CPA Blog

Review your strategic plan … and look ahead

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Published: Tuesday, 04 January 2022 08:47

Written by Phillip Strickler, CPA.CITP

Business owners, year end is officially here. It may even be over by the time you read this. (If so, Happy New Year!) In any case, the end of one year and the beginning of another is always an optimal time to look back on the preceding 12 calendar months and ask a deceptively simple question: How’d we do?

Large companies tend to have thoroughly documented strategic plans in place, some stretching years into the future, that include various metrics for measuring whether they’ve achieved the growth intended. For them, reviewing a calendar year’s success in terms of strategic planning is relatively easy. They mostly just crunch the numbers.

For small to midsize businesses, the strategic planning process may be a little more informal and less precise. Yet even if your strategic plan isn’t a detailed document replete with spreadsheets and pie charts, you can still review actual performance against it and use this assessment to look ahead to 2022.

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Gig workers should understand their tax obligations

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Published: Tuesday, 04 January 2022 08:45

Written by Phillip Strickler, CPA.CITP

The number of people engaged in the “gig” or sharing economy has grown in recent years. In an August 2021 survey, the Pew Research Center found that 16% of Americans have earned money at some time through online gig platforms. This includes providing car rides, shopping for groceries, walking dogs, performing household tasks, running errands and making deliveries from a restaurant or store.

There are tax consequences for the people who perform these jobs. Basically, if you receive income from an online platform offering goods and services, it’s generally taxable. That’s true even if the income comes from a side job and even if you don’t receive an income statement reporting the amount of money you made.

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Tax depreciation rules for business automobiles

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Published: Tuesday, 21 December 2021 14:09

Written by Phillip Strickler, CPA.CITP

If you use an automobile in your trade or business, you may wonder how depreciation tax deductions are determined. The rules are complicated, and special limitations that apply to vehicles classified as passenger autos (which include many pickups and SUVs) can result in it taking longer than expected to fully depreciate a vehicle.

Cents-per-mile vs. actual expenses

First, note that separate depreciation calculations for a passenger auto only come into play if you choose to use the actual expense method to calculate deductions. If, instead, you use the standard mileage rate (56 cents per business mile driven for 2021), a depreciation allowance is built into the rate.

If you use the actual expense method to determine your allowable deductions for a passenger auto, you must make a separate depreciation calculation for each year until the vehicle is fully depreciated. According to the general rule, you calculate depreciation over a six-year span as follows: Year 1, 20% of the cost; Year 2, 32%; Year 3, 19.2%; Years 4 and 5, 11.52%; and Year 6, 5.76%. If a vehicle is used 50% or less for business purposes, you must use the straight-line method to calculate depreciation deductions instead of the percentages listed above.

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Helping your employees make the most of email

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Published: Tuesday, 21 December 2021 14:06

Written by Phillip Strickler, CPA.CITP

Once a revolutionary breakthrough in communications technology, email is now an afterthought for many people. But that can cause problems for businesses: Servers get filled up, messages get lost, and employees’ productivity isn’t quite what it could be.

Although doing so may seem superfluous or antiquated, providing employees with some retraining or upskilling on proper email usage can improve efficiency and morale. Obviously, you don’t want to spend a lot of time or money on this, but a “lunch-and-learn” seminar or a series of quick meetings could prove effective and affordable.

Here are some email management tips that you might want to consider:

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