Budget Update 2022 – in simple terms for vets

http://www.aplaccountants.com.au

 www.mytaxvet.com.au    

Cost of Living Tax Offset

A one off $420 offset for anyone earning under $126,000. This will be applied as an offset to your tax payable when you lodge your 2022 tax return.

Tax Deductibility of Covid-19 Test Expense

The cost of taking a Covid-19 test to attend a place of work is tax deductible from 1 July 2021 (this whole financial year) for individuals. This means that if the business pays the fee then there is no Fringe Benefit Tax as it’s a deductible expense to employees.

Skills and Training Boost

As from budget night, you can deduct an additional 20% of the expense the business incurs on external training courses for employees. The course must be provided in Australia or online and delivered by entities registered in Australia. For Example – if you spend $1000 on a course then you claim an expense of $1200 on the business tax return. This is until 30 June 2024.

Technology Investment Boost

As from budget night, you can deduct an additional 20% of the expense the business incurs on expenses that support digital adoption such as cyber security systems or subscriptions to cloud-based services. For Example – if you spend $1000 on this then you can claim an expense of $1200 on the business tax return. However this is capped at an expense of $100,000 per year. This is until 30 June 2023.

Latest News March 2022

http://www.aplaccountants.com.au

http://www.mytaxvet.com.au

Did you miss our web event how to engage your team and clients by being an environmentally friendly business quickly and easily?

This event has had some great feedback so we are happy to share the recording with you https://vimeo.com/673442885 at no charge. Steve Pipe is a successful entrepreneur who has now retired and is dedicated to helping businesses make a difference whilst being more successful. All offers that were made by our guest speaker will be honoured even to those of you not attending live, just email [email protected] with the subject “yes please – APL webevent”. He is genuinely happy to assist free of charge.

Who is who in our team!

Recently we have had a few new people join us and increased the range of services we offer. Some clients have been asking us who’s who and where the various people fit in, so here is a quick summary so you know who to call and which box to put us in.

Paolo and Anne are involved in APL Accountants (bookkeeping and business advisory), Profitdiagnostix (business software), Valuvet (valuations), MyTaxVet/James Noble Accountants (tax) . So Paolo and Anne work across all the services, but more specifically:

Anne – your ‘go to’ if you don’t know where to go. She knows a little, sometimes a lot, in most areas so if you’re unsure who to contact then she’s the one for you – we call her ‘Google Anne’ in the office because she knows most of the answers. Main areas of expertise are business advice and valuations. She fits into all the boxes.

Paolo – your ‘go to’ for business advice and valuations. Because he spends a lot of time looking at data from vet practices he is the go-to for KPIs. He fits into all the boxes.

Kezah – she’s the one for tax, whether it’s capital gains, tax planning or anything else involving tax she’s the one for you. She fits into the James Noble Accountants/MyTax Vet box

Renaei – manages the other bookkeepers and also looks after the bookkeeping for some of you whom she loves to talk to. She fits in the APL Accountants box.

Amanda and Joy – the bookkeepers who keep your books in order, answer your bookkeeping queries and stress out when you don’t get information in time and risk your BAS being lodged late. They fit in the APL Accountants box.

Sharon – keeps our office running. She makes sure all the paperwork is properly filed, everyones’ details are correct and all the procedures are followed. She also follows up  and collates some of the valuation documents. She fits in the APL Accountants box but also in the Valuvet box.

Bill – answers all your questions on Profitdiagnostix, helps you find those reports that you know are in there somewhere, and keeps your software running. He fits in the Profitdiagnostix box.

Joss and Hau – Joss and Hau are the software developers for Profitdiagnostix. Most of you won’t have spoken to them because developers like to close themselves in dark rooms and write code. However very occasionally if there is a really big problem with Profitdiagnostix that requires technical expertise, Joss or Hau end up contacting a few people.  They fit in the Profitdiagnostix box.

Ben – He has worked with us on Profitdiagnostix for over 7 years and worked with us on prior software projects. He manages the software developers for Profitdiagnostix. Ben fits in the Profitdiagnostix box.

Note that there will be a couple more people joining the James Noble/My Tax Vet part of the business very soon and we will introduce you to them when they arrive!

Exit strategies seminar

This seminar is live in Adelaide 26 March 8:30am to 5pm. It is for anyone looking at selling in the next 5 years and gives you insight into:
– Getting the business ready to sell
– Valuations
– Legals
– Tax implications

Click here for more info https://practicesalesearch.com.au/pdf/PSS-Exit-Strategy_2022_ADELAIDE.pdf

Dog Tales!

