MYOB – Automate Batch Invoice Multiple Customers eg Annual Subscription

(Read all instructions before starting – can be time-consuming to correct a mistake!)

1) Create a recurring sales invoice for your first customer.  Use generic terms like “Annual Subscription”  for the item/service description so it can be used for any year.

2) Go to List>Recurring Transactions. and locate the sale you just made.  Select edit.

3) Set the Frequency to annual.  Input the date of the required invoice.  At alerts tick “automatically record when due” then  Save

 (or if you want to review the sale before it is sent tick “remind me to record on due date”.  Then use the To Do List>Recurring Sales to actually generate the sale)

 4) Now select “create copy” tab (third box along bottom of recurring list) and select all the customer cards this applies to by ticking them.

5) You now have a recurring sales entry for every customer.  Then you can delete individually if customer does not want to renew.

6)  If you want the actual year of the subscription to show on the invoice sent to the client, edit your invoice layout by adding a text box and enter the year.  Then change the layout next year and so on. Do this BEFORE you create copies for all the subscribers if you need year on the invoice!!

 Always take a backup of your file before attempting and have a trial run.  It is very tedious to delete a mass of recurring entries if something goes wrong!

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Year End Business Tax Planning Tips

Nearing the end of the tax year at 30 June, there are several things to consider and watch

• Record Keeping – normally required to be retained for tax purposes for at least five years, but special requirements apply in some areas.  For example, in the case of capital gains tax and the substantiation rules, records have to be held for longer periods.
• Stock on Hand – It’s not sufficient to simply make an estimate of your stock, or to take a guess.  Each year you need to include a value in your accounts of stock on hand and work-in-progress at 30 June. Closing stock can be valued at cost, replacement or market value or less if obsolete, but you have to document which method you use.
• Personal Services Income –  designed to limit the level of deductions available to certain contractors whether they are operating as a sole trader or through a company, trust or partnership, and to also extend the PAYG withholding rules in such cases. If you meet certain specified tests such as the ‘results’ test will be treated as carrying on a personal services business and will be able claim a wider range of deductions.  But be aware of the ATO‘s strict approach to income retention and income splitting (with some exceptions such as for standard ‘mum and dad’ partnerships).
• Superannuation – must ensure they have made sufficient superannuation contributions (9 per cent) for all employees on a quarterly basis throughout the financial year to avoid the risk of incurring a penalty under the Superannuation Guarantee Charge (SGC) regime.
• Dividends and Interest  – Ensure that interest and dividends are returned by taxpayers, the Tax Office matches information provided in tax returns with information from external sources. And remember to put in your imputation credits. The best way to avoid trouble here is to include all such income in your return and retain supporting documents such as bank and company dividend statements.

To Be Continued

Quickbooks – Customise Address placement in Cheques

Client called and asked – “Is there a way to change the placement of the address on cheques so that they appear better in my window envelopes?”

There are a couple of ways this can be changed –

1.   Go to >File >Printer Setup, on the Form Name choose Cheque/PayCheque then click on the the “Align” button. You can choose to move the printing in any direction. Print “cheque test”on  the choices you  make with the Print Sample to see if it will work for your envelope window problem.

2.   Or go to the Vendor Center and put spaces before the name to move them to the right. This is the hard way to fix your issue but do-able.

3.   You can also change the way you feed your cheques into your printer. Check if this is an option with the printer you are using.

MYOB – Purchases are in my Bank Reconciliation – how fix it?

Client called – has some items appearing in her bank reconciliation, even after checking accounts set up and items. What else do they need to check?

No purchases should be in your bank reconciliation, only payments to them!  Click on the transaction to open it (white arrow on the left) and then open each item (white arrow to the left of the item number) and check each item for what accounts are linked in:
I Buy
I Sell
I Inventory
Sounds like one of them is linked to your bank account

Ensure they are set to go to the correct accounts:

Buy – 5.000 purchase account

Sell – 4.000 sales account

Inventory – 1.000 asset/ stock on hand /merchandise account

Quickbooks – Pt 3 Speed up paying Suppliers & Staff from the software

In Pt 2 we covered setting up supplier and employee bank accounts on their cards. Here we look at the last steps.

Note for employees  – you need to change their pay method to Bank (Online).

Third  – Process Transactions and Create Online Banking File

This involves processing transactions as normal. QuickBooks will identify payments set up for banking online and have those ready to include when creating an online banking file.

Create an online banking file:

1. Go to the Online Banking Centre. Go to Banking menu and click Online Banking Centre.
2. Scroll to the section To Bank
3. Choose the date you want the payment to be made, using the calendar from the Date to be Processed field.
4. Enter a payment description. If no payment description is entered, a description of “payment” will display in the ABA file by default.
5. Select payees from the list. Each payee must have a bank account defined for them under their employee or supplier record. This includes details for Bank Account Name, Number and Branch Code. In addition, employees must have an employee number.
6. Click Preview ABA File if you wish to review the ABA file before creating it.
7. Click Create ABA File. QuickBooks displays the standard Windows Save As dialog box with *.ABA entered in the file name.
8. Enter a name for the online banking file (leaving the .ABA) and choose a location to save it. QuickBooks provides a default folder within the installation directory called Export Files/ ABA Files. You may choose to save the ABA file in this directory, or in any other directory of your choice.
9. Click Save.
10. Your ABA file is now ready for upload to the relevant financial institution.

