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Small Business Tax Calendar for December 2008
The following list of December tax dates is intended to be useful for accountants, bookkeepers and small business owners:
Using the QuickBooks Customer Register Instead of Invoices
Some businesses choose to record charges to their customers in the customer register, as opposed to creating invoices. They then send statements summarizing the entries in the customer register to their customers on a regular basis. While there are some limitations of using billing statements in QuickBooks, this method of billing customers is practical for some businesses.
2009 Standard Mileage Rate
The IRS announced the 2009 standard mileage rates today. The rate for business miles driven is down slightly from the second half of 2008, but still considerably higher than the first half of 2008 and prior years. Effective July 1, 2008, the standard mileage rates are as follows:
Home Office Deductions - Rooms Method vs. Square-Footage Method
Home office deductions are normally based on the percentage of your house you use for business. For example, if you have a 2,000 square foot house and use one 200 square foot room of it for business purposes, then you can deduct 10% of relevant expenses (200/2,000). This is called the square-footage method. However, you are also allowed to base the percentage on the number of rooms in the house (the rooms method). Therefore, if you only have 5 rooms in the house, you can deduct 20% of relevant expense (1/5).
Creating Statements in QuickBooks for One Customer
Sending statements to customers who owe you money is an important piece of an effective cash management system. If a company isn't paying your invoices, then it's probably either a mistake or because they are having cash flow problems. If it's a mistake, then a reminder will be appreciated. If your customer is having cash flow problems, then you want to keep your invoices at the top of their list. If you don't keep requesting payment, then you will be a lower priority than those companies that do keep asking. Fortunately, QuickBooks makes it very easy to create statements.
C-corp or S-corp?
While C corporations and S corporations have a lot in common, there are some significant differences that cause them to appeal to different businesses. First, some similiarities of C-corps and S-corps:
Limitations of Using Billing Statements in QuickBooks
Some businesses choose to bill their customers via statements instead of invoices. While this is not the best choice for most businesses, it sometimes is for businesses that bill periodically (weekly, monthly, etc.). These businesses record charges to their customers in the customer register instead of creating invoices, and then create statements summarizing the entries made in the customer register to send to their customers. Before choosing to do this, it is important to be aware of the limitations of doing so:
2009 Corporate Tax Rates
The corporate tax rate schedule has been the same for a number of years and President-elect Obama has said he has no plans to change corporate tax rates. Assuming the rates don't change, 2009 corporate tax rates will remain as follows:
When to Use Statements in QuickBooks
The primary reason for using statements in QuickBooks is to remind delinquent customers that they owe you money and to summarize the amount they owe. However, some businesses use statements instead of invoices.
QuickBooks 2009 Live Community Makes Getting Help Easy
QuickBooks 2009 Live Community greatly simplifies getting help in QuickBooks. If you keep the Live Community/Help window open while you work in QuickBooks, it continually changes to suggest relevant topics to whatever it is in QuickBooks that you are currently working on. And you can choose between getting help via the standard QuickBooks Help (which is faster and easier to use than it used to be) or using Live Community to ask a question. If you choose to ask a question in Live Community, the first thing Live Community does is to check to see if your questions has already been asked and answered, in which case you can go right to the answer, as opposed to waiting for someone to answer your question.
