TAXES and Tips

My husband would be the first to say I should NOT be giving tips on preparing for taxes.  However, I know fully well HOW to make it easier on myself, I just don't always adhere to it.  So I thought perhaps by sharing with you all, it will make me more accountable.

All you need is a  simple excel chart.  I custom make some for my husband and myself (he is a contractor).  That way we can make them work for us.  I am NO wiz in excel, and only had some brief training for a job I had a decade ago.  I know how to make it look pretty and add up columns.  But thats all we need to make it work.


I have a chart to log my miles.  Don't forget you can write off your miles.  I log the miles each time I run to JoAnn or the bank.  Anything related to your business can be written off.

I have a chart for my expenses.  This year I am breaking it down into categories; supplies, office supplies, online fee's, show fee's, shipping, and advertisings and promotions.  Really, if you enter the information each day, there is not a lot of work to do before taxes.  However, I usually end up entering the information by quarter when I do my sales taxes.  (last year was the first time I slacked WAY off on that and worked an entire day entering information).

And did you know Paypal has reports?  That is sooo wonderful.  You can run them by month or quarter and see just how much you paid in fee's.

Then I have a chart for income.  Each quarter I have one part for sales that included tax and one chart for sales that did not require tax.  This helps to make it easier for me come quarterly sales taxes.

For my husband, his is a little more complicated.  He has charts for what he pays his subs, what they paid him, income, expenses.....I guess its similar, he just has more charts then me. 

Come tax time, we just print them all out, double check to make sure things look right, and transfer to a main page with all the categories our accountant needs to enter.  Not only does this save us time, it saves us money at the accountants office.

Here is a sample of what we each take to the accountant.

Income			Expenses
			FEE'S
			Show / Booth Fee's
			Etsy Fee's
			Paypal Fee's
PA 1st Quarter			Shipping Fee's
			sales tax paid
PA 2nd Quarter
PA 3rd Quarter			Total	$0.00
PA / NJ 4th Quarter			Other Expenses
			advertising / promotions/ web
total	$0.00		office supplies
			materials and tools
Charity / Offering			travel expenses
women in business jewerly (materials only cost)
penn view christian school jewelry (mat. Only cost)
cash donation for flood relief
beads to raise fund for Beads of Courage supply costs
			total	$0.00
total	$0.00
Social Security Numbers
Justin Smith
Staci Smith
kid 1
kid 2
kid 3
Mileage-
Studio Square Footage- 117

So think of ways to streamline your record keeping so its not a nightmare (like it was for me this year) and stick to it. 

Anyone else have tips to share to make this a better experience????