 

TIP:  This will upload Quickbooks ABA files directly from the cheque account. The downside is that the bank account in QB shows every transaction in the ABA file and not just the total. as appears on the bank statement.

Instead you can use a clearing account and it works well. I set it up in the chart of accounts as a bank account using the “actual” bank account number.

When I pay bills I select “online” and select my eft account to pay the bills out of.

Then, I create an aba file, etc.

Then, in QB, transfer funds from your “actual account” into your eft account. So, when you do your bank rec, only one credit will show up in QB (to match with the one debit on your bank statement).

MYOB – Pt 3 Speed up paying Suppliers & Staff from the software

In Pt 2 we covered the steps to set up a clearing account, then entered banking for suppliers and employees, now to the final step.

Fifth – Enter and Pay Suppliers and Employees

Processing electronic payments is a two-step process:

• Entering the payment
• Processing the payment

Payments to be processed electronically and uploaded online are entered using the same steps as conventional payments.

The only difference is that when in Pay Bills, Pay Employees or Spend Money, select the Group With Electronic Payments option (located at the top left corner of the transaction window).

Once you have recorded all the supplier payments you want to pay electronically, you can prepare an electronic payment file which creates the ABA file.

1. Go to the Banking command centre and click Prepare Electronic Payments. Or it will be a step in the Payroll process to select the Process Electronic Payments.
2. In the Pay From Account field, enter your cheque account if not already selected.
3. In the Select Payment By field, select the relevant payment type.
4. Enter the other payment details as needed.
   1. Select the payments to be processed – this will place a tick in the far right column. The example below shows the Prepare Electronic Payments window with three payments selected for processing.
   2. Check all the payment details then click Bank File (Process in earlier software versions).
      Note: The Bank Processing Date is the date upon which the bank will withdraw the money from your bank account and transfer it to the payees’ bank accounts. If the payment is post dated, the software will display an alert informing you to check your bank’s policy with regards to post dating electronic payments.
   3. Read the displayed alert then click OK. A standard Windows Save As window will be displayed.
   4. Navigate to the folder on your hard drive into which you want to save the ABA bank file, then click Save.
      Note: It’s important you know which folder the ABA bank file has been saved in.

Open your bank software and import the ABA bank file. Please contact your bank for assistance with this.

What’s in the Aust Fed Budget for Small Business?

Here are some excerpts from several sites that summarise the key points for small business –

Aust Government Website:

The 2010-11 Federal Budget revealed funding for new and existing products and services to assist businesses. Some of the initiatives included in this year’s budget cover –

New programs or services

• New national system for registering business names.
• Funding to provide guaranteed training places for under 25s.
• Funding for training costs of up to 50% for large organisations and 90% for small businesses.
• Increase in employer sponsored skilled migration places.
• Renewable Energy Future Fund to assist businesses to reduce their energy consumption.

Existing programs or services

• Increased funding for business mediation services.
• Extension of the Apprentice Kickstart Program.
• Increased funding for the Textile, Clothing and Footwear Strategic Capability Program.
• The program will now also be able to support smaller projects up to $500,000.

Tax and super changes

• Company tax rate to fall to 28% by 2014.
• 40% Resource Super Profit Tax to be in place from 2012.
• Instant write off for small business assets to the value of $5000 from 2012-13
• Increase to employer super contributions to 12% by 2019.

Business Spectator:

Small business owners and pensioners are the latest Australians to be gifted some small surprise in the federal budget. Small businesses will be eligible for a tax write-off of up to $5000 on assets.

“This new measure will replace the Entrepreneurs Tax Offset (ETO), saving $365 million over the forward estimates that only goes to a small number of businesses” Treasurer Wayne Swan said.

Smart Company:

Smart Company’s Patrick Stafford reports that “Business experts are disappointed over the Government’s new initiative to temporarily reduce the amount charged to SMEs in quarterly PAYG tax installments, saying it is only a minor initiative that could have been expanded.

In its budget last night the Government announced businesses will be given temporary reprieve in their quarterly PAYG statements, saying the GDP multiplier for this year will only be set at 4%. While this is an increase from the 2% rate set during the past two years, the rate had been set to jump to 8% this year.”

By Amy Lyden, Australian Businesswomen’s Network Advocacy Advisor tells us

“After scouring through the papers and online material, there aren’t a lot of surprises this year. The government has delivered a pretty basic budget promising to get Australia back in black by 2012-13.

There are many facets of the budget, but here I have focused on small business and working families.” See her comments

For more information on the Budget, visit the Innovation  website. For a full copy of the Budget and details visit the Budget 2010-11  website.