Let’s face it – doing your taxes is not fun. As rewarding as it is to be a sole trader running your own business, it also comes with its fair share of annoying tasks, and calculating sole trader tax takes the cake for being the most annoying. You need to get your taxes done on time and accurately but this is easier said than done. Every year you waste countless hours trawling through the last financial year’s records and promising yourself that next year will be different and less painful.

But what if there is an easier way to organise your business, not just at tax time, but all year round? Job management software stores and tracks your business’ financial details in one place, to help you lodge your small business taxes quickly and get you the most accurate return.

Here’s how management software can save you time (and money) during tax time.

Keep Track of your income

The key to getting your sole trader tax return done successfully is preparation. Your business needs a singular and efficient record of every expense, quote, payment and return it’s ever made to ensure nothing falls through the cracks. When you rely solely on manual processes, what starts as a hopeful plan to keep everything in order, quickly becomes “where the hell did I put that receipt from six months ago?”

Job management software is a digital record of every transaction your business makes, from the time the first quote is created to the final receipt of payment. Every time you or a staff member makes or receives a transaction it can be immediately logged into the system and stored. When it’s time to lodge your tax you simply need to review your records and report your income with confidence.

Organise your deductibles

You’d be surprised what your business can claim under tax. From parking to legal fees, there’s plenty of big-ticket items your business can earn back in its tax return. But the tricky part is, how do you differentiate between all the expenses you and your staff make throughout the financial year? Without a clear way to record and report on these expenses, chances are you’ll miss something and in turn, miss out on getting some decent money back into the business. With job management software you can easily organise your expenses throughout the year. When it’s time to lodge a claim you can have them ready to go rather than scrambling to remember and compile everything.

Achieve easier compliance

The new Single Touch Payroll (STP) system enables your business to more easily send your employee’s payroll and super information to the Australian Taxation Office (ATO). This is done through automatically sending that information via your company payroll or accounting software. Every time the software runs your data is sent straight to the ATO, eliminating the need to manually send the information during tax time. But not all accounting software is created equally and to remain compliant, businesses need to implement an approved STP solution. Fortunately many of these are free or low-cost, such as Xero and Quickbooks, and can integrate directly with job management software.

Integration with an approved STP system means you benefit from both solutions at once and don’t need to switch between them. For tax purposes, integration makes staying on top of your business and its finances easier. The jobs you log and manage can be instantly cross-referenced with your payments and reports can be automatically generated and ready for submission to the ATO.

Tax doesn’t need to be a long and arduous process. There are tools available to help make the process quick and less a headache. Job management software not only makes your internal processes more streamlined but it lets you get a more accurate tax return quickly and easily.

Want to learn more about Job Management Software?

Geo is our cloud-based job management app that tracks jobs, invoices and customers for your business. It lets you and your team work how you want, wherever you want. Best of all Geo is simple and easy to use – making it the ultimate tool for your workforce. You can try Geo FREE for 30-days and see the difference for yourself.

Try Geo for free.