Just a reminder of what an important job you do.

Our oldest member of the pack, Lucky, suddenly got very sick vomiting through the night. Mom rushed him to our special doctor as soon as they opened, and despite being short staffed due to COVID and fully booked they took nearly an hour out of their morning to look after our  friend.

After a thorough examination, blood tests, injections and starting a drip they found he had a severe pancreatitis. Trusting in mom and dad’s skills (and possibly because Lucky will bite vets without warning), Lucky was able to come home with his fluids and infusion pump and be looked after by all of us. I (the biggest lover of the pack, Strudel, the Daschund) did an awesome job never leaving his side for the 6 days he needed fluids.

I am proud to say he has fully recovered due to my help, but had our special doctor not taken the time out of his busy morning Lucky would have died. Did mom pay an extra fee on the consult called ’emergency/same day’? Of course she did! Would she have paid triple that amount to see Lucky smile again? Of course she would.

Our pack wouldn’t be the same without him, and so what she paid wasn’t relevant, as long as we got to have our friend back with us.

Mom and dad have spoken to a lot of you about having a special higher cost consult fee if you have to fit someone in on the same day and re-shuffle some of your workflows. A lot of practices are charging a $180 consult fee for this, and we can assure you that from the pet’s perspective, its definitely worth it. 

Bookkeeping team grows for the new year

Our bookkeeping unit continues to grow, so we welcome Amanda an experienced bookkeeper to the team. Amanda lives in a farming community so is very comfortable with the array of animals you are treating and is well versed in the demands of being a veterinarian.

For those of you still juggling your own bookkeeping with running the business or those of you with a messy set of books that have been prepared by one of your team members, Amanda is happy to help you. She even mentioned some ‘rescue jobs’ in her application – so she’s used to rescuing clients and their books so don’t be embarrassed by what may need doing!

Let us know if you’d like more information on our bookkeeping services. You can just reply to this newsletter.

What every business owner needs to know about upcoming payments

Do you know what your balance sheet actually means? Do you know how much superannuation or GST you’ll need to pay? Do you know how much money you’ve taken out the business that you need to repay? Do you find yourself worrying about your next BAS payment?

Join us on Wednesday 19 January at midday Qld time when we will explain all this and how to use your accounting reports more effectively to resolve the problems of some of your ‘surprise payments’. This web masterclass is for all veterinary business owners that don’t have an accounting degree.

Register here:

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_6i8rg0lVSC2bjb8GzK2VNA

For every registrant we will be planting a fruit tree to help Kenyans generate income

Dog Tales!

So many new things happening, how could we possibly compete on the dog front. Well we have a new year ahead and new opportunities – at the end of last year we were invited to do a dog dancing demonstration at an aged care home!

The audience loved us so much, had such a good time and we were so well behaved that we have been invited to a couple more aged care homes in the new year. We seriously could not believe how happy and engaged the residents of the home were and how many smiles we created.

Why is this important to you and your team? Well without a great veterinary team we wouldn’t have the health and fitness to entertain the wider community, so your services are welcomed not just by us awesome pets but the wider community that we serve!

Wishing you and your team an awesome new year and don’t forget you have a very big purpose that spreads into the wider community because pets make people happy!

Latest News December 2021

http://www.aplaccountants.com.au

Some very important changes for your business!

There are two very important changes to running your business so please take note of this!

1. EVERY person that is a company director needs to apply for a director ID. This is compulsory so don’t think you can avoid it. You apply once and then that ID remains as your director ID forever across any entity that you are a director of. You have to do this application for yourself as it requires personal identification.

All the steps are here:

https://www.abrs.gov.au/director-identification-number/apply-director-identification-number

Note the first step is setting up myGovID, this is not myGov and most of you will not have done this step before so don’t confuse the two!

2. There is a new compulsory extra step for new employees’ super if they don’t give you a specific fund. If new employees don’t give you a superfund to pay them superannuation then you need request their ‘stapled super fund’ details from the ATO. This is an existing superfund that is linked (stapled) to an individual employee and follows them as they change jobs. You have to do this via online services for business – check out the information here https://www.ato.gov.au/Business/Super-for-employers/Setting-up-super-for-your-business/Offer-employees-a-choice-of-super-fund/Request-stapled-super-fund-details-for-employees/?=redirected_stapledsuperfund

Closed for Christmas

We will be taking a break over the Christmas period. We are closed from midday 22 December to 9am 5 January. Hope you all manage to get some time off too!

