Anyone who owns their own small business knows that when you don’t have an organizational system in place, you are going to be drowning in important paperwork that you are more than likely going to need at some point. It is essential that you have some sort of plan in place for organizing all the important documents that come through your office. There are several things that you can do to help keep it all under control with a little bit of effort. Mark Dicus & Company is here to share some organization tips for your business paperwork.
How Long Should You Keep Business Records Like Bank Statements?
The first thing that you need to be aware of is the timeline that the IRS recommends for your business and the records that you need to keep. While the IRS will tell you that you need to keep paperwork for the last 4 years of your business before getting rid of it, you need to know that when you report more than 25% of your business’s gross income, the IRS can come and ask you about it 6 years after you file the return. It is important that you have all of your records ready in the case that you get notified by the IRS that you are getting audited. If you do get this letter and are organized, it won’t be nearly as stressful when that letter shows up.
How to You Keep Your Business Records Organized?
Since every business is different, we are going to be sharing some general organization tips that you can customize to fit the needs of your business.
– Receipts: Some businesses are going to have more receipts than others that they are trying to keep track of. One of the easiest ways to keep track of the receipts for your business is to put them in envelopes that are categorized by month. That way, if you ever need to refer back to them, you can simply go back and look at the month in question.
– Bank Statements: Another great way to keep track of this is by month as well. You will want to print off all of your credit card, PayPal, bank and stripe statements and keep them organized together.
– Invoices: While your first thought may not be your taxes when you think of your invoices, the state is going to be looking to make sure you invoiced state sales tax properly. If you use a program like QuickBooks for your invoices, it should be fairly easy to access these records. You can also save the invoice records as a PDF so that you will still have them in the case your software was to crash.
Tax Preparation, Filing, Planning & More in Salt Lake City, St. George, West Valley City, Provo, Orem, West Jordan & Greater Cedar City, Utah
If you are struggling with bookkeeping, you can turn to Mark Dicus & Company to help you keep it all straight. We will take it off your plate so you can focus on other areas of your business. Call us today!