Australian SME Business News and Accounting Articles

The most important tip to making a successful business is having a strong cash flow. That is why every single business owner should have to know what it takes to have that strong cash flow and ultimately make a business successful.

You cannot afford to be lagged in the business industry as letting this happen will mean losing your customer base and not growing your investment.

In these times of financial uncertainties and tough business competitions, you have to exhaust all your efforts to keeping your business afloat.

In order for a business to have a strong cash flow, it is important that it sends out invoices to its clients to remind them of their dues and to enable the company to liquidate their profits.

As such, it is most useful and beneficial to have online accounting programs to make sure that nothing slips the accountant’s hands.

Online timesheets have become an important tool for any small business. In as much as employees need to be compensated appropriately for a day’s work, businesses also have to be careful not to overpay or underpay its employees and risk losing thousands of dollars due to miscalculations.

Among the most important measures for a business’ success is its productivity. The more productive it is, the faster it will grow and the bigger the profits. That is why it is essential to always make sure that the business, particularly, its employees’ productivity.

Another important aspect of every business is the payroll. It is one that keeps the workforce functioning to make the business earn profits and sales. These reasons make it essential for businesses to have an effective payroll system.

There is an old adage that goes, “practice makes perfect”. However, is there really anything that we can do perfectly? Perhaps, the answer is no. But practicing still makes sense especially that it helps us avoid committing mistakes.

Just like any other subject, accounting, which is often a difficult thing or task to many, has practices which are actually mistakes that need to be avoided.

Business productivity is the main and ultimate goal of any company. However, times change and so do the ways of achieving such productivity. So for every small business, here are some helpful tips to boosting that productivity and leading the way in the industry.

Today, more and more businesses are moving their transactions and details to the cloud. The cloud, or also known as cloud computing, is like virtual office that gives business owners the chance to connect to their businesses anytime, anywhere from a computer. It is one kind of accounting software. News has it that its benefits are continually growing as well as more and more companies are seeing its advantages.

Poor cash flow has always been the biggest cause of failure for small businesses. Often this can be due to a too high ‘debtors days ratio’, the ratio that measures how quickly cash is being collected from debtors, those individuals or companies that owe debt to you (the creditor), as a result of borrowing or issuing bonds.

This has been an age old problem and can be caused by a number of seemingly small issues, such as slow payment of invoices from customers.

Having difficulties with your business accounting?

In every type and size of business, managing your business accounts is a vital necessity. As the language of business, accounting is the basis for communicating information about the performance and condition of your business via financial documents and reports, which is necessary to assess the financial position of your company as well as help your company accordingly engage in future planning for your finances.

Accounting software have been proven to have provided much help to business owners and accountants. These have made work much more convenient and the business thriving. So if your company has not found the right software, then take note of these top features of accounting software:

Your business is your life’s work. Therefore, you will do everything to make it grow and reap fruits. There must be a return of investment for it to start making profits. And this can be made possible by using business accounting software.

Many companies have already engaged the services of such small business accounting software for they have seen the changes their businesses have had. They recognize that online accounting software can indeed change their business for the better.

Shoebooks.com.au, Australia’s simple yet comprehensive online accounting software provider, has now grown even bigger and better!

Shoebooks, an Australian accounting software provider located in Melbourne, Australia, was originally established in 2002 to provide flexible, efficient and affordable online accounting software and bookkeeping solutions to small and medium business. Its online bookkeeping and accounting software was originally developed as a primary delivery method that reports to and collects information from clients.

For many years Shoebooks’ managing director, David Dean B. Bus (Acc), has analyzed and developed best practice bookkeeping and billing systems and along with his business partner Michael Szirom, Database Engineer, was able to develop a customized online accounting and bookkeeping solution that stands alone from the competition in effectively servicing the SME sector.

