The start of a new financial year is always a great time to review and refresh your business practices to optimise efficiency and effectiveness.
Here are five financial activities that you can review in your business to help you review and forecast and your small business financials in FY 22/23.
Your chart of accounts allows you accurately analyse your business by listing your income streams and expenses. The beginning of a new financial year is a great time to review your chart of accounts and add in any additional income streams or expenses that will allow you to analyse your business more accurately. Be careful not to add too many items in your chart of accounts otherwise you might face paralysis by analysis when it comes to your reporting.
2. Make sure your vehicle logbooks are up to date
If you have purchased a new car you will need to create a new logbook for this. Also, if your car is more than five years old, you will also need to create a new logbook.
3. Review your tax receipts
We often get asked how long businesses need to keep tax documentation. The documentation that the Australian Taxation Office requires you to keep are things such as bank statements, invoices sent to customers, invoices received from suppliers, payroll records and Business Activity Statement workings. While the Australian Tax Office requires you to keep copies of this documentation for five years, we recommend that you keep them for seven years. Just in case. The beginning of the new financial year presents a great opportunity to review all your kept receipts and discard any that are older than seven years.
4. Update your financial forecasts
Ideally you will have completed your financial forecasts for FY 22/23 in May 22. Ensure that your forecasts are added into your accounting software so that you can incorporate these into your monthly reporting and analyse your actuals with your forecasted numbers. Be sure that your annual forecasts have catered for commercial loan interest rate rises as well as hikes in staff wages.
5. Archive terminated employee records
Tidy up your payroll information by archiving any terminated employee records that are older than seven years. Once again, the Australian Tax Office recommends that you keep these records for five years. We recommend that you keep them for seven. Just in case.
By tidying up your financials and getting them in good working order, you will ensure that you can more accurately measure your impact and create realistic budgets and forecasts.
If you would like help preparing financial forecasts for your small business, please get in touch with one of the Wrights team at admin@wrightsca.com.au or 02 6566 2200
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