The end of each year is always a busy time for quick-service restaurants. There’s the rush of hungry holiday shoppers and the significant task of closing out the books to prepare for tax season.
If you’ve kept up with your accounting tasks regularly, your year-end accounting process will be smoother and more streamlined. Here are some tips to help make the end-of-year accounting process less stressful.
1 | Understand Your Tax Deductions
Understanding your tax deductions is a valuable tool for reducing your liability. While there are several deductions available, food costs, labor costs, and marketing are three that you may be able to take advantage of.
2 | Review Your Tax Credits
Tax credits can be directly used to offset taxes or taken as deductions, and they can be extremely valuable. However, it’s crucial to handle your finances and reporting with care to ensure that all your deductions are eligible. Some tax credits available to quick-service restaurants include repair and remodel, research and development, and FICA tip credit.
3 | Reduce Your Taxes with Depreciation
You can deduct depreciation for machinery, fixtures, and equipment. Section 179 allows you to use the entire deduction the year of purchase and is intended to enable small businesses to purchase up to $500,000 of equipment for their business and immediately reduce costs with all qualifying deductions.
4 | Review Your Accounts and Books Before Filing
Conduct a thorough review of all your accounts and books before filing your taxes. Ensure that everything is accurate. Don’t forget to review your balance sheet to check for assets that can be written off, prepaid expenses that can be deducted, and loans that can be used as deductions. Other deductions you may qualify for include charitable contributions, bonuses or perks, property tax changes, retirement plans for employees, and investments held by your business.
5 | Make a Plan for Next Year
Want to make closing out the end of the year even smoother and easier? Consider using QSRSoft Reports! Reports is a powerful analytics tool that seamlessly integrates with your POS system and other data sources. It’s cloud-based, enabling access from anywhere at any time, including real-time streaming data! It’s mobile-friendly, and you can customize your view and set up alerts to stay on top of the most important performance metrics for your quick-service restaurant.
Key Takeaways
Closing out the books and preparing for taxes is an essential task. Take the time to ensure that all your data and accounts are accurate before closing your books and filing your taxes. Make reporting even more manageable by using QSRSoft Reports, a powerful analytics tool that will drive your business forward!