenses

Understandably, you can only deduct expenses for miles driven for business purposes. If you have a vehicle—either owned or leased—that you also use for personal driving part of the time, you’ll need to track those two separately.

There are two options for calculating business mileage: Actual Expenses and Standard Mileage. To calculate the latter, you’d multiple the number of business miles driven by 53.5 cents for tax year, then add tolls and parking fees. The Actual Expense method is more complicated; it involves many costs, and recognizes depreciation of the vehicle. Check with us if you’re planning to claim expenses for a car or truck, as there are additional rules governing this deduction.

Postage and office supplies

Yes, they’re deductible if you need them for your business.

Meals and entertainment

Familiarize yourself with the rules for this one. They’re complicated, and the IRS looks closely at such deductions.

Business use of your home

Ditto. There are all kinds of regulations, restrictions, and exceptions here, even if you use the simplified method that the IRS introduced a few years ago. Further, the home office deduction can be an audit red flag.

The rules are very specific and very rigid. For example, even if you use your home’s land line for business, you can’t deduct it. Add another line for business, and you can.

Professional and legal fees

If you pay an individual or firm for services provided to help you operate your business, those fees are often deductible. This includes lawyers, accountants, and tax preparers, of course, but as always, there are exceptions. You can’t usually, for example, deduct attorneys’ fees if you were getting legal help to buy business assets.

Dealing with Details

As you can see, there are many allowable business expenses that require meticulous recordkeeping. You can, of course, do this on paper or in a spreadsheet. There are cloud-based applications specifically designed for this purpose. If you’re interested in checking these out, let us know. We’re always available to help you plan for future tax filings.

Every interaction with your customers can enhance your image. Here’s how QuickBooks Online contributes to that.

Getting paid by your customers—on time, and in full—can take some effort on your part. You set smart due dates and enforce them. Price your products and services so they’re both reasonable and profitable. Accept online payments.

But are your invoices working for you here? QuickBooks Online provides sales form templates that you can usually use without modifying. But it also offers tools that support multiple kinds of customization. It helps you shape the content and appearance of your invoices and their accompanying messages to be consistent with your company’s brand.

These may be cosmetic changes, but they can affect the way customers react to communications from you. You have few chances to make an impression, so anything you can do to enhance and personalize every interaction will have impact on their impression of you. Neat, well-designed sales forms convey professionalism and attention to details.

Here’s a look at what you can do.

Editing Fields

Unless you use every single field in QuickBooks Online’s default sales form template, your invoices will look sloppier than they might otherwise. The site gives you control over much of the content that your customers will see. To make changes, click the gear icon in the upper right of the screen and select Account and Settings, then Sales. You’ll see Sales form content in the left column. Click on any of the fields to the right to open a more thorough list of options.

QuickBooks Online lets you turn fields on and off in your sales forms and specify other preferences.

Click on the status (On, Off) in the right column to change it. When you’re satisfied with your selections, click Save. Then close that window by clicking the X in the upper right corner.

You have more options than these. Click the gear icon again, and then Your Company | Custom Form Styles. You’ll see that there is already a “master” form. You can either edit it or create a new one. We recommend leaving the master form alone so you always have a clean copy to consult if you get tangled up while you’re working.

Click the down arrow in the New style box in the upper right and select Invoice. In the screen that opens, enter a descriptive name for your template in the field at the top and then click Content. A graphical representation of your invoice will appear in the right pane, grayed out. It’s divided into three sections: header, footer, and table (the middle of the invoice where you describe what you sold). Each displays a small pencil icon on the right side of the screen. Click the one in the middle to make that area more visible.

It’s easy to specify which fields should appear on your invoices, what the labels should say, and how wide the space should be.

As you check and uncheck boxes to indicate what content should be included, your invoice on the right will change to reflect your actions. You can Preview PDF by clicking that button in the lower right. When you’re satisfied with the changes you’ve made to all three sections, click on the Design tab.

Changing the Look

You don’t have to be a graphic artist to have QuickBooks Online forms that look attractive and consistent, which highlight your brand. The site provides tools that give you control over the appearance of your invoices, not just their content. Click each link below the Design tab to:

• Choose a template.
• Add your company’s logo.
• Select a color scheme and fonts.
• Change the printer settings to accommodate letterhead, for example.

Choosing Your Words

You have control over the messages that go out with your invoices.

Finally, click the Emails tab. Options here let you customize the emails that are sent to customers along with their invoices. Again, changes you make in the left pane will be reflected in the graphical version on the right side.

When you’ve completed all of your modifications, click Done.

We gave you this whirlwind tour of QuickBooks Online’s invoice customization options so you’d know what was possible. We expect you might need some assistance when you sit down to apply the concepts you’ve learned about to your own company’s sales forms. We’re available to help you present a polished, carefully-crafted image representing your brand to your customers.

