The end of the year will soon be here.
Motor Vehicle Allowance
For vehicle expenses we need you to tell us the total number of kilometres you have travelled during the year and the amount of kms that are for business. Don’t forget to take an odometer reading on 31 March every year otherwise we can only use the maximum claim rate of 76c for 3,500 kms.
If you replace your vehicle during the year, you will need to keep an odometer reading when the old vehicle is sold and the reading for the new vehicle on date of purchase.
Logbooks
If you need to keep a vehicle logbook, remember you need to take a representative three-month period and keep a record of all the running for that time.
There is an alternative. You could record the business running only and note the total number of kilometres travelled for the period. By deduction, the difference would be personal.
You are not permitted to do it the other way round and count just the personal running, because any travel which is overlooked needs to be treated as personal by default.
If you forget to record a business trip, you will pay for it yourself. It’s better to try and account for all kilometres travelled every day to minimise the risk of overlooking a business trip.
Bad Debts
IF you want to write off a bad debt and claim your loss in the current year, you must do this before your business balance date.
Depending on your system of accounting, this could involve writing something like “debt written off by me on. . . Date signed. . . .” across a copy of an invoice. If you have a more sophisticated system, you will need to make it clear the debt has been written off in time.
Stocktaking
Now is a good time to tidy up your trading stock. Get rid of anything which has no value. If you’ve got time before balance date, have a sale. Any stock remaining on your shelves at balance date has to be taken into account at cost unless you can prove market value is lower by comparison with other sales outside your business.
Salaries and wages
Any holiday pay, paid out within 63 days of the end of the financial year, may be claimed as a creditor. You can put the amount down as money owing by you at balance date.