Include Your Tax Paperwork in Your Spring Cleaning

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Looking to minimize clutter? Here are recordkeeping guidelines that will help you do just that while retaining what’s important.

  • Income tax returns. Keep these at least seven years. Hang on to the back-up documents, such as Forms W-2, mortgage interest statements, year-end brokerage statements, and interest and dividend statements, for the same amount of time.
  • Supporting paperwork. Keep cancelled checks, receipts, and expense and travel diaries for a minimum of three years.
  • Stock, bond, or mutual fund purchase confirmations. Retain these while you own the investment. You can destroy them three years after you sell.
  • Real property escrow and title statements. Retain these documents as long as you own the property so you can prove your purchase price when you sell. They can be destroyed three years after the date of the sale.

As you purge your financial clutter, be sure to shred or otherwise destroy the discarded paperwork. These documents often reveal your social security number, bank and brokerage account activity, and other personal information that could lead to the theft of your identity.

Contact us for more recordkeeping tips.

Sunk Costs Could Lead to Bad Business Decisions

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Do you think pulling the plug on a failed contract would be “wasting all the money” your business has spent to date?

If so, you may be making the choice based on emotion and “sunk costs.” Sunk costs are past expenses that are irrelevant to current decisions – such as those spent on non-performing contracts. Why are they irrelevant? Because that money is already spent and generally cannot be recovered.

While admitting mistakes may be difficult and ego-bruising, staunching the flow of cash and changing course by abandoning a failed contract can be a wise decision. That’s because the only relevant costs are those that influence your company’s current and future operations.

For example, say your firm hires a new sales representative. You spend thousands of dollars sending the rep to training seminars. You assign mentors who take time from their busy schedules to provide on-the-job coaching and oversight. But despite your best efforts, the new hire isn’t working out. The rep doesn’t fit your firm’s culture, doesn’t grasp the company’s goals and procedures and doesn’t generate adequate revenues for the business.

As a manager, what should you do? At some point, you may need to terminate the employee and start over with someone else. But what about all that time and money you spent on training and mentoring? Those are sunk costs. Acknowledge that you can’t get them back, cut your losses, and start anew. Throwing good money after bad won’t salvage a poor business investment – or a poor business decision.

Teach Your Children This Vital Skill

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Financial literacy is a vital skill in today’s world. Will your children be able to handle their finances when they became adults? Here are tips to help ensure the answer is yes.

Shave spending. Take the weekly allowance to the next level by helping your child develop a budget. Review the results to reinforce good habits.

Stress savings. Even young children can grasp the power of compound interest. A simple example is asking your child to put a dollar in a piggy bank. Offer to pay five percent interest if the money is still there in a week or a month. Make the same offer at the end of the first time period, and pay “interest on the interest” as well.

Introduce investments. Create a portfolio, either real or paper, consisting of shares of one or more stocks or mutual funds. Make a game of charting the investment’s progress on a regular basis.

Cover credit. Take on the role of lender and let your child request an advance on a weekly allowance. Charge interest.

Talk taxes. Use word search or crossword puzzles to teach tax terminology. Consider creating a “Family Economy” game using examples from your own budget.

Lessons in financial responsibility can benefit your children now and in the future. Get them started on the right path.

Complaints Can Be Opportunities

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When a customer complains, think of it as three opportunities in one.

  • An opportunity to get feedback on something that’s not working right in your organization.
  • An opportunity to convert a disgruntled customer into a loyal customer.
  • An opportunity to head off negative publicity.

Here are four steps to take to convert a complaint into a positive outcome.

  1. The initial response. Be respectful and helpful. Avoid becoming defensive or saying “it’s not our fault.”
  2. Understand the complaint. What’s the true complaint? It may not be easy to stay calm when faced with an angry rant, but making sure your customer knows you’re listening can defuse hostility and ill will. Gathering the facts provides valuable feedback to help you pinpoint the problem and find out what went wrong.
  3. Fix the problem. Have established procedures so your employees know who has the responsibility and the authority to correct a problem. Do employees need managerial approval to compensate a customer for inconvenience with an upgrade or refund? What actions can your employee take to remedy the customer’s immediate concern?
  4. Follow up. A phone call or letter within a reasonable time can ensure the problem has been resolved and turn the customer from “disgruntled” to “loyal.”

Do You Have Enough Emergency Savings?

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A December 2015 survey by a consumer financial services company showed that 36% of the people who participated said they dealt with their most recent unexpected expense by using savings. Would you be part of that group? Here are tips for starting your “rainy day” fund.

Define how much emergency savings is enough. A good starting point is to plan for your emergency fund to cover three to six months of expenses. Another good starting point: Ask yourself how much you’ll need to cover minimum monthly expenses without resorting to credit cards or lines of credit. Your assessment of an adequate balance will vary based on your financial situation, including the vulnerability of your income. For example, a one-earner household is more vulnerable than a two-earner household when it comes to paychecks, so the one-earner family generally will need to set aside more for emergencies.

Track how much you already have set aside. Include all sources in your accounting. For instance, some companies provide payment for accrued vacation and/or sick leave to laid-off employees. If your company provides this benefit and you maintain significant balances, you may not need as much in an emergency fund to help you weather an unexpected layoff.

Decide whether to pay off bills first. Putting excess cash toward high interest credit card balances might make more sense than funding a savings account that earns a much lower rate of interest.

Keep your funds liquid. Emergency money should be easy to get at. You don’t want to have to sell investments at a potential loss or pay withdrawal penalties in order to cover an unexpected hit to your finances. Look into savings or money market accounts as places to accumulate cash.

