Tracking Your Business Mileage

Do you use a vehicle for business purposes? If so, you may be missing out on an easy deduction on your income taxes. The IRS currently allows a deduction of 55.5 cents* per business mile driven. However, if you can’t prove it, you can’t claim it, so you must maintain a timely and accurate record of all miles driven.

Mileage tracking doesn’t have to be complicated. A simple log book can be purchased at any office supply store for two or three dollars, or a blank notebook can serve the same purpose. For those who prefer to maintain a log on the computer, it is easy to set up a spreadsheet in Excel. At a minimum, you want to record the date of travel, purpose, starting mileage, and ending mileage. You may wish to include amounts paid for parking or tolls. It is a good idea to also make note of your car’s odometer reading on January 1 and December 31 each year. This log should be filed with your other business receipts for audit purposes. 

A sample mileage log, freely available from www.microsoft.com

I currently use an app on my Android phone called “Trip Log – GPS Mileage Tracker,” which uses GPS tracking to calculate the miles I’ve driven. I can even pause GPS tracking during a trip. This is especially useful when I have multiple stops to make, not all of which are business-related. I can then email a monthly report to myself for my tax records.

In addition to business mileage, remember that miles driven for charitable organizations, medical purposes, or for moving are all expenses you can claim as deductions on your personal income tax return. 

No matter what method you use, maintaining a mileage log is a necessity if you plan to claim automobile expenses as a business deduction. It’s never too late to begin tracking. Once again, the mantra is, if you can’t prove it, you can’t claim it. Start today!

For more information, please refer to IRS Publication 463 or visit www.irs.gov.

*The IRS adjusts rates periodically. Please visit www.irs.gov for the most current standard mileage rate.

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog! I hope you will find this to be a useful resource for your QuickBooks and general accounting problems.

Many people have asked me how I came up with the name “My Shoebox Bookkeeper” for my company. It’s simple, really: how many small business owners do you know who are wildly successful at what they do, but can’t seem to balance a checkbook? How many of them have a shoebox filled with receipts but no idea how much money is in the bank? That is where My Shoebox Bookkeeper comes in. My goal is to free you from the stress of the shoebox. You give me that messy pile of the bank and credit card statements, receipts, and check stubs, and I return to you a binder organized by month, including a complete set of financial statements for your business. I also provide a copy of a QuickBooks file for your company, which you can use to generate your own reports or to pass along to a CPA for tax preparation. It’s that simple. One call to My Shoebox Bookkeeper can free you from the shoebox forever!

I have met many business owners who are excellent at what they do – doctors, attorneys, marketing professionals, artists – but who simply do not have the time or desire to keep up with the shoebox of receipts. Either the business suffers because bookkeeping takes time away from the mission of their company, or they simply ignore the bookkeeping altogether. Too many times I’ve seen business owners who are wasting precious dollars on late fees, overdraft fees, and bank errors because their bookkeeping is not being done on a regular basis. The look of relief on their faces when they realize they can afford to have someone else take over their accounting nightmare is gratifying.

I am a Certified Bookkeeper through the American Institute of Professional Bookkeepers, as well as a Certified Intuit QuickBooks ProAdvisor. In addition to general bookkeeping services, I provide QuickBooks installation, setup, and training. I am also a Notary Public for the state of North Carolina, and existing clients never pay a fee for notary services. In early 2012 I plan to begin offering payroll preparation services.

No job is too small! I cater to small businesses and not-for-profit organizations and my hourly rates reflect that commitment. (501c3 not-for-profit organizations receive a 25% discount off my normal fees.) 

Now that you know why I do what I do, isn’t it time you called for a free consultation? Click here to send an email or call me at (919) 308-2470.

Modifying QuickBooks Reports Gives You Better Insight Into Past, Future: Part 1

If you make one resolution about improving your accounting procedures in 2012, it should be this: Make extensive use of the tools that QuickBooks offers for report modification. Comprehensive, meticulously-shaped reports that flow out of your carefully-constructed records and transactions are your reward for pounding on the keys every day, conscientiously recording income and expenses.

QuickBooks supplies you with a wide variety of pre-formatted reports whose modification options can help you do focused, critical analysis of your financial data. The right set of numbers will help you understand your history and plan for the future more effectively.

Note: The reports discussed and pictured here show only one possible set of customization options. There are many variations. We can answer your questions.

Check your preferences

When you created your company file in QuickBooks, you chose between reporting on a cash (income and expenses are recorded when money changes hands) or accrual (recorded when you invoice or receive a bill) basis. This affects summary reports, but not those that break out individual transactions or are simply lists.

If you want to change this, click Edit | Preferences | Reports & Graphs | Company Preferences and click the desired button:

Figure 1: You can establish a preference for your summary reports' basis here.

You can set other preferences in this window that will affect your report output here, too, as you can see.

Altering the display

Open the Income by Customer Summary report (Reports | Company & Financial). Change the dates to reflect a range you'd like to see. Want the data displayed by different time increments – like week or quarter – instead of just the total? Click the arrow next to Columns and select Four week.

Figure 2: You can do some report display alterations from this toolbar; the options it offers vary by report.

By default, your report rows display alphabetically. If you want to view a column by total in ascending or descending order, select the column by hovering over the top number until the magnifying glass appears, and click on it. Click the arrow next to Sort by and choose Total, then click the AZ [down arrow] icon (in some reports, there will be other options here).

Additional options in this toolbar let you:

·         Memorize the report

·         Print, email or export it to Excel

·         Hide or Show the Header

·         Collapse or Expand the columns

·         Refresh the report if you've made changes that will alter data

More display options

Click Customize Report to open this window:

Figure 3: This window outlines your report's content options.

Some of the options here duplicate what you saw in the toolbar. In addition, you can switch between Accrual and Cash for just this report, and add subcolumns in some. The latter is a complicated operation, one that you must understand well in order to glean any insight from it. We can help you with this.

Sometimes the subcolumns are generic, as shown in the screen above. In other reports, they're very specific to that group of data.

Clicking on Revert takes you back to the default format, and Advanced opens additional options specific to the current report.

More customization = more insightful results = more informed financial choices

Transaction reports have many similarities and two major differences. You can change the column order by hovering your cursor over the column label until a hand appears. Click, hold and drag the column to the desired spot and let go. You can also add or delete columns by clicking Customize Report and checking or unchecking labels.

Figure 4: In transaction – or detail – reports, you can alter the column structure.

Learn the mechanics of report display modification well, and your company's finances will come into much sharper focus, improving the wisdom of future choices. Up next month: filtering your reports for additional clarity.

If you have questions on this or any other QuickBooks feature, call or email us. We’re your partner and we’re here to make your business better.