04 February 2020
Question:
What do I need to do before my financial year-end?
Answer:
Even the phrase year-end can cause some to come out in a cold sweat with visions of pressure levels rising, long hours and sleepless nights. But there are some measures you can take to reduce the impact of the increased admin and paperwork that the year-end brings:
- Make sure that your internal management accounts are up-to-date, ideally on a monthly basis, and that you have all the necessary expenses recorded and have made any necessary provisions.
- At around 9/10 months before your year-end, your accountant should arrange a meeting with you to discuss your accounts, audit if required, and look for tax planning opportunities that may be lost once your year-end has passed. For example, the company making a pension contribution on behalf of the owner manager (within specific guidelines). This has to be physically paid before the year end OR if you are about to invest in some capital equipment, it may be worth considering doing that just before rather than just after the company year-end so you can claim any potential capital allowances a year earlier.
- Talk to your accountant about the possibilities of the company submitting an R&D tax relief claim and start to gather the relevant information.
- Start to think about setting next year’s budgets and financial targets.
- Consider voting or paying a year-end dividend. This won’t reduce the company’s corporation tax bill but it needs to be considered for your personal tax planning situation.
Talk to us about pre financial year-end checks in your business.
