Quite often, while doing tax preparation in Las Vegas, I get asked the question by small business owners, “How can I reduce my taxes?”. Almost always, the most important thing that they forget is that they don’t keep their receipts so that they can deduct all the expenses that they pay. It’s important, for tax preparation, that the Las Vegas business owner keeps track, even if you just take an envelope and put the receipts that you paid for (whether cash, or by credit card) in that envelope every single day, and at the end of the year, or at the end of the month you just add those up and put those on the expense sheet – that’s a huge way you can save, and quite often, small business owners will just throw away the receipts (or they can’t find them when it comes time to do their tax return)
Some of the most common areas where people forget their expenses are in the materials or the supplies that they might pay for. If they’re a contractor for instance – they may run to a local hardware store and pick up some small supplies they need for a job, but they forget to keep the receipt, or forget to put it in that box or envelope at the end of the day. As well, there are office expenses, or meal and entertainment expenses. If they take employees out to lunch, or pay for a dinner with current clients or customers, and then they forget that, “Oh, that was something that I need to go ahead and deduct on my tax return”.
more »