Dr. Roshawnna Novellus: 5 Tips for Entrepreneurs/Small Businesses During Tax Season

Dr. Roshawnna Novellus believes people should live the life of their dreams. While individuals live out their daily lives, financial burdens can oftentimes affect their wallets – as well as – their mind frames. Dr. Novellus is on a mission to help people understand the power of “pairing finance with mindfulness.”

As the March 15 deadline approaches, small business owners usually find themselves stressed during tax season. From W-2’s to business expenses, how to go about filing taxes is a big deal. To help business owners prepare themselves mentally, we asked Dr. Novellus to share her top five tips for the 2015/2016 tax season.

5 Tips for Entrepreneurs/Small Businesses During Tax Season 

1. Stay on top of payroll – Small businesses have to send in their 1099’s and W-2’s at the end of January. Doing this, not only impacts your company, but also impacts all of your employees and independent contractors. You don’t know how many times people file their taxes, then they receive a 1099 in March. It affects everyone. So, be on top of your payroll and be compliant because their alot of penalties.
2. Claim all of your deductions – A lot of business owners don’t prioritize beyond their taxes and then when the deadline approaches, only actually record their revenue. So, in fact, they have a larger tax bill than they otherwise would have. If they would have properly prepared their taxes and claimed all of their deductions.
3. Be honest – Small business owners try to find deductions they do not qualify for. That’s a bad deal. Be honest. If you have a home office, please claim the home office. But if you don’t, you don’t. Have an accurate assessment of your finances and do what it takes to get all of the deductions that you are legally entitled to receive, but don’t claim anything else.
4. File early – Don’t wait until the last minute to file your tax return. Partnerships have to send out K-1’s to all of their business owners. And, a lot of times businesses file extensions and the K-1’s aren’t sent out until September (when small businesses have to file their tax return). This doesn’t give the company an accurate understanding of where it stands financially nor the owners.
5. Stay organized – Have that relationship with your money. Do not wait until tax time to know what your profit is for the year. You should actually know how you are and where you stand in your business on an ongoing basis. A lot of companies wait until 18-months after to figure out “Hey I made a loss. Or hey I made this much money.” That’s not the place you want to be. You want to be in alignment of where your profit it and where your expenses are, so that you can modify as necessary and maximize your business revenue whenever possible.

In addition to the tips, Dr. Novellus also spoke on any new regulations implemented by the IRS.

“The Affordable Care Act has implemented a penalty for small business owners. Small business owners will have a heavy penalty for not providing health insurance to their employees. Be sure to abide by all regulations and don’t be caught by surprise. Also, reimbursing your employees for their health insurance does not count as an exemption. Make sure you follow all of the regulations and stay compliant with all Affordable Care Act obligations,” stated Dr. Novellus.

Watch the video above.

Dr. Roshawnna Novellus aka The Wealthy Yogi (www.thewealthyyogi.com) is a federally licensed tax professional that uses yoga and meditation as tools to empower individuals financially. She holds five degrees and is the president of Novellus Financial (www.novellusfinancial.com) located in Atlanta, GA.  Novellus Financial provides tax resolution, operation strategy, and bootstrap capital securing. 

Follow her on Instagram @wealthyyogi !