Category: Accounting
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Reviewing income tax returns for accuracy and opportunity
Reviewing income tax returns for accuracy is valuable because it can avoid processing delays, prevent errors that would cause audits and trigger penalties. There is a second potentially more valuable reason to review a tax return. and uncover opportunities for tax planning to reduce tax burdens in the future. Many accountants, including myself, offer a…
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Employer health insurance payments are not wages
Employer-paid health insurance may not be included in employee wages. Doing so, even in error, does not alleviate the employer from possible excise taxes under ACA. This errant accounting practice also creates additional employer tax penalty liabilities for improper reporting of wages. This afternoon I attended a continuing professional education webinar where a fabulous tax expert…
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Explaining the Health Insurance Penalty
Accountants and tax preparers complain that they have been put in the position of enforcing the Affordable Care Act’s insurance mandate without compensation or training as health insurance agents. They are absolutely correct and this system has produced in some bizarre results. This was illustrated when one accountant wrote to me “I have clients that…
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OnlineAdviser gets a makeover
As I reviewed my first year in business (2015) it was obvious that I had 3 distinct problems with the business model and my personal habits. It was not completely unexpected. I operate a different and largely untested type of accounting practice under the brand name OnlineAdviser that relies almost exclusively on online technologies. While I…
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The problem with accountants
Accountants generally enjoy a reputation as the ‘most trusted adviser’. But the problem is that we do our work, get out and move on. That work might be the income tax return, bookkeeping work, or some other well-defined engagement. General financial advice is too often an unplanned side benefit of our work. Accountants who don’t define and…
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Top ten tax saving strategies for 2016
Our U.S. federal income tax law includes a number of built-in strategies available to reduce income tax liability. Your ability to legally reduce your own income tax bill depends on your level of understanding and utilization of the opportunities available in five key areas of financial planning: Source of income and the legal format of…
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Use American Express with QuickBooks to save bookkeeping time
Typically the most time consuming task in small business accounting is recording the details of expense transactions. The built-in coordination between American ExpressOPEN business card and QuickBooks can cut that time requirement. Simply enroll in the “Connect to QuickBooks” feature at no extra cost to have transactions sent to QuickBooks daily. Employees can also have their transactions…
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Early tax filing: what you need to know
For millions of Americans, the individual income tax refund is the largest payday that they have all year. So it is understandable that many are eager to be the first in line to file for their federal income tax refund. If you are among them, here is what you need to know: The first day…
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Three tips for wage tax do-it-yourselfers
Here are three tips if you prepare your own W2 and 1099 forms for your small business: The first tip is that there is no need to purchase the stock forms from an office supply store. The forms are available for free from IRS at https://www.irs.gov/Businesses/Online-Ordering-for-Information-Returns-and-Employer-Returns . The second tip is don’t do this again! If you…