Though the tax season is over, it doesn’t mean that you’ll also stop thinking about your taxes. In fact, small business owners, especially sole proprietors, are particularly at risk of being audited by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). This is because the IRS believes self-employment incomes are grossly under reported, according to experts. That's why, even though the tax season is over, now is still a great time to make sure your tax planning strategy is solid and know how to avoid an audit.

Every business owner would aspire for nothing less than have a return of investment, at the very least, as well see the investments double or even triple. And this can be achieved by ensuring that the company’s bookkeeping and accounting are accurate. Otherwise, everything will go down the drain.

Been having payroll errors lately or been late with your payroll?

For small businesses, it can be a complicated and time-consuming to process payroll. You need to be accurate with your inputting and calculations, as errors will lead to payroll delays and employee dissatisfaction.

Fortunately, with the advent of a more advance internet technologies, online payroll software services have become easily accessible. Online bookkeeping and payroll service has become an excellent alternative to company's more costly internal payroll department.

Investing in a business these, in the midst of the financial crisis affecting the world over, can be a tough one to think about. There has to be a series of thinking, discussion with financial advisers, and a really strong reason to do so. That is why it is important for a business owner or investor to analyze a company’s financial statement before jumping into the water.

Though this task does not seem too easy, you can always learn the basics and be knowledgeable and ready to invest or not.

Accounting and Bookkeeping in a business need to be taken care of by the business owner in order to make the investment thriving. These two should not be taken for granted or else, the owner will just be surprised to know that the business is losing much from its coffers. There is, therefore, the need to employ accounting software for business.

Any business thrives on a strong cash flow as well as in industrious employees. And the way to get the latter is to keep employees well-compensated and happy. They must get what is due to them so that they will continue to work hard and become efficient and productive workers.

Collecting, recording, calculating, keeping track and then analyzing a business’s transactions accurately and efficiently is a vital part of business, whether small, medium or large, yet especially in the world of small businesses and start up businesses.

Fortunately, there are accountants available who can do the accounting manually for you and there are a myriad of accounting software for businesses available that are able to complete accounts chores faster and more efficiently than is possible manually. Moreover, with the increased availability and competition in the accountancy services market, nowadays, web accounting software has become affordable enough to be used by small businesses.

Every business needs to keep its cash flow strong. It has to constantly collect its receivables and pay its dues. And though many businesses stick to the conventional way of invoicing, the process whereby a business sends its billing to a customer, it would be much better and more efficient if they use invoicing software.

The advantages of such are enormous and overwhelming. In fact, many businesses have already seen these and are quickly deciding on using accounting online to make their operations smoother.

In any type of business, may it be SMEs or corporations, payroll has always played a major role both in the business’ administrative and employees sides.

In the employees’ perspective, payroll is a source of joy for employees. If being paid accurately and timely, it can bring a satisfying compensation of a job well done. Whereas, for business owners, payroll is an essential and crucial accounting matter as it can considerably affect the net income of any business. If payroll accounting is not done accurately and timely for any errors, it can cause businesses to lose money and causes unnecessary upsets to employees.

Any business today that wants to grow and expand its reach definitely needs to have bookkeeping software, preferably online bookkeeping. This is because the trends in businesses have changed, customer demand is growing, and competition is tightening.

Bookkeeping software is known to bring about a number of advantages to a company or business.

Often called “the language of business”, accounting lies at the heart of a business, serving as the backbone of core business operations across the entire company.

Accounting provides much of the information that owners, managers, and investors need to evaluate a company’s financial performance. However, managing a business requires attention to many financial details and much more time-consuming without the help of accounting software.

Technology has really revolutionized everything around us. And businesses, which are considered the main source of income of many business owners, have received a lot of advantages of technology. Among these is the use of accounting software.

Accounting software for business has been deemed very helpful especially for those business owners who have engaged the services of such software providers. Many have reported having increased profits due to more efficient and accurate processes in their transactions.

As more and more online accounting programs are emerging in the web and increasingly becoming more and more popular, did you know that online accounting software are now also offering online payroll features?

