We would like to inform you of a couple important developments on the Government Assistance.
On the CEBA program of $40,000 interest free loan, they have started taking the applications today. You can only apply online and through the bank you have a business account with.
The wage subsidy program has been split into two, Temporary Wage Subsidy (TWS) and Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy (CEWS)
The former program gets you 10% subsidy and the later one, 75% of the wages you pay.
They have yet to start taking applications on CEWS.
Let us know soon if you need more details on these programs.
In recent weeks, we brought to your attention about five Government Assistance Programs.
EI & CERB seems to be working well by now. Most of the eligible employers have started receiving these funds. CERB now allows you to earn some additional income to complement your $500 benefit.
The CEBA & TWS also seem working well. Most of the eligible employers have started receiving these funds.
Employers can start applying for 75% Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy (CEWS) starting today. Some of you may recall the employees you laid off earlier. If you now give them less hours than you gave in Pre-COVID time, the subsidy may work out to 100% of what you pay. Corporate owners on payroll may qualify.
Also coming on board is a new program, Canada Emergency Commercial Rent Assistance (CECRA). This will help tenants pay 75% of their rent for 3 months. The key eligibility criterion is that your revenue must have declined at least 70% from the Pre-COVID-19 levels. And those levels should be less than $50,000 per month. Government covers for the 50% of the rent; landlord takes 25% less and you pay 25% of your rent.
Should you need our help to follow up on any of these programs, please do contact us.
When we start our own business, we do most things ourselves because of the new likeness and excitement which urges us to handle things on our own, even the things we don’t like, including the bookkeeping, and is not a task that comes easy. This is because you would not only have to deal with getting someone who can perform the tasks that you need to be done like keeping your accounting books well-maintained in an accurate manner because you think you have a grasp of the basics of businesses.
Here are 3 most common bookkeeping mistakes small and new businesses often make, along with our handy suggestions about how to avoid them for long-term business growth.
Putting off Bookkeeping Process:
Sounds fun, but it’s not! If you’ve decided to handle those looming and deadlines tasks, then better be prepared for the consequences. Sooner or later, there will be an overwhelming sort of tasks which you need to update. The things can go even worse when you won’t have a clear idea of what’s happening in your business. And soon HST and tax deadlines are looming, and you aren’t ready.
Do’s:
The best thing you can do is put some effort to update your financial information in your dairy and check that you understand what your figures are actually telling you without doing minimum fuss and duplication.
Mixing both business & personal spending:
Thinking of mixing both business & personal spending is actually not a good idea to consider. It’s easy to lose track of what you have done so far as it creates a mess and confusion towards you, and soon you can find yourself out of nowhere.
In just a few days you will begin to struggle to remember all your relevant bank or credit card statements which were necessary for your business, and wasting a lot of time is another task which will frustrate you from inside.
Do’s:
Our recommendation is to go for a separate business credit or debit card so that you will always have a clear view, record and track of your business-related spending. Another benefit which you will get is it helps to avoid tax return mistakes.
Intricate Cash Flow:
Not collecting your receipts and purchase invoices might lose you a clear view of tracking your business cash flow. Not correctly coding all your income and expenditure creates unuseful reports for you and your business which will devastate business in the long run.
Do’s:
Well, it is advised to always keep an extensive record for your business receipts from the biggest to even the smallest expenses as it will help to reduce your HST and tax bills. But it may come handy during scrutiny as HMRC could ask to scan your receipts reports.
For business proprietors and partners and their spouses we do have some time before filing their returns.
For others we are running short of time; deadline to file this year is June 1st.
For many of such clients, we have already filed the returns. But some clients have yet to provide us their documents (tax slips). We do have your T4s and T5s if we prepared these slips for you. But you need to provide us other slips you may have.
Tax Planning takes time but can save a lot of taxes, many times hundreds of dollars and sometimes thousands. If you bring your documents close to the deadline, we will not have enough time to do proper planning.
To save you maximum taxes we request that you provide us your documents soon. Send these electronically or drop these through our office door slot at any time of your convenience. Alternatively send these in the mail. These days we do not meet our client’s in-person for reasons known to you.
A large Employer subsidy program CEWS has just started. It will give you 75% of the wages that you pay your employees.
People who have taken CERB will not qualify for CEWS. You may like to pull yourself out of CERB and go on CEWS. Those who got CERB without being eligible, should also do so.
There are many Assistance Programs to help businesses cope up with Covid-19 damages. Only some of the programs may apply to your business. We are helping our clients to maximize their benefits. We do so by matching program eligibility criteria with your business situation.
