When you are just starting up a technology business, it can be very important to find the right accountant. Not only can they help to minimise the tax you pay in the short term, but they can also help to keep a track of your expenses to minimise the tax bill if you do get bought out by a big investor.
Research and development (R&D) tax benefits
If your startup is in the technology field and is working on either generating new knowledge or processes and has an uncertain outcome, then you may be eligible for an R&D tax offset. This offset is for small companies and is designed to encourage businesses to embark on R&D. An accountant can help you to apply for the offset. It can be useful to get an accountant that specialises in startups as the offset application is a very specialised accounting task.
Setting up an easy to use accounting system
As you go through the life of your startup, you may accumulate a lot of costs. It can be easy to miss some of the amounts, particularly if you are self-funding and there is an overlap between personal and company funds. However, it's important to keep a track of accounts and costs that you are using, as these can be used to offset your tax at a later date. Losses can be carried forward and offset against future profits in some cases, so you can use these early losses in later years as your business becomes more successful.
Project accounting
If you are working on multiple R&D projects it's important to have a system that easily allocates costs between the projects. There are several great accounting systems that can be connected to smartphone apps, making it easy to keep a track of expenses and allocate them to the right project centre. This means that if you get an offer to buy or invest in one of your projects, you can easily describe how much money that your company has already invested into the project (including people related costs such as hours worked on each project by your staff).
If you would like some help in setting up your accounts for the maximum long-term benefit to your startup, it can be good to get advice from accountants who specialise in startups. They can give you specific advice depending on the nature of your business as well as your future plans for the business.
Share16 August 2016
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