Yes, online accounting software now features payroll services and is a perfect solution for your payroll needs, especially for SMEs.

Complete payroll web accounting software that fits the needs of most users regardless of their payroll requirements are now increasingly more available in the web nowadays.

Aside from being inexpensive and effective solutions, these accounting on line also have special features.

For professional services firms and project-based businesses, Timesheets are essential.

Whether you’re billing your clients by the hour or using a value-based pricing model, you need to keep track of employee time and know how much time was spent on specific projects and manage projects. Manually tracking your employee’s time is inefficient and prone to errors. Besides, if your employees have the usual tendency in submitting their timesheets late, you may not get an actual picture of your projects’ profitability. Worse, if the timesheet collection process is delaying your invoicing, your cash flow will be suffering.

Running a business entails much skills as well as patience and perseverance. Oftentimes, it can be frustrating especially when things do not go well as planned. And in such situations, any business owner should consider the ways by which the business will benefit. And among these ways, and perhaps the most important and helpful, is the use of small business accounting software.

Commissioned by Google, Vanson Bourne had conducted a research that questioned 100 senior executives within the finance departments at UK companies.

According to the research, data revealed that there are 93% of financial decision makers that believe that cloud computing, of which online accounting is one of the examples, will be an important element to the success of their businesses over the next couple of years.

This year may be quite different considering the tax changes that have and will be implemented. It is best to be acquainted and informed about these to avoid being sanctioned by the IRS as well as to better know one’s rights.

Millions of SME’s are not aware of how they could save business energy by using cloud computing, says E.ON.

According to a research by energy provider, E.ON, there are around 90% of SME’s that don’t understand that they could significantly reduce the amount they spend on IT energy by using cloud computing.

Cloud computing is a general term for anything that involves the delivery of computing and storage capacity as a service to a heterogeneous community of end-recipients over the Internet and entrusts these services with a user's data, software and computation over a network and are stored on servers at a remote location such as those involved in online accounting that stores accounting data entered into a network and stored on servers at a remote location.

Every small business needs to have bookkeeping software to ensure that everything goes smoothly including the cash flow of the business. Checks and balances have to be monitored because the slightest error in bookkeeping can spell a big disaster for the company. And with the uncertain economic times the world is facing, it is only necessary to get that accounting software that suits one’s business.

If you haven’t yet made use of your accounting software to do the calculating of your taxes for you, then it’s time to do so.

As the end of financial year is fast getting closer, now is the time for small businesses to start getting their tax in order, using their small business accounting software, and to psych up in leveraging some law changes set to commence in the new financial year.

Branding is very essential in businesses. No customer will ever want to deal with one that is not known in the industry it plays in. Even in buying small stuff, it is important to go for those which are known and reliable in the business world.

Last week, After the release of strong domestic employment data figures, the Australian dollar surged back towards parity with its US counterpart.

The Australian dollar had risen to 99.54 US cents in late afternoon trading. Just before the data was released, it was trading at 98.97 US cents.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics had recently released employment data that showed there were 38,900 more people who had found jobs in May.

However, there was an increase of 0.1 per cent to 5.1 per cent in the unemployment rate, as economists had forecast.

Every business needs all the attention and careful planning it can get in order for it to survive and thrive. And among the things that it can benefit from include having bookkeeping software. However, not all business owners acknowledge the importance and help of such software. Instead, they prefer to do it by themselves and end up making all the mistakes in accounting and bring their businesses to the edge.

Another option to ensure a company’s efficient services and strong cash flow is to hire a professional bookkeeper. This person is experienced in the ins and outs of keeping records of transactions of a company. A bookkeeper helps out in the tasks of the accountant and makes the accountant’s work easier and more efficient.

In these troubling times of our world economy, the way for business owners, whether SMEs or large corporations, to achieve maximum profit returns is to concentrate on effective business management.

