Blogs/Vlogs

Get control of your figure in January

10 January 2017

First of all, I would like to say Happy New Year to you all. The team at UHY Hacker Young and I would like to wish you all the very best for 2017.

January is the time of year when all the old clichés are wheeled out, New Year’s resolutions, Dry January, must get fit, must lose weight… the list goes on.

You can probably also add doing your tax return to that list. It does baffle me though; why people leave it so late? Why would you want to be hit with an unknown tax bill so soon after Christmas? Especially when you’ve had ten months to do something about it? I appreciate this doesn’t apply to all businesses, but you get my point.

In reality we know why. People are motivated by their businesses, earning money and dreaming of a comfortable retirement. They didn’t want to be an accountant (who does?), so the last thing they want to be doing in their evenings and weekends is bookkeeping - however much they know they should be doing it.

In 2017 things can change. Technology is moving at a rapid pace and you have the chance to embrace it - before it leaves you behind drowning in a pile of paperwork.

There are three simple reasons why I think you should consider cloud accounting technology, such as Xero, if you haven’t already:

  1. It will save you time
    Features such as direct bank feeds, raising invoices via your mobile phone, online payments and taking photos of receipts whilst you’re on the go will save you a considerable amount of time and paperwork.
  2. It will give you up-to-date information
    To allow you to make informed business decisions and calculate your tax liabilities (such as VAT and business tax) on a regular basis. Who likes tax surprises? Imagine having a good idea what your tax liabilities will be before handing your information to your accountant!
  3. You can access your financial data anytime, anywhere
    No matter where you are, your finances are at your fingertips. You could have access to the key metrics that help drive your business forward. Whether that’s profit for the year, actual vs budgets, or knowing who your best and worst customers are.

If one of your New Year resolutions was to get control of your business, why don’t you try and Xero in on your financial figure (do you like what I did there!) and make January a month to focus on your business, rather than worrying about your tax liability.

You don’t need to ‘figure’ it out for yourself either, just come along to one of my free introductory Xero workshops and see for yourself how easy it is to get control or simply contact me for a one-to-one system review.

Alternatively,  feel free to follow me on Twitter: @AdamBFernandes.

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