Dog Tales! – the pack expands……

Our pack is expanding! A big welcome to Sharon who will be doing administration and lots of other useful bits and pieces so that mom and dad have more time to give us treats. Sharon has a dog and a cat, not sure why she doesn’t just have two dogs but it does mean she gives us extra pats when she comes into the office as she doesn’t have enough dogs at home!

Latest News November 2021

http://www.aplaccountants.com.au

Are you pricing appropriately?

We recently had a friend mention to us that their dog had been to the vet for an eye problem and had lots of tests done. After two visits the vet suggested they may like to see a specialist just to confirm that there was nothing more serious going on and that the cataract wasn’t causing the problem (uveitis). Our friend was surprised that the specialist seemed to take a lot of time checking over the eye and doing things but somehow the invoice seemed cheap and they may not have done all the special tests that their vet did on the eye.

They showed us the two invoices to see what we thought (we have slightly altered the fees by less than 5% and changed the name of the fee to something similar to keep this strictly confidential).

General vet:

• Consult $80
• Sedate dog including i/v catheter placement $185
• Flourescein staining $50
• Local anaesthetic for eye $50
• Tonometry (Eye pressure measurement) $70

TOTAL $435

Specialist:

• Consult $200
• Sedate dog $130

Total $330

You can see how missing fees off an invoice can seriously undervalue the work done as speaking to them it seems the specialist did at least ‘put in some orange stain, some other drops and use a couple of little machines on the eye’….

This can easily happen – the vet in the consult room is focused on the patient and not on the billing. This is why we strongly encourage templated invoices for all your common conditions, and when these are made be very careful that everything is included in template. For example the above may also have needed to have a Schirmer tear test, so that should be on the template and the vet have the option of deleting it rather than having to remember to add it on.

Make it easy for invoices to be done up quickly, but also make sure that everything is included and items have to be selected to be deleted off!

Note also that in the above example the very easy to compare price of ‘Consult’ is $200 at the specialist and only $80 at the general vet, yet the whole invoice is significantly higher at the general vet. So consumers would have the perception that the specialist is more expensive.

This example clearly shows how increasing list prices does not necessarily mean that you are charging enough – it is the total of the invoice that matters. This is why these days you may have noticed (if you were awake in our workshops) that we are benchmarking prices on total invoice values as well as list prices – for example if an invoice contains a consult fee, on average what is the total of that invoice. Incidentally, for those of you who are curious, the average total of an invoice containing a consult fee is $275. And you can see how looking at it this way would quickly identify a problem in a practice that is forgetting to charge for things during consults.

Dog Tales! – a trick for a treat

Because its Halloween, we thought we would introduce you to how dogs like to celebrate this festivity. Humans like ‘trick or treat’ and we think that’s mean because it results in snotty nosed kids throwing eggs at houses. Our way of doing it is ‘a trick for a treat’. And who says you ‘can’t teach an old dog new tricks’. Here is a video of 11 year old Lucky learning some new tricks just for Halloween:

https://vimeo.com/639829403

Latest News August 2021

http://www.aplaccountants.com.au

How have veterinary businesses performed during 2021?

We are just finishing analysing a number of clinics annual results and we are definitely seeing an improvement in business health over 2021.

Average profitability is up by 3% and revenue per full time veterinarian is up by $30,000, this is due to a higher average transaction fee, more pet owners and a higher average client spend. It looks like the industry is now stabilising at this current level, with the initial trend of monthly increases for the last year now leveling off, so we expect 2022 to look similar to 2021, as long as the Australian economy doesn’t suffer a sudden set back.

A different approach to monitoring how well you treat your patients

We have started to analyse clinics differently for 2021 and as well as the traditional approach of comparing clinics KPIs ‘per full time equivalent’ eg. number of dentals per full time vet equivalent we are also comparing clinics KPIs based on the number of patients they see eg. what % of their patients have dentistry, radiography, vaccinations etc. This gives a better idea of whether the veterinarians are working as good patient advocates as it does not depend on how many clients the clinic has or how busy it is. It is purely a measure of what % of patients that are seen actually receive certain services.

This new analysis is also looking at how many patients each client presents to the clinic – and this is surprisingly lower than anecdotal reports of how many pets the average client has. Even more interesting is looking at the number of animals that have had something purchased for them at the clinic yet have not seen the vet for a consult or vaccination in over 12 months – massive missed opportunity!

For those of you that are clients who have annual benchmarking with us all this new information will be in you reports and we will spend some time at our workshops discussing how best to interpret and use it. Lots of exciting information for the year ahead!