Because of too much pressure, especially from the financial side, often basic management is overlooked. However, if a business is to survive and thrive in this current state of our world economy, the business must be managed effectively.

In effectively managing a small business, you must manage your time, resources and employees as effectively as possible.

With Europe trying to deal with its debt crisis, the effects have been felt by Australia as over $120 billion had been wiped off its shares in the market in the month of May. This has been the lowest level that Australia’s stocks had fallen in six months.

The market had plunged by 2.6 percent, wiping off about $35 billion from the local shares. With the market’s loss reaching $121 billion with its year’s peak on May 2, Australia could have already bought A380 super jumbo jets.

Just recently, it has been revealed that almost 7000 of WA's small businesses have had a tax windfall.

A one-off payroll tax rebate awaits the almost 7000 WA’s small businesses as the Barnett Government commits to reimburse up to $41,250 each for the payroll tax in an attempt to bolster the non-mining parts of the economy.

But the WA’s small businesses will have to wait until next year to get the cash.

About $US2 billion was lost by JPMorgan Chase, US’ largest bank, in a trading portfolio, according to the company. The same portfolio was designed to protect the company against the risks it takes in relation to its money.

After the loss was announced on Thursday, a plunge of more than 6 percent in the company’s stocks in the late electronic trading was recorded. It was not only the JPMorgan Chase that felt the losses. Other companies also felt the same like Citigroup and the Bank of America.

Having just finished filing your income tax last month, yet forgot to include your use tax? If you’re busy, you can avail of small business accounting software that will help you work out your use taxes.

What is Use Tax?

It is a type of excise tax imposed goods or certain services used, consumed, or stored in a particular state where sales tax has not been paid.

Generally, use taxes are the tax that you accrue when you purchase an item without paying your home state's sales tax and you use, give away, store, or consume that item in your home state.

In an effort to reignite growth in the sagging economy, the Reserve Bank of Australia has made a cut on its interest rates, with the dollar diving on the recent decision.

As evidence of weaker demand in the Australian economy continues with weaker global conditions hitting exports and restricted wage growth keeping prices in check, the RBA has cut its growth and inflation forecasts for the next 18 months, according to its Statement on Monetary Policy released recently.

With the series of accounting mistakes by Groupon recently, it is taking steps today in order to win back the confidence of investors and industry observers in it.

Daniel Henry, the Chief Financial Officer of American Express, along with Robert Bass, Deloitte Vice President, has been appointed as the new board member of Groupon.

Small businesses today have more to worry than those in the past decades like fuel costs, cash flow, and interest rates. This is the main reason why small business owners are losing their confidence on the economy. It has been noted that their confidence levels have gone down to very low levels not seen since the global financial crisis.

The MYOB Business monitor report for March showed that only 19 percent, or less than one-fifth, among small business owners and managers have faith that the economy will improve in the next 12 months.

It may seem like the end of the financial year is a lifetime away and working on your taxes an eternity. But, there’s no best time like today for shrewd small business owners to start planning, coordinating and developing their personal and business end-of-year tax saving strategies of deferring income where possible until July 1 while maximizing deductions by June 30 to take full advantage of changing tax-saving opportunities and to sidestep a range of looming tax traps; thus, saving more of their hard-earned profits, as well as eliminating headaches and possible IRS difficulties down the road.

With the current trying times of the different economies of the world, coupled by inflation and unemployment, it is no longer a wonder when a small business tries to avail loans from money lending institutions. This is something that has to be anticipated in order for a company or business to have the necessary funding to support its operations.

The easiest and most convenient loan by small businesses may be taken from banks. Banks, though requiring a lot of documents, can very well provide the amount that companies need. That is why it is very important for business owners to establish positive relationships with banks.

Weak business confidence pulls Australian dollar down by a third of a US cent.

The Australian dollar has seen a slight drop in quiet trade just recently as investors display weak business confidence, sitting on the sidelines awaiting the outcome of a Spanish government bond auction.