25Nov 2014 by Nancy Smyth
Year End Payroll Tasks for 2014 and year beginning 2015

Year End Payroll Tasks for 2014 and year beginning 2015

Business Productivity Tips & Training, Free Stuff
Year-end payroll tasks actually should start on December 1st and really can continue right through the first of April!  Yikes – that’s a lot of time to be spending on additional payroll tasks, especially during the holidays! There are so many things that need to be taken care of; you need to be organized and have a checklist that includes when certain things have to be completed and helps you to prioritize tasks so that you don’t feel so overwhelmed. From simple things – like starting around the first of December you should remind employees that if their has been a change in their filing status due to getting married, having or adopting a baby, or perhaps they have a child that is turning 21, that they should fill out a…
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25Oct 2013 by Nancy Smyth
Payroll Deduction Authorization form- Word format

Payroll Deduction Authorization form- Word format

Business Productivity Tips & Training, Free Stuff, QuickBooks Tips, Techniques & Work Arounds
Payroll management isn't an easy task and certainly involves more than just getting paychecks distributed in a timely manner.   One area that businesses seem to have a hard time with is putting a plan in place to ensure payroll deduction authorization forms are properly collected and errors are prevented.  Payroll deduction authorization forms are a must if you are taking money out of an employees paycheck for anything other than required payroll taxes.  Yes, I know - more paperwork!  You can implement a simple system in which the authorization forms can be numbered as they come in and a log may be maintained to help keep track of the forms.  QuickBooks can help you to automate this process and even help you store this information electronically by attaching the authorization…
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15Nov 2012 by Nancy Smyth
Payroll Due Dates for Year-End 2012 and Year Beginning 2013

Payroll Due Dates for Year-End 2012 and Year Beginning 2013

Business Productivity Tips & Training
Payroll due dates always seem to cause a lot of stress - especially at year end when there is so much to do! The holiday's don't seem to help matters any either with extra time away from the office, it's difficult to concentrate, get things done, and stay organized. Perhaps you are fairly new to payroll in general and this is the first time that you've had to deal with year end tasks and are feeling totally overwhelmed. Year-end payroll tasks start in December and really can continue right through the first of April!  Yikes - that's a lot of time to be spending on additional payroll tasks! There are so many things that need to be taken care of; you need to be organized and have a checklist that includes when…
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26Oct 2012 by Nancy Smyth
Employee New Hire Information & Checklist

Employee New Hire Information & Checklist

Business Productivity Tips & Training
An employee new hire information and checklist will help you to gather all the information your need about an employee once you have made a hiring decision. Congratulations, you've decided to hire your first employee or perhaps your business is growing and you are hiring additional employees. In either case, there is so much more to hiring an employee than putting an ad in the newspaper and arranging for interviews - even though these are both very important. Once you have gone through the interview process with everyone who has applied and you make a hiring decision; you find yourself with a lot of additional information that you need to have keep on file about the employee that you just hired. All of a sudden you are subject to Federal…
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11Jul 2012 by Nancy Smyth
Email Etiquette eBook

Email Etiquette eBook

Business Productivity Tips & Training
Email etiquette is vital to your success. We only get one chance to meet someone for the first time and “WOW” them with our products and/or services, so, it’s important to really put your best foot forward when composing an email to a customer, client, vendor or potential business partner.   With advances in technology, we are no longer limited to meeting prospective customers, clients, or referral partners face-to-face like we used to.  Technology now allows us to meet these same prospects via email, phone, or our websites. With these advances, and the ever increasing fast-paced world that we live in, are we sacrificing good old fashioned common sense etiquette protocols? Are we still making a good first impression? Are we identifying ourselves as professionals? Are we clearly stating the reason…
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16May 2012 by Nancy Smyth
ARTICLE: What to Look for in a Construction CPA

ARTICLE: What to Look for in a Construction CPA

Business Productivity Tips & Training
  Hiring a CPA or tax accountant for you construction business is as critical as hiring a supervisor on the job site.  Not all CPA's or tax preparers understand construction and when they don't your books could be in as much of a mess as your job site would be if you hired a supervisor with no experience! In that perfect world, your company wouldn’t need a CPA.  We would all just pack up our adding machines, green eyeshades, and armbands and move on to other professions. But, that isn’t going to happen, is it? In fact, the regulatory environment is headed in the other direction.  States are looking for revenue, there are three or four new federal tax acts each year, and GAAP is going global.  These current and…
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26Apr 2012 by Nancy Smyth

Project Information Worksheet-Keep Your Contract Info Organized

Business Productivity Tips & Training
  A project information worksheet will help you keep your contract info organized. One of the best ways to stay organized is by using a Project Information sheet, it will help you to keep your project paperwork organized. We've developed a Project Information worksheet, with the help of several contractors; it summarizes important aspects of a particular job and keeps essential information handy, it's also a great thing to give to your key office staff. When you are working on multiple projects, you do not want to have to stop to re-read a lengthy contract in order to find a single piece of information. The simple practice of recording important detailed information for each contract will make everyone's life easier when you need to complete progress requisitions and/or make collection…
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24Apr 2012 by Nancy Smyth

VIDEO: How to Calculate Equipment Costs per Hour

Business Productivity Tips & Training
  How to Calculate Equipment Costs per hour.  What does it cost your company, on an hourly basis, to have equipment on the jobsite? Whether you have a mower, a compact tractor, or an excavator on the jobsite, learning how to calculate the cost-per-hour for each piece of machinery that your company owns and uses on a job site is a great tool for understanding, and even eventually, recouping the actual cost of the machine itself. Most contractors have a rough idea of these costs - but these days is a rough idea good enough?  We don't think so. Equipment cost-per-hour rates are calculated by adding together three (3) distinct pieces of information. Watch this YouTube video to learn how to calculate the cost of your equipment.     Once…
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30Dec 2011 by Nancy Smyth
Calculating Company Paid Health Insurance & The Affordable Care Act

Calculating Company Paid Health Insurance & The Affordable Care Act

Business Productivity Tips & Training
The Affordable Care Act was enacted on March 23, 2010. It contains some tax provisions that are in effect and more that will be implemented during the next several years. One of the requirements of the Affordable Care Act that will effect all business owners who provide employee health insurance, is that you now must report employer provided health coverage on Form W-2.  Below is information copied directly from the IRS website. The Affordable Care Act requires employers to report the cost of coverage under an employer-sponsored group health plan on an employee’s Form W-2, Wage and Tax Statement, in Box 12, using Code DD. Many employers are eligible for transition relief for tax-year 2012 and beyond, until the IRS issues final guidance for this reporting requirement. The amount reported…
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