A key parameter in matching is your Current Operation (CO) Level. For example, your CO level may be about 80% of the Regular Operation (RO) level. This represents an almost fully open business. At 20% level you will be almost fully closed. A partly open situation may be at 50% CO level. We would like to know your approximate CO level.
We would also like to know your Revenue in January, February, March and April. We have now prepared the attached Form to get your answers.
Due to COVID-19 we have not been meeting client’s in-person since last week of March. But we have managed well using emails and phone call to exchange Information or Documents (IODs).
Even if some restrictions are being reduced by government, Social Distancing is expected to remain for a while. We are afraid we have to continue these procedures to exchange IODs.
Some clients had to provide us packages containing hundreds of documents. At our request they dropped off such packages through the slot in our office door. We want all clients to know of this procedure.
Anybody including the couriers can drop off document packages at our office in a bin placed on the office stairs. You can do that any time in office hours. The other drop off alternative is through our office door slot; this can be done at any time.
For providing us information on a few pages, you can use E-mail and that on many pages; use a service like Google Drive or Dropbox or OneDrive.
We are all going through tough times brought upon us by COVID-19. We hope you and your family are all well.
Health departments and professionals are helping you by informing on health matters; and Finance departments and professionals, on economic matters. We as accountants want to help you in ways we can.
Most of you own small businesses. So, we undertook to help you with 3 major economic programs set up by our governments recently.
For the employees who have lost their jobs, the usual route of Employment Insurance (EI) is already there; a new route Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) is being setup.
This will give $2,000 monthly to self-employed owners and contractors.
To help employers pay wages, a program called Temporary Wage Subsidy (TWS) is being setup. Employer can get up to 75% of their wage expenses paid by government.
To ease cashflow of businesses, Canada Emergency Business Account (CEBA) program is being setup. This will give your business an interest free loan of $40,000 and $10,000 of this amount may not be even repayable.
Eligibility Criteria and Application Forms for these programs should be ready within a week. We are watching the developments closely and continuously. Let us know if you need our help in applying for EI, CERB, TWS or CEBA.
We also want to let you know that we have extended our restriction on in-person meetings to April 13th. But we are open for business using email and phone during regular office hours.
There are no limits on who can become a great entrepreneur; everyone can start their beautiful and challenging journey on their own. And for that, a bunch of money in the bank or even business experience is needed to start something that could become the next major success in future. However, you do need a strong plan and the drive to see it through what going on behind.
There are lots of things you have to do to run and manage your business and it is not like a one-person involved. However you can, but chances are that you may need someone who can keep a sort of records like harmonized sales taxes, workplace safety insurance payroll, prepare journals, ledgers, and compliance reports and schedules to make your business run smoothly without hiccups.
Now everything is set up quite perfectly to run your business, but many a time bookkeeping – which is one of the fundamental origins that keep track and monitors the business aspects, often ends up at the bottom of the list.
Business owner and entrepreneur like to think forward, plan to implement change in real-time and having a bookkeeper is a one step ahead and a game changer. Look, whatever business you want to run or already running, without bookkeeping don’t think that things will move into the right direction. If you having that kind of mindset, better evaluate and be aware because after that, things will be in chaos and revert is quite impossible.
We compiled 4 best bookkeeping practices for you which in today’ world necessary to keep your business run in a flow
Separate business:
Now for instance, if you, or your employees, are buying things for personal use with business funds, do you think that it is a good idea to implement as it will quickly cause cash flow issues, and tax filing and auditing complications? And it is better not to ever make a mistake of incorporating business with your expenses. If done, then in the long-term, it will make bookkeeping much harder and creates chaos.
Make review habit:
Being busy in handling business is a good thing, but not having a glance on where your money is going or went each week can put you in confusion or in a dilemma state. If not controlled, in no time can quickly cause cash flow issues.
To ease and help you mitigate financial stress down the road, bookkeeper recommends weekly expense review using Quick-books which is only not smarter in making a simple transparent report to review your expenses but also keep track of what income came in that week and how it process.
Time for paperless:
21st century is all about technology and it is not a smart step to implement paper books in keeping records these days as it acts as a pile that puts loads on managing and updating stuff. Without implementing a solid core foundation of accounting systems like Quick-books or cloud-based expense technologies, daily bookkeeping tasks will put a major strain on your ass and time. And professional bookkeeper often recommends using it as it saves time and efforts and can give you a portal glance of your financial histories.
Consult Bookkeeper Regularly:
Keep a list of your second thoughts or back-office questions on a regular basis with a professional bookkeeper and it is not a good idea to consult only just at tax time to get relevant answers and advice because maybe, later on, this also puts you at risk if you are ever audited by the IRS and having a hectic moment, not every businessperson wishes for. So, keeping an eye on your bookkeeper ensures you are always tax-ready and will also help you avoid major money pitfalls that may create a burden on your shoulder.