Dog Tales!

Don’t get caught napping on the job! I don’t hear too well, so when I’m asleep I don’t always know when mom or dad ‘ninja’ feed me – leave a morsel of food for when I wake up as a reward for being good. Last week I heard that ‘Chica’ my sister STOLE my ninja treat from right under my nose….imagine that! It got me thinking about napping on the job, and some of you are a bit tired from working too hard (much like me) and as a result you may have forgotten a couple of very important things:
Did you ‘finalise payroll’ for 2021 – if you haven’t done this then your team can’t get their tax returns done, and they will know you were napping.
Have you paid the superannuation from June? – many of you will have paid ‘most’ of the super towards the end of June but not the last payrun or two. Now if the ATO know you’ve been napping on this one they will steal your ninja treat and your next dinner too in the form of fines, so make sure you are all up to date!
I’m off for a quick power nap to recover from writing this….

Latest News July 2021

http://www.aplaccountants.com.au

Happy new financial year!

Don’t miss this web masterclass on employment contracts and wage increases!

Many of you have realised that you can currently afford to pay your vets more, but you are also worried about giving them a pay rise in case their performance drops or the economy takes a downturn and you find that you can no longer afford the higher wage. As accountants we are very cautious and realised your valid concern. We have approached Aspect Legal about this problem and they have a solution!

Please don’t miss this event if you are a business owner, as many of our ‘hands on’ clients are experiencing a lot of challenges over wage increases in the current market where there is a lot of work, a shortage of vets and the recruitment space is becoming a battlefield. 

Join us on Wednesday 21 July at 1pm (Qld time) where Aspect Legal will discuss how to implement the pay rise safely as well as some other important employment contract tips.

Register here:

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_oSj2p4GgR_uyw0HKsBDcUg

Web Masterclass Wednesday 14 July 1pm

Basic normalisation and business KPI comparisons

Register here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_jwL_jMBHTjilQx2G6QjbUQ

Comparing your business with the performance of others is very common practice these days. It helps business owners identify what they are doing well with, what they are doing badly and what targets to strive for. However if done incorrectly (and it is in 80% of cases), the information becomes inaccurate, misleading and can do more harm than good.

So to avoid the rubbish in/rubbish out situation that is commonplace in business comparisons, attend this event and we will show you all the important things you have to do to make business comparisons accurate.

This is a must for new clients to understand their annual strategic reports before our workshops and a great refresher for many others. We will discuss what we do to your financials to make them comparable, what we do to your list of services and fees to make them comparable and what the national average really is.

Everyone that registers will be doing some good as we will be planting trees in the world via B1G1 on behalf of every registrant.

Hope to see you there, so don’t forget to register here:  https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_jwL_jMBHTjilQx2G6QjbUQ

Have you booked in for our annual strategic workshop?

If you are currently a client then don’t forget to book into one of our annual workshops! If you haven’t received all the information then please let us know asap.

If you are currently not a client but would like to know how your business is doing, the areas you should be focusing on and get ideas from other veterinary business owners then please contact us for information on our annual strategic reporting and workshop by sending an email to [email protected] .

How has the veterinary industry tracked through 2021? And are vets working harder for their money?

At APL we always like to keep our data current to address the challenges in the immediate environment. On a monthly basis we have been sharing with our clients the trends in the industry over the last volatile 15 months where uncertainty has been the norm. 

This has also given us some opportunities to identify new ways of measuring things which we will be discussing over the coming year with both our clients and those who regularly attend our popular web-events.

As a brief heads up as to what we are talking about:
We know that the veterinary industry has weathered the storm of COVID pretty well over the last 15 months showing significant growth. But with our regular monthly monitoring, it is starting to look like the industry is starting to drop the ball on one of the most important things – performing high value wellness services on animals.

As many of you know, historically we, and many others have reported on the uptake of key veterinary services on a ‘per full time vet equivalent’ basis. And we will continue to do so because this is a good way to see how hard you team is working and how optimally your practice is resourced. For example, if your practice performs around 550 primary consultations per full time equivalent, then that is where the average practice is and it is likely that the size of your team is adequate to deal with the current workload.

But things are changing, there is a shortage of vets and an increase in pet ownership, so the same KPI’s have to be viewed in a different way to identify not if you are staffed optimally but rather if your existing team is adequately treating the pets and animals that you service. So now we will be measuring the percentage of pets who visit your practice that receive key services such as dentistry, primary consultations and vaccinations.

