Hey everyone, few generalized questions about some things.
I want to know how you all run your businesses on the back end. The gears and operations of the structure you run within your business.
The tax man…I had an accountant helping me with everything until he fell very I’ll and no could no longer be in practice.
Long story shortened I registered my business through the state, dba through my county, and have a ein# and I’m registered as a S-Corp for taxes purposes.
He filed an extension for me back in April and now here it is almost September and I finally get word on his situation. I feel like I’m hanging with my w2s from my jobs and now my business taxes.
I haven’t paid anything into taxes thus far(business.)
So I go to speak with another accountant and I’m being told to file my taxes and dissolve my current business and start completely over as just an LLC. The accountant gave me that option and insisted that would be the best option considering the business itself has not made a ton of money. I’m still currently juggling two jobs and building this business so I can get rid of at least one job and go full time soon.
I don’t really want to close and then reopen another entity, I see the pros and cons of each side. My only thought is why would I be given such advice? Is it because a Scorp requires more paper work than just being a llc? That’s all I can think of other than the fact the business has not generated tons of money. But it has generated money I’m not at a loss.
Now with all of that being said. How do you operate your business on the back end?
I’ve used Google sheets to keep records of everything I’ve spent and earned etc. But I want to know is when you sit down in your office what makes your business run smoothly? What softwares do you personally use. If you’re a scorp for taxes how do you handle that on a quarterly bases? Or do you let a accountant handle everything for you?
I love window cleaning and I really want to grow my business…a lot of you guys on here have inspired me so much to be able to see that I can do this. I have 4 commercial accounts, and a good growing route for storefront. I haven’t done much residential, but I also haven’t marketed or really focused on that side of income for the business. I decided in the earlier stages I wanted to build a route on storefronts, and have a handfull of commercial accounts. I’ve done that and I’m still growing but I want to expand my business and grow in the right direction.
Now…I know there’s a search function and I’ve used it.
If in fact I should close and restart like the advice I’m getting from 1 accountant I’m considering making a move to another state, if I did so I’d be moving to the panhandle in florida.
I know I have a lot of questions on a few different topics but I need advice. Because at this point to be told to close and reopen just is a catch 22 for me or maybe a bit of a ego issue?
Thank you in advance if anyone has the time to reply and help me with some guidance on the topics at hand in this post.
I’m an Scorp , yes I have an accountant
What she does is files my Sales taxes quarterly.
So each quarter I get her my business account Bank statements ,an she figures out the sales tax from there Each quarter
Each month I get paid as an employee , An we pay our payroll taxes each month, So it’s paytoll every month an sales tax quarterly
I operate my business through my business credit card. Nothing else goes on that card just anything ,An everything for the Business. I set up that card on automatic payment through the business account. I raise it lower it all depending on the balance
We file at the end of year together my wife, an I My Salary ,an her Salary she works , so that income , an my income.
Hopefully I explained that correctly. I have an accountant, so this stuff is not my strong point.
Thank you very much. I just can’t seem to figure out why she wants me to proceed and dissolve. I’m going to seek 2 more accountants advice. I really appreciate your response!
I have an S-Corp too. I submit my sales tax receipts quarterly. I submit taxes annually with the use of TurboTax. I haven’t depreciated assets yet as my vehicles are quite old .
All of my expenses are annotated in FreshBooks. My S-Corp has checking and savings accounts that are separate from my personal accounts. There is NO commingling of funds. When I have had to loan personal money to the business those loans were promptly repaid.
My invoices are sent and annotated in FreshBooks for the customers I inherited. All new accounts are invoiced with The Customer Factor. I do my scheduling with TCF and my hard copy calendar and my smartphone calendar.
I am an employee of my S-Corp and I and my other employees are paid monthly via Sure Payroll, which also withdraws and disburses the payroll taxes. Sometimes the President (me) authorizes the business manager (me) to issue dividends (not the correct term for S-Corp distributions but I will think of it later) to the shareholder (me). My personal income taxes are also done by me with TurboTax.
I am not qualified to tell you what type of accountant advice you should be seeking but I will tell you that the Turbo Tax plug and chug by the owner operator is relatively simple for a small business like mine.
You said you cant quite figure out why she wants you to do this. Why don’t you schedule another appointment with her and tell her to slowly walk you through the reasons so you can have a deeper understanding and better knowledge before you, ( A ) - Accept her advice or ( B ) - Seek opinions from other accounting firms.
I would not rely solely on the forum to make this decision because everyone’s situation is potentially different.
I set up as an LLC. It has the protections of a corporation, but is not subject to corporate taxes and is much simpler, especially for a solo operator. When i was beginning i did encounter the suggestion to do s-corp as apparently you can set it up in a way that can possibly save a bit on taxes. My accountant also advised me against this though and said i should stick with LLC. Of course, it depends on your state too. I agree with @WDW that you should have your accountant go through the actual numbers with you and maybe get another opinion.
This organization can give you some free business consultation. They were helpful to me when I needed to take some actions to have workers compensation not apply to the corporate officers who worked for the company. http://floridasbdc.org/
