I went to a party on Monday night, and I’m going to another one this Sunday…a tax return party!

One of the great things about being a networker extraordinaire is meeting lovely people from across the country (and indeed the globe!) – and this week I had the chance to work with one of these lovely people.

Erin O’Brien is a time management coach based in Sydney, and the founder of the “Tax Return PARTY”.  The concept came about from Erin’s passion for creating solutions to annoying problems – and I was so pleased to be asked to be “Consulting Tax Counsel” on the call.

The format is a video based webinar with a bit of fun and then an “Action Power Hour”!  The Action Power Hour is divided into four 15 minute blocks of time, you set yourself a goal to achieve in relation to your paperwork or records and then get stuck into it.

I’m on hand to answer general tax and accounting questions (of course due to professional and ethical considerations I am unable to provide personal advice unless you are a client of mine) – yet some of the things I helped with on Monday included providing website links to areas of interest, assistance with Xero and tips on record keeping!

Tickets are available for this Sunday (31st July, 2016) from this link.

The Action Power Hour is a great concept – I was even able to set myself some 15 minute tasks and achieved them – very productive!

Regards

Our next Business in Heels – South West Victoria event is coming up on Wednesday 10th August, 2016.

Message in a Bottle – Overcoming your hurdles, will be presented by Narelle Fraser.

Narelle was a member of Victoria Police for 27 years, 15 of those as a Detective with Homicide, Rape, Sex Crimes, Missing Persons & Child Exploitation Squads.

Narelle was involved in some of the most serious crime investigations in Victoria including The Society Murders (Margaret & Paul Wales-King), The Body in the Boot Case (Maria Korp) The Mornington Monster (Anna & Gracie Sharpe) and The Ascot Vale Rapist (Christopher Hall) – amongst the most dangerous criminals in the state.

And why do I need to know them?

Have you been in the situation where you’re working at your job, and you start a business on the side, you make a loss in that business and your accountant tells you that you can’t claim it?

This may be because you don’t meet the non-commercial loss rules.

The rules were introduced to ensure that only genuine business operators benefit from any losses they incur, and provided a counter-act to the number of taxpayers who were operating “hobbies” but  trying to claim them as a business.

If you make a loss in your business operation (this is any business, not just a part time business as I referred to above), there are some questions that need answering in order to determine if the loss is claimable in the relevant year, or does it need to be carried forward.

Each of the questions to be asked must be applied to the specific circumstances, and so I won’t go into them here – safe to say, if you run a business and have incurred a loss for the year, get The Tax Chic to help you determine if the ATO will consider it a commercial or non-commercial loss!

Regards

From 1 July, 2015 (ie: the 2015/16 financial year just ended), an individual will be eligible to a 5% discount, as a non-refundable tax offset, for an income year when the individual is a small business entity sole trader or an individual’s income includes a share of the net income of a non-incorporated small business entity such as a partnership or trust.

This measure was introduced to match the reduction in the company tax rate, and of course there are some rules that go with it.

The sole trader or small business entity must have carried on a business during the year and have a turnover (sales) of less than $2 million (this amount will need to be annualised for any business that commences or ceases during the year – I can help you with this!)

There is a special calculation for calculating this discount (or offset, as is the more official terminology…) but I won’t bore you with that here…you just need to know that it is limited to $1,000 and cannot be applied against the tax payable on wages or investment income (including dividends received from a small business entity company).

If you think this might apply to you, make sure you get The Tax Chic to complete your tax return, simply Contact me on how to do so.

Regards