You may not be surprised to know that whilst the total amount of money being spent at practices and the number of pets is increasing, early data is indicating that the percentage of pets receiving key wellness services may be dropping.

Here is an example: For the month of June, across a population of 35,000 patients examined in that month, whilst the sales increased by 6.2%, the number of primary consultations dropped by 2% – so this is certainly an area that needs attention.

Dog Tales – For accountants Christmas comes twice a year!

As the dogs in the office we can assure you that there is a certain advantage in working in different professions. For example, if you are in a room full of people, and you tell them that you are an accountant, then nobody wants to speak to you. However, if in the same room you say that you are a veterinarian, then everyone wants to speak to you! Some could therefore argue that veterinarians have the social advantage over accountants because their job is indeed far more interesting. This has been tested a few times by our Mom and Dad who engage in this social experiment occasionally because they have worked in both professions. But as dogs, we can also guarantee that vets smell a lot more interesting too, so no argument there, vets win.

However there is one HUGE advantage to being an accountant. And that is that Christmas comes twice a year! The real Christmas involving the fellow with the big white beard who overdresses for Australian summers, and then there is the one that mom and dad call ‘Money Christmas’ right in the middle of the year. In accounting firms, this ending of a financial year is celebrated in Xmas like style – so happy end of financial year to you all and we are going out to party in a room full of boring accountants!  They may be boring, but they still give us treats.

Latest News June 2021

http://www.aplaccountants.com.au

Budget highlights

• Company tax rate will be 25% from 1 July 2021
• Superannuation guarantee will be payable even on employees earning less than $450/month from 1 July 2022
• Superannuation guarantee increases to 10% from 1 July 2021
• Fully deduct costs of equipment purchased (up to $150,000 per item) extended to 30 June 2023
• Changes to superannuation cap – $27,500 for next financial year.

Recruitment

Recent immigration changes have added veterinarians to the ‘Priority Migration Skilled Occupation List’. This not only means that their visa processing is given priority, but also that they can apply for an exemption to enter Australia. Under current regulations only residents and citizens have been allowed in, but foreigners on this special list can also apply – so at least it is a possibility. It still won’t be easy due to restricted and expensive flights and the time and cost of quarantine, but is an option.

Client workshops

Our client workshops will be a mix of online and face to face this year. Clients who already have this a s part of their package will have been emailed details, if you haven’t received this then please let us know. Any other independent veterinary business owner that is interested in attending please contact [email protected] for details and cost.

Dog Tales!

Mom and dad have started doing awesome ‘training’ with me, it’s all about games and yummy food! I must say it’s loads of fun, and I can’t wait for them to finish work every day so we can go and play. It got me to thinking – do you remember to give your team treats and let them have some fun? I wouldn’t behave nearly as well all day at work if mom hadn’t started these games with me….

Latest News May 2021

http://www.aplaccountants.com.au

Web Masterclass – Active patients and active clients, what do these numbers mean and how can you use them to improve your business?

Date and time: 12 May 1pm Brisbane time.
To register for this event click here:
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_vR0VqpUySfOwbHWjUxgN7Q

For a long time now we have relied on Active Clients as a very useful number – in fact we may have even said it is one of your most important KPI’s. It helps assess the workload of a practice, whether a practice is overstaffed, the inherent goodwill in a practice and whether a practice is growing by more than just fee increases. Surprisingly though, we have noticed when doing business valuations that many practices outside of our regular accounting and advisory services are not aware of this important number.

And now we have managed to get accurate measurements on a KPI that is just as powerful – Active Patients. This is something completely new that almost nobody knows about! 

In this event we will discuss how we define an active client vs an active patient  (the criteria for measuring them). We will discuss what the client to patient ratio should be and what it means if your practice deviates from this ratio. Then we will show you some interesting scenarios of how practices deviate from this and could potentially be losing a lot of money.

Finally we will also look at this measurement in context of how it has changed over COVID and how we intend to use these numbers over the next 6 months to make sure the veterinary industry is staying healthy.

So don’t miss this lunchtime ‘no-sales’ web event that promises to give you more insight into the industry.

Date and time: 12 May 1pm Brisbane time.
To register for this event click here:
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_vR0VqpUySfOwbHWjUxgN7Q

Should you have registered for payroll tax?

As annoying as it may be, when your wages and superannuation go over a certain amount you have to pay ‘payroll tax’ to the state government. Every state is different, generally you need to add up wages, superannuation, locum fees and director fees and if your expense is over a ‘threshold’ then you have to register for and pay payroll tax. 

