Tips for managing the accounts and business.
After many years of working in the accounting sector and my failed business experience, I want to insist that small business owners prepare themselves to implement systems in their businesses to avoid disappointments from the start.
Maintain good bookkeeping from the first day of your business.
I understand that you will experience lots of stress in setting up a business, and there will be a possibility of ignoring your business’s accounting side. However, remember it is a necessary action for you to survive in your industry. First, start with a filing system for all the receipts to bring things up to date.
Collaboration
No one knows everything in a business. Everyone needs another viewpoint to do things better and wiser to save time. Time is money; besides, that allows you to enhance your knowledge and thinking power regarding your business.
Pay attention to deadlines.
When running a business, you will have many deadlines you cannot afford to miss. In accounting, filing accounts, paying taxes, making payments to staff, and being a charity, you must comply with the charity commission’s regulations.
Write all the important dates on a wall calendar where you cannot miss them: Year End, VAT Return, PAYE, Business Insurance Renewal, Website Hosting Renewal, Employee Birthdays, and other essential dates meeting the declaration.
Cash flow & budget
A business owner should have a budget before getting into the business and follow it regularly to avoid overspending on anything.
The cash flow needs monitoring from day one of your business if you will not know how much cash is coming in and how much is going out. Therefore, checking your cash flow daily helps you to keep everything under control.
Treat your customers.
Customers are the backbone of your business, so if they face any problems related to your product or services, you should provide the attention at your earliest even though you might have issues on your own. Therefore, please do not neglect your customers and help quickly resolve their problems. That makes your customers trust you and your business.
Keep personal and business completely separate.
If you mix it up, the bookkeeper will find it difficult to produce accurate accounting, which results in making over or underpayments of tax to the tax office. If you have a tax inspection, they will not separate the two, and you will lose money and pay more tax. Apart from the tax issues, you will face other problems. There will be no clear rules if you want to make decisions for your business, like managing your staff, making payments to suppliers, and creating your business’s financial statements. Therefore, always set the rules for keeping business and personal separate, particularly when your family is involved in the industry.
Keep all receipts from fuel, office supplies, overheads, work clothes, equipment, and hospitality/social functions, so your accountant can claim total expenses entitlement against your tax bill.
Staff training
Do you have a blueprint for your training needs? If you want to train your staff, create a detailed blueprint explaining your potential employee’s expectations for running your business. I am sure you must have a business plan with all that, but you will not be able to hand over the whole business plan to everyone who comes to work for you. Therefore, you need to have the training plan separately and hand it to your potential employee to read.
Tips for managing the accounts and business.
We all make mistakes and learn from them, which is the most valuable skill you will learn. However, remember that mistakes are irreversible unless you face them head-on and put them right.
I hope you find these tips helpful for running your business smoothly and setting up your accounting systems.