5 Important Year End Bookkeeping Checks

Here are some tips for important checks to make sure that your books are up to date and the information contained in them is correct for the end of the financial year and ready to send to your Tax Agent to prepare the annual tax return.

Reconcile Bank Accounts

It is important to ensure that the balance of all bank and credit card accounts actually matches the balance on the bank statement at 30th June. A reconciliation report can be run from your software to check that all transactions have actually been reconciled and that the balance is correct. Even if you use a software with active bank feeds, it is not enough to rely on those feeds as I have experienced transactions that have not fed into the software and even duplicate statement lines.

Stocktake

If your business has inventory, an annual stocktake must be performed and details provided to your bookkeeper or accountant so adjustments can be made to your books as necessary.

Asset Purchase Details Saved

A good accountant will require details of any large purchases or assets, so get prepared and, if possible, attach the documentation to the transaction in your software. Alternatively, save the details to a shared Dropbox, Google Drive or similar folder online. Other information you may wish to save for ease are insurance details and invoices, and receipts for tax deductible donations.

Payroll

It is super important that, if you employ staff, before you prepare the PAYG Payment Summaries, you check that all payroll details reconcile. There are various reasons why what has been recorded on a payslip does not match the actual amount that has left the bank. It is very common that bank transactions are incorrectly coded and are sent to the incorrect account on the balance sheet or profit and loss - these errors all need to be resolved before PAYG Payment Summaries are prepared.

Is your super paid up to date? Payments for the June quarter need to be sitting in the employees super fund prior to 30th June to be claimable as a tax deduction!

Single Touch Payroll is coming! Is your business prepared? Are your staff prepared?

Aged Payables and Aged Receivables

Check over the outstanding Sales Invoices and Purchase Bills to ensure that what is showing as outstanding is actually what is outstanding. Have you accidentally recorded a payment to a supplier as a spend money instead of matching it against a bill, or a customer receipt as a receive money instead of matching it to a sales invoice?

If you require any assistance in getting your books ready for year end don't delay, contact us now!