This is something you should all be looking at as you are employing more people and increasing wages. Below is an annual threshold for each state, so if you are close to this threshold then you should look at it more closely. Note that the threshold for Victoria is very low compared to other states:

Qld $1.3m

NSW $1.2m

Vic $650,000

SA $1.5m

WA $1m

NT $1.5m

Tas $1.25m

ACT $2m

Dog Tales!

Yay, we are SOOO excited! We have a new bookkeeper, Renaei, that’s joined our pack. The bigger the pack the better – more tickles, more treats…oh no, mom just said Renaei will be working from her home office so how do we get remote tickles and treats?! Why is everyone working from home these days, it’s making the office so boring we only ever hear one side of the conversation and it’s never good to know only one side of a story. But what we do know from our side is that Renaei has an accounting degree and is xero certified, she loves helping clients and mom and dad think she’ll be a great fit to our pack! 

Latest News April 2021

http://www.aplaccountants.com.au

Sounds too good to be true?

Sometimes you get an offer that seems irresistible, almost too good to be true….if you don’t just jump in but stop to investigate further you may just find it’s not true! It has been brought to our attention by a client that there are some potential buyers for your business that you really need to think three times about before selling to.

If you are thinking of selling your business, would you accept part cash and part shares (in the entity that will be buying your business)? If you think you wouldn’t think carefully if somebody dangled an 8-10x multiplier of profit to you if you would just walk away. If you think you might sell then please read on.

What due diligence would YOU as the seller do on the buyer? We are all familiar with the buyer wanting lots and lots of information from you the seller, but what do you ask for in return?

If, for example, your clinic was worth $1m and you took 60% as cash and 40% as shares, then what would happen if the buyer went insolvent? Well the good news is that you’d keep the 60% cash – $600k – as this is yours and nobody can take it away from you. However what would happen to that $400k tied up in shares in the insolvent company? The most likely answer is you would never see another $ from it!

Remember that if you are not offered 100% cash then you are only really getting paid for part of your business. You may own many shares, but if you have not done a lot of research into the buyer then you may well end up with shares that are worth nothing. This has happened a number of times in the past in other industries and there is no reason it won’t hit the veterinary industry too.

One of our clients informed us that there is a new group out there buying veterinary practices right now that left a number of dentists with very empty pockets and loss of shares when their venture in the dental market went insolvent. They have just re-formed another entity moved onto the next thing – veterinary practices!

Think twice about any great looking deal particularly when all the cash is not upfront. If a buyer making such an offer is asking you to show all your finances and dirty laundry, remember, you are investing as much in their venture as they are in yours! So in these cases you would have to ask them to show you exactly the same information for their business – it’s an “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours” scenario. 

Thought about your 2021 tax bill yet?

This is the time of year that we start looking at ‘tax planning’ with our clients. One of the most important aspects of this is estimating how much tax you will need to pay on your 2021 tax return. We know that most of you have had a better year than previously, but with all the good there is also a little pain and that will come in paying your tax bill. If your profit has gone up this year then you will not have paid enough in tax instalments during the year and will likely need to be paying more tax than usual.

For many of you this extra tax won’t fall due until this time next year, so it could be easy to spend your surplus cash now and then end up stuck for cash next year when you need to pay your tax. Make sure you have factored this in to your current spendings!

There are some common things you can do that reduce profit and therefore tax:

1. Pay extra into superannuation – $25,000 including super guarantee for the year. For some of you there is an option to put in more than this as a tax deduction (most importantly your superfund balance needs to be under $500k and then the amount you can add depends on how much you put into superannuation in previous years)

2. Buy equipment that you are needing – each item up to $150k is fully deductible but remember it reduces your profit by the amount you spend so you only get a % of the amount you spend paid by the ATO.

Dog Tales!

As the naughty dogs in the office we can say that the dog people have won! Nurten, who was actually a CAT person, has decided to leave us and move to a different field of work. In her defense though she still used to give us tickles and treats even though she preferred cats. If Nurten was doing your bookkeeping, don’t worry as mom and dad have it all in hand and are searching for a great replacement as we type. We promise we didn’t scare her away, we are far too friendly for that – she has decided bookkeeping is no longer for her….ouch that veterinary paperwork must really be as yucky as diet dog food. A big thank you to Nurten for looking after us and her clients and we do hope she enjoys whatever work she chooses to do (but we doubt she’ll ever find an office as doggy as ours, and as of yet, we have never heard of a cat friendly office)