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Are you satisfied with the image you convey to customers through your QuickBooks Online sales forms? We can help you make them more customized and effective.

You have few chances to interact directly with your customers. Make sure your QuickBooks Online sales forms convey the image you and your brand deserves.

QuickBooks Online comes with sales form templates that may work for your company, but did you know you have control over their appearance and content?

Your customers pay attention to the sales forms you produce for them. QuickBooks Online lets you improve on the default templates it provides making a better impression to your client.

Ready to get started with a Certified QuickBooks accountant? Call us at 912-634-7722 to schedule your free initial consultation.

QuickBooks Online is more than just an online bookkeeper. It can help improve your cash flow, your customer relationships, your inventory readiness, and your future.

 

If you’re already using QuickBooks Online, you know how much impact its bookkeeping abilities have had on your company’s accounting operations. You’re saving time, which in-turn saves money, and you’re reducing errors. When a customer or vendor calls with a question, or you yourself need to track down a critical detail to solve a problem, you’re able to find solutions quickly.

 

You may already have learned, though, that QuickBooks Online’s benefits include much more than simply getting the numbers right. When you take advantage of all it can offer, you’re likely to notice more far-reaching effects.

 

The Specifics

 

Let’s look at how QuickBooks Online accomplishes all of this. You can do much of it on your own, but we’re trained to help small businesses get the most out of QuickBooks Online. We can help you maximize the effectiveness of your accounting time so your company can:

 

Better balance between income and expenses.

QuickBooks Online provides quick, real-time overviews of your sales status.

 

You can’t begin to improve your company’s cash flow until you understand where the financial bottlenecks are. QuickBooks Online provides that information for both income and expenses in a variety of ways. In the image above, you can see that there are seven past-due invoices. Click on the orange bar to see a list of them, and you can automatically send reminders. QuickBooks Online also automates the process of sending statements.

 

You can also run accounts receivable and accounts payable reports that will show where you stand with customers and vendors, like Open Invoices, Uninvoiced Time, Unpaid Bills, and Accounts Payable Aging Detail. If you determine that one of your consistent problems with cash flow is late customer payments, you can set up a merchant account through QuickBooks Online to support credit card payments and bank transfers.

 

More repeat business because of improved customer interaction.

 

Your customers are like gold. To build the best relationships possible with them, you need a clear, updated picture of their transactions, their payment details and history, and your interaction with them. QuickBooks Online provides templates for Customer Information records that provide all of that, along with their contact information and a real-time update of the status of their invoices and payments, estimates, time activities, etc. The latter is provided in the form of an interactive list with links to immediate actions you can take.

 

A more stable, profitable inventory of products.

 

If your business sells products, you know that you have to be smart about inventory levels. Stock too much and you have too much money tied up unnecessarily. Too little, and you’ll be turning customers away and possibly losing their future business. QuickBooks Online’s inventory-tracking tools help you achieve and maintain that balance, so you know both when and how much to reorder.

It’s easy to evaluate your inventory status very quickly in QuickBooks Online.

 

QuickBooks Online also offers multiple inventory reports, like Inventory Valuation Detail, Physical Inventory Worksheet, and Sales by Product/Service Detail.

 

Readiness for growth.

 

You may never want to acquire another company, or move into more spacious offices, or employ dozens of individuals. However, it’s not often that a company doesn’t want to be in a position to grow. And you never know when an opportunity will present itself that would require additional capital. Would you be ready?

 

If you’ve never applied for a business loan or tried to attract investors, you don’t know how much financial information you’ll need to provide, or in what format. There are very specific reports your potential lenders or investors will want to see, standard financial statements. QuickBooks Online includes templates for these, which include a Balance Sheet, Profit and Loss, and Statement of Cash Flows.

 

Like the reports we mentioned earlier, they’re easy to generate on the site, thanks to intelligent, customizable templates. Analyzing them, though, and making sure they’re ready to be seen by third-parties takes professional expertise. We can provide that for you. We can also help you better understand and use other elements of QuickBooks Online so that you’re taking advantage of all of its benefits. Contact us soon to set up an initial consultation.

 

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Cash flow problems? Before you can solve them, you need to learn where the bottlenecks are. QuickBooks Online can help. Contact us to find out how.

 

Is your company ready to grow? You’ll need reports to show lenders and investors. QuickBooks Online can create them, and we can analyze them for you.

 

How well do you know your customers? Could you assemble a quick, thorough overview of their history with you? QuickBooks Online can, and we can show you how. Are you dealing with product inventory problems due to overstocks or insufficient orders from vendors? QuickBooks Online can help.

Ready to get started with a Certified QuickBooks accountant? Call us at 912-634-7722 to schedule your free initial consultation.