Business Owners: Don’t Let August Slip By Without Reading these Important Reminders

Here we are already through half of August! We can’t believe how quickly 2018 is flying by!

With the busy schedules that business owners keep, we wanted to check in and take the opportunity to send out what we feel are some important things business owners should be doing at this time of the year.

W9’s Filled Out or Updated

W9’s are important for issuing 1099’s at year-end. The issuance of the 1099 is a requirement that the IRS places on the business owner when paying contractors for services rendered. In order to ensure the accuracy of 1099s issued to the recipient as well as the IRS, there must be a W9 on file for each contractor paid by your business. 

We encourage clients to make sure to have contractors fill out their W9 prior to the first check issued as this offers a little leverage in ensuring that the W9 is completed in a timely fashion. Unfortunately, what we see all too often is that business owners forget to get the W9 filled out and when tax time inevitably rolls around, contractors are unreachable or take a while to get the information back to the owner, resulting in missed Federal deadlines. 

Not only should W9’s be filled out by each contractor you pay for services, but W9’s need to be updated to reflect address changes.  If you haven’t updated your W9’s at the beginning of this year it wouldn’t hurt to go ahead and have your contractors fill out another W9 now.  We see 1099’s returned, undeliverable, during tax season. As a result, the contractor does not receive their 1099 and generally the business owner has to take time to track them down to ensure delivery.

Get your W9’s filled out today.  Here is a link to get your W9 form https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw9.pdf

W4’s For Employees Updated (New Tax Law and Address Changes)

W4’s are important for issuing accurate W2’s to your employees at year end.  You have probably already had your employees fill them out in prior years or if they started this year, at the start of their employment.  However, with so many people moving, it is always good to have W4’s filled out each year or even during the year if they have moved.  If you didn’t have people fill them out at the beginning of this year or if you have had employees move, please have them fill out a new W4.  Another very important reason to have your employees fill out a new W4 is the fact that new tax laws went into place this year and they may want to adjust their withholding allowances to account for that.  Here is a link to the Form W4 https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw4.pdf

Keeping Up With Your Accounting

Hopefully you are not in this boat, but there are often times business owners that put off doing their accounting.  Proper accounting can help and is very important for all aspects of your business.  If you don’t have time for this important task and need to focus on your business, we would love to help you out.

Tax Planning

Tax Planning is very important.  We recommend setting a Year-End Tax Planning appointment with your CPA during the timeframe of Oct.-Dec. This would definitely be a great reminder to put on your calendar. 

It is always better to be proactive than reactive.  

Joshua Wilson, CPA, PC is a full-service public accounting firm that specializes in accounting, tax preparation, tax planning, & business development for small businesses in Winder, GA and the surrounding areas. Give Joshua a call today to set up a consultation at 770-856-1309 or email him at josh@joshuawilsoncpa.com.