Last but not least, the reason why bookkeepingis important because it allows the business owners to know exactly what is happening in their business with full transparency tracking reports. To make your business progresses in an exceptional way, you must know how to play the numbers well like in the revenue and expenses and you cannot afford to miss out on.
Are you planning to start a new business this New Year and looking for a bookkeeper, who is equally responsible for his work, effort and reputation to manage all the official task of the business, then understand its tactics, before you hire one?
Bookkeeping is the systematic and consistent recording, organizing and maintaining of financial transactions in a company or a business. It doesn’t matter what kind of business you are having, Starting and maintaining solid, professional accounting practices for bookkeeping is honestly essential for the overall growth of the business.
In general, accounting should be performed daily on financial transactions and information related to a company. The reason why we are so concerned is whenever there is a situation when we want to verify the task like the sales, tax or something which is related to the benefit of the company, it ensures that records of the individual financial transactions are correct, up-to-date and comprehensive.
Make sure you are ordering in work with accuracy and consistency is therefore vital to the process. Basically, accounting means recording and keeping track of the financial numbers which is vitally involved in the financial aspect for both individuals and non-profit organizations.
It is obvious because detailed and thorough accounting is crucial for companies of all sizes as it controls the business which is a never-ending process coupled up with increasing to-do lists. Later on, if we didn’t aware of keeping a track, accounting quickly becomes more complex with several taxes, assets, loans and investments responsibilities. So, the bookkeeper is equally responsible for its reputation and comprehensive work.
Now, the main and truest purpose of a business is the tracking and maintaining company’s financial assets that allows bookkeeper to responsibly keep an up-to-date record of current incoming, outgoing and outdated amounts. This is what we talked about earlier.
The bookkeeper responsible for bookkeeping a business would record all transactions that are related to business, but not limited to:
Basic Accounting Records
Handling the Vendors and Customers Invoices
Cheque books and Reconciling Bank Statement
Payroll Records and Payroll Files
Receivable Accounts
Sales Tax Reports
Relevant Ledger Entries and so on
Bookkeeping and accounting are often heard being used interchangeably and sometimes confuses a person which one to consider, however, accounting is the overall practice of managing and tracking finances of a business or individual, while bookkeeping usually refers to more specifically to the tasks and practices involved in recording the financial activities.
This however looks same but is somehow different depending upon the task and services which business are offering.
Now you know the difference between the two, so find which one suits for you. Well in our case, both are necessary and vital for handling the reputation of your business
At H&T Accounting Services, we can prepare for you any documents you need to present to various government departments on income tax, harmonized sales tax, occupational safety insurance and payroll. All the documents we prepare are highly confidential and tax-efficient. We also carry out all the necessary records and accounts to support the information used in the archived documents so that next time it can come in use. With our accounting services, we can help improve the administration and profits of your business. For more information on how we can help you regarding your business, consult our professionals.
Every company or business has a mission and once it is sorted out or vision are tweaked, then big tycoons faced with the issue of implementing the new plan and sometimes that requires extensive help from accountants or bookkeepers.
For the purposes of controlling business, the following will serve as why having a bookkeeping services is vital organ for your business.
According to us, Bookkeepers are a rare breed of individuals, and are used by every organization’s – known for their skills for the recording and managing of financial transactions, and is basically the part of the process of accounting in business. But if they do not possess superior skills, they can drop a corporation in a very quick order and guess what things are messed.
Therefore, this person is vitally important to any organization and if you are wishing to have a more than one, then this is overall good just for the bright future in the world of business.
Now, what duties they actually offer us to surf the business with ease, let’s find out:
Maintenance of Basic Accounting Records
Handling the Invoices of Vendors and Customers
Balancing the Cheque books and Reconciling Bank Statement
Maintenance of Payroll Records and Payroll Files
Maintenance of Receivable Accounts
Making Relevant Ledger Entries
Preparation of Sales Tax Reports
Prints Preserved Financial Reports and Statements
Well, there are a lot more and it surely depends upon what kind of business you are having. If you are having a small business, still there is a chance that you require bookkeeping and it’s better to hire one for your business.
If you want us to do bookkeeping for your new or existing business, H&T Accounting services offer premium bookkeeping and accounting services in Mississauga, Toronto.
No matter what your business says or what kinds of services you are serving we have everything to provide you with every record where our professional’s accountants use standard working techniques to prepare journals, ledgers, and compliancereports and schedules and a much more for you.
