Tax can be stressful and with the end of year tax return approaching fast, it’s best to start planning to avoid the headache. Your tax return reveals insights on how your business is performing. Decisions can be made on investments opportunities, where you can cut costs and opportunities arising to maximise profits. Super, GST and ATO reporting are all part of your tax obligations, so what documents for tax return do you need to make sure are lodged properly?
6 requirements of your business tax return
Not every business will have same requirements. Here are a few fundamentals that need to be calculated, and documents for tax return that are necessary to lodge a successful one.
BAS and PAYG reporting
Have you been lodging your Business Activity Statement BAS, via SBR2 Pay-As-You-Go PAYG and superannuation throughout the year? Single Touch Payroll STP also became mandatory on the 1st July 2018 for companies with over 20 employees as the new way of paying wages. Your BAS reporting should be monthly or quarterly and its important they are accurate and efficient.
Expense tracking
When it comes to expense tracking, make sure your data is up-to-date and categorised. This will make it easier to quickly determine your profit and loss. You should be keeping track of stock, inventory of products or parts so you can calculate cost of goods sold.
Income Tracking
Your cash flow has to be accurately represented even if it’s a negative. It’s also important to know whether your company is using accrual (products or services are invoiced to a customer) or cash-basis accounting. The type of accounting you use will determine which recent transactions count as income for the current year and which are saved for next year’s taxes.
Separate Personal & Business Expenses
Expenses need to be categorised and separated as business or personal. Ideally, you’d want to have a separate business account, but if you don’t, this is incredibly important.
Deductions
Deductions such as mileage, travel, clothing and home office should be tracked throughout the year and claimed in your return. Capital expenses like machinery can be depreciated over a longer period of time.
Reporting
You should have available the right data at the right time. Year-to-date (YTD) reports, payment summaries, turnover, Profit & Loss Balance Sheets, liabilities and more. With comprehensive reports you can focus on and remove bad debts, prepare and lodge for the ATO, and stay on top of your obligations.
If this seems a little overwhelming and your growing in size, it might be time to look at investing in accounting software. SapphireOne Accounting Software saves you time by automating processes and prefilling statements for the ATO. SapphireOne’s secure connection is complaint and ensures lodging of BAS, payroll, super and tax is fast and accurate. Your end of year business tax return can be calculated after generating reports with all the necessary financial information from your one data file.
For more information on the capabilities SapphireOne ERP, CRM, DMS, Accounting Software application and how we can help you at tax time click here, request a demo or contact us.
