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Get your books in order for the new financial year

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Mika, Staff Writer

Friday, 16 April 2021

Every business owner’s nightmare is getting to that tax return deadline and realising that your books aren’t in order. It’s easy to leave things until the last minute but it can cause undue levels of stress which could have been avoided if you’d thought ahead.

Here are our top five tips for getting your books in order for the start of the new financial year.

Keep your personal and business accounts separate

If you’re running a limited company, you’ll need to keep your personal and business accounts separate by law. However, if you’re self-employed, there’s no law that prevents you from using your personal account for your business.

However, it’s best to keep your personal and business accounts separate. Whilst it’s ok to use your business account in an emergency, keeping separate accounts can help you to keep track of how your business is performing and make it easier when that all-important tax return deadline rolls around.

Track your expenses

It’s easy to purchase things for your business and put off recording it as an expense. You might plan to deal with it later, but then end up forgetting about your purchase.

Keeping clear records of your expenses is essential for managing your cash flow. This will make your life easier when you come to do your tax return, reduce the amount of tax that you pay and also make it easier if you need to return a purchase.

Keep backups

IT is a great tool that can make your life much easier, especially when it comes to your bookkeeping. Using an online system means that your invoices and receipts are kept in one place and you can easily generate reports to monitor your performance.

However, things can quickly go wrong with IT. Therefore, it’s a good idea to keep backups of your bookkeeping. This way, if anything goes wrong, you’ll be able to recover your data from a backup, making sure that you don’t lose anything.

Set time aside weekly

Aside from bookkeepers, there won’t be many business owners that enjoy doing their bookkeeping. It’s easy to leave the task until the last minute when you’re likely to make mistakes and forget crucial information.

Try to get into the habit of setting time aside each week to do your accounting. Keeping track of your income and expenditure can help to keep your business on track as you can accurately measure your performance. It will also make things easier when it comes to filling out your tax return.

Hire a Bookkeeper

It can sometimes be hard to find the time and motivation to do your bookkeeping. Not only that, but it can also get complicated. Hiring a bookkeeper can save you time and effort, leaving you free to focus on what’s important to your business. They’ll also make sure that no mistakes are made, giving you confidence in your accounts.

If you’re ready to hand your bookkeeping over to a professional, you can hire a bookkeeper on Bark. 

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