Update Your W-4 to Adjust Your Withholding

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Did you receive a big tax refund or owe the IRS a lot of money for 2015? Then it’s time to update the form that tells your employer how to calculate your federal income tax withholding. That’s Form W-4, Employee’s Withholding Allowance Certificate, and here’s what you need to know.

Filing a new Form W-4 with your employer allows you to adjust your income tax withholding to avoid overpaying or underpaying tax for 2016. The form comes with a worksheet to figure out how many allowances you should claim. These allowances are similar to dependency exemptions on your income tax return. However, the total allowances on your W-4 don’t have to agree with the exemptions you claim on your return. For example, say you’re single and you want to have the maximum amount withheld from your paycheck. You can claim zero allowances on Form W-4. You’ll still claim your personal exemption on the federal income tax return you file next April.

One caution: You should not claim more exemptions than you’re entitled to on Form W-4.

Updating Form W-4 can help adjust your withholding to match the tax you expect to owe. If you need assistance completing the form, give us a call at 913-338-3500.

Finance

Three Positive Steps to Financial Well-Being

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While you’re gathering information to prepare your 2015 tax return, set aside time for a financial review. Here are steps to get started.

  • Compile a year-end list of your assets and debts and compare the list to last year. Are you gaining or losing ground? What actions can you take to improve your financial situation in 2016?
  • Review your insurance. Do you have disability insurance to replace take-home pay if you become incapacitated? What about life insurance – will the benefit provide enough cash to pay your family’s expenses in the event something happens to you or your spouse? Is your home protected with replacement value property insurance? What about insurance for automobile accidents or lawsuits?
  • Update your will and estate plan. What changed during 2015? Did you marry? Divorce? Have a child? Move to a new state? Receive an inheritance? All of these events can affect your planning. This year, you can leave up to $5,450,000 to your heirs with no federal estate tax liability. But that doesn’t mean you can ignore estate planning, which includes expressing your wishes for who will make decisions for you in times of emergencies as well as who will receive your assets.

For more suggestions, call us. We’re here to help.

Happy Children

Who Can Be Your Dependent?

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You might believe a “dependent” is a minor child who lives with you. While that is essentially correct, dependents can include parents, other relatives and nonrelatives, and even children who don’t live with you. Here’s an overview of the dependency exemption.

Exemptions and your taxable income. Each dependent deduction is worth $4,000 on your 2015 federal income tax return and reduces your taxable income by this amount. You’ll lose part of the benefit when your adjusted gross income reaches a certain level. For 2015, the phase-out begins at $309,900 when you’re married filing jointly and $258,250 when you’re single.

Definition of a dependent. A dependent is a qualifying child or a qualifying relative. While there are specific rules, very broadly speaking, a dependent is someone who lives with you and who meets several tests, including the support test. For qualifying children, the support test means the child cannot have provided more than half of his or her own support for the year. For qualifying relatives, the support test means you generally must provide more than half of that person’s total support during the year. There are many exceptions. For example, parents don’t have to live with you if they otherwise qualify, but certain other relatives do. If you’re divorced and a noncustodial parent, your child doesn’t necessarily have to live with you for the dependent deduction to apply.

Who can’t be claimed? Your spouse is never your dependent. In addition, you generally may not claim a married person as a dependent if that person files a joint return with a spouse. Also, a dependent must be a U.S. citizen, resident alien, national, or a resident of Canada or Mexico for part of the year.

For a seemingly simple deduction, claiming an exemption for a dependent can be quite complex. You’ll want to get it right, because being able to claim someone as a dependent can lead to other tax benefits, including the child tax credit, education credits, and the dependent care credit.

Contact our office to learn who qualifies as your dependent. We’ll help you make the most of your federal income tax exemptions.

Corporate Minutes Support Tax Deductions

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Well-documented corporate minutes can provide valuable supporting evidence if the IRS questions choices you make on your tax returns. Minutes are especially important when related-party transactions are involved, such as payments, loans, or distributions between the company and you or other owners. For example, the IRS may challenge the amount of your compensation. Corporate minutes that document the factors considered by the board in approving the compensation can be a defense against this type of challenge.

Another area to consider is the amount of earnings your business retains instead of distributing the funds as taxable dividends. A penalty can apply to retained earnings over a certain limit unless the needs of your business justify the amount. Corporate minutes can help by spelling out the reasons your company needs to retain funds – for example, to purchase assets or for working capital.

Does your company have a tax-qualified retirement or a stock option plan? The minutes should show decisions by the board when adopting or modifying the plan. Other information to include: annual decisions on the contribution percentage made to profit-sharing plans and the amount of fringe benefits, such as medical reimbursement accounts.

If your corporate minutes need updating, we suggest you contact your attorney.

Three Tips to Start the Tax Filing Season

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  • Check whether your children need to file a 2015 tax return. They’ll need to file if wages exceeded $6,300, self-employment income was over $400, or investment income exceeded $1,050. When income includes both wages and investment income, other thresholds apply.
  • Consider whether you’ll contribute to a Roth or traditional IRA. Since you have until April 18 to make a 2015 contribution (April 19 if you live in Maine or Massachusetts), you can schedule an amount to set aside from each paycheck for the next few months. The maximum contribution for 2015 is the lesser of your earned income for the year or $5,500 ($6,500 when you’re age 50 or older). Be sure to tell your bank or other trustee that these 2016 contributions are for 2015 until you reach the 2015 limit. You can then deduct these 2016 amounts on your 2015 tax return for a quicker tax benefit.
  • Do you need to file a gift tax return? For 2015, you may need to file a return if you gave gifts totaling more than $14,000 to someone other than your spouse. Some gifts, such as direct payments of medical bills or tuition, are not subject to gift tax. Gift tax returns are due at the same time as your federal income tax return.

Call us for more tips on getting ready for filing your 2015 income taxes.