If you are just starting out in business you will probably have lots of questions especially when it comes to managing your finances. Many banks will want you to prepare a forecast of your income and expenditure before they will consider you for a loan or an overdraft and many need this even to open a business bank account. That can be daunting if you really don't know where to start and what you should include. …
Making Tax Digital (MTD) is HMRC's term for submission of tax information online. The revised implementation date was announced in July 2017 and now we have a little more information about what will be expected. From April 2019 VAT registered businesses over the VAT registration threshold (£85,000 for 2017-18) will have to submit their monthly or quarterly VAT returns online through their accounts software. VAT registered businesses below the VAT registration threshold will not be required to but can submit in this way voluntarily. If you submit annual VAT returns you will be able to continue to do this. …
Businesses should have a separate bank account for their business transactions as it will make preparing their accounts so much easier. Trying to extract business income and costs from a personal account takes a lot more time and if you needed to prove any business transactions when applying for a loan, for example, they would have access to your personal spending habits too. …
Bookkeeping is defined as "the recording of all financial transactions". Sounds simple but if that was the case why is bookkeeping a career with qualifications ranging from Level 2 to Level 4? The financial transactions of a sole trader's business to those of a huge organisation vary enormously but whatever level of transactions there are bookkeeping principles to follow. A sole trader business can be just as complex as a limited company business, maybe more so in some cases - we certainly deal with sole traders who have high value businesses and large numbers of transactions as well as limited companies who have very …
It is surprising how many emails I receive asking how much we charge for bookkeeping. Of course that is the uppermost thought when deciding to get some outside help with something. How much is it going to cost me? But how can I give you a price when I have no idea what you need, what your business does, whether your accounts are up to date or in a mess or whether you have a VAT return due next week. We do not have a "one price fits all" package. …
