A Love Letter to Business Owners, You Survived Tax Season.
Take a deep breath. No, really. Breathe in, hold it, and let it out. You did it. You survived tax season.
Through the mountain of receipts, the endless spreadsheets, and the moments of sheer panic when you wondered if you had forgotten something major, you actually submitted your taxes.
Those late nights spent double-checking write-offs, the endless emails with your accountant that feel like decoding an entirely new language, and the deep sigh of relief when everything is finally submitted...that's what we are celebrating here in this blog!
Tax season is stressful all in itself, but tax season as a business owner is double the work and double the stress. Even if you work with a tax advisor or account, there is still a lot of time and effort that you likely put towards this process! So, before you rush off back to work, take a moment to celebrate tax season officially being complete and focus on self-care! Here are a few of our favorite forms of self-care lately:
Buy yourself a coffee
Go shopping for a new outfit
Take a bubble bath
Go on a Walk
Try a New Recipe
Take yourself out to dinner
CHEERS TO YOU!
If you're ready to prep for next year, keep reading!
Prep for Next Year, NOW!
Audit
What worked well? Half the stress of doing your taxes is ensuring that you collected all the right information so do a quick audit, what worked well, and what was the most stressful? This is how you'll revamp your process to better this time of year for yourself next year!
Reorganize
Organizing is KEY for success here. Everyone organizes so differently, so go back to your organization tool (even if it's just Google Drive, no shame in that!) and restart your organization, whatever that looks like for you, so you are ready to go into this new tax season. In my Google Drive, I like to keep one spreadsheet with a checklist of everything I need to submit to my tax accountant on one tab and link it to a folder inside my drive with each of the categories for quick access, like receipts, W2s, etc. While I use Quickbooks for a lot of this information storage on a daily basis and have paper copies, too, I always like to have an extra cloud backup like Google Drive as a just in case!
Set Money Aside
Start prepping for next year! Even if you took a bit of a loss this year and didn't have any major paying-in to do, it can be great to get a head start and set money aside or come up with a plan to set money aside for this in the next year. That way you aren't panicking when/if the time comes.
Mark Your Calendar
Important due dates, set deadlines, add in time for a review! If you're anything like me and like to push tax season out of your mind as much as you can...I feel you. I set up quarterly time blocks in my calendar to ensure that all of my tracking is going well — receipts are being scanned, expense reports are good to go, etc.. 80% of the time I find an error in my own systems, and that why I always recommend to mark this into your calendar! Again, put due dates and deadlines for yourself, too, because you know you are a busy business owner and things can slip under the rug!
That's all the advice we have here! We aren't tax advisors by any means, so consult with your tax professionals on what this process should look like for your company. And, remember that you are one tough cookie for making it through tax season as a business owner!
