I have mentioned that I use my cell phone to remind me to do things. Before I had a cell phone or a computer calendar, heck, back before I had a computer or used my husband’s comptuer - I needed a way to remember to do things.
When we lived an apartment chores were a lot easier. My husband would come home exhausted at the end of the week and go to bed early on Friday nights - very early - so I would clean the apartment while he was sleeping. I changed the bedding on the weekend. At first when the laundry bag filled up - about once a week to a week and a half - I went to the laundry up and across the street and wasted time doing the laundry - it came home in the same bag which also was washed. Then someone left a lipstick in the washing machine there - the washing machine I put all our clothes, towels, and bed linens in. Most of it had to be thrown out. Even then we were “odd sized” and had trouble replacing the clothes - plus the expense of replacing same and the rest. So we looked around and bought a very small washer and a very small dryer - really small. This turned laundry into an ongoing process most of the week. On Monday I would put the first load in the washer - a week of our shirts was all it was hold in one load. The dryer was about the same and did not have an exhaust hose, it exhausted the hot air into the adjacent air in the apartment and it took about twice as long as drying a full load of clothes does now. So this was a laborious process for most of the week - and very hot in summer with the air from the dryer heating the apartment beyond the summer heat, even with an air conditioner running.
When we moved to the house I needed to find ways to remember and “force myself” to do the household chores. I found it helpful to associate the chores to things to remind me. We have garbage pickup on Monday and Thursday - so, I started changing the towels on the same days - new towels went out on Mondays and Thursdays. Eventually I decided that I needed to change the kitchen towels more often and they became Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays, while bathroom towels stayed the same. (Shower towels are taken out when they will be used and used once.) Works well.
I used to change the bedding on Mondays as it was a new workweek. This worked okay until we started traveling for weekends more often as we often stayed away through Mondays. Since then Tuesdays is the day I change the bedding - unless there is a reason to do it on another day.
I started doing the laundry on Wednesday nights. Why? If we were going to take a weekend trip it definitely would not be while we were away and we would have clean and folded clothes for a trip leaving on Friday. I used to do the entire washing and drying on Wednesday nights, then husband started watching TV in the kitchen and blocking the basement door, so I could not conveniently do the laundry while he was sitting there and had to wait for him to go upstairs to his computer, so I ended up splitting the laundry between Wednesday and Thursday nights - and folding them Thursday and Friday mornings. Yes, “West Wing” changed my laundry schedule. :-)
Even this blog is tied to something, it is written on Wednesday night and posted late on same - or technically early on Thursday - as I do the laundry at the same time.
Actually cleaning and dealing with the house was easier before husband quit his job and is now with me all the time. My time is no longer my own - similar to him sitting in the way of doing the laundry on Wednesday nights. I may plan to do one thing - but he needs help warping his loom. I plan to do things during the afternoon - not even house related - and he has other plans. Today the eyeglasses he ordered came in, so everything I hoped to do was gone. We drove 45 minutes to Walmart in the next county (the only one with a vision department around here) plus the time there and then the drive back - and while driving home I remembered we needed to buy milk at Walmart and had to stop at another one and buy it.
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -
Are there automatic reminders which you can tie your house chores to?
Thursday, May 18, 2017
Thursday, May 11, 2017
SHREDDING AND SCANNING
I have been very busy scanning bills and shredding papers - two separate, but slightly related projects. This has taken me only about 4 days - and by days I mean 4 sessions of a few hours each.
First the scanning - Last month I decided and posted about - 4-13-17 POST
- deciding to scan in bills as I pay them. Understand if I pay a charge card bill, I am only scanning in the statement, not every slip - even I am not that crazy - this is to make it easier if I need to view or need a copy of what I paid. Per the earlier post this is the result of needing a bill from last year and not being able to find it. I was lucky enough to have a scan of the bill and was able to use that for reference.
So I have since been scanning each bill as I pay it. For our personal checking account I am scanning them into my data drive. I set up a folder for the year with a subfolder for each month to make it all easier to find. For our business checking account I am just using a folder for the year as we write very few checks. I will go back when I have a chance shortly and scan in the bills from earlier in the year.
Once a year I empty out the oldest storage box of records - I have 9 boxes so it is the one from 9 years before - and refill it with the previous year. I cannot do this in earlier in the year as I want to include in the new year’s storage, the papers needed for income tax and our bank statements through the end of the prior year and I like to have the last statement we have at hand - some of our statements come in quarterly, so this can not be done before mid-April at the earliest and generally later than that. This year since I did not put our business return on extension I was ready to do this switch over now. I have been getting rid of 2007 records to make room for storage of 2016 records.
I was already to get rid of the 2007 records when the thought hit me - why not scan in the 2016 bills so I have them for reference before I store them away.
Second, the shredding - Before I get rid of the old records (in this case 2007) I shred them. I shred and shred and shred. I actually ended up with almost 39 gallons (3 kitchen bags) of shredded papers. Some papers I toss in the shredder without looking at, others I check first.
Which ones do I check? I look through the checking statements - personal and business - and keep any checks which paid income taxes or sales taxes (for the business). I keep these (or a scan of them - front and back) forever. I set them aside in my “to file” holder on my desk to file at the end of the week when I do filing. They will go in my tax files - personal or business - depending on what they are for. I also go quickly through our credit card statements. I look for any large amounts (over $100) and check what they are for. If they are for hotels, food, etc. I just skip them. If they are for a specific thing I look at them. This is especially true for expenditures for the house which may add to its cost (technically its “basis”) when we or our heirs one day sell the house and will lessen the profit on that sale. Anything else large I look at and sometimes discuss with my husband if we need to keep it for any reason. Almost always anything other than house related bills go into the shredder. For 2007 there were few bills that I looked at and those were large food bills or hotel bills. One bill was for a clothing item for me to wear when reenacting. I pulled that bill and made a note of the name of the company as reenacting friends have asked where I bought it and I did not remember. Now I have the name to give them.
Now here is where I took a big chance on being able to do two things at once. I had the large plastic box of 2007 records and a cardboard box (that originally held large manila envelopes) which was holding our 2016 bills. Two tasks to do - which to do?
Both of course. I would put a bill from 2016 in the scanner and hit the scan buttons. I would then take a handful of papers from the 2007 box and shred them - setting aside the bank and credit card statements. I did this for 3 days - working in checking the statements and shredding them also. I managed to not shred any of the 2016 records and not scan any of the 2007 records.
As of tonight I have finished shredding all of 2016 and the 3 white kitchen size bags of same have been put into a large black garbage bag - so that one cannot see what is in the bags through the white plastic - and the large black garbage bag is out at the curb for pickup tomorrow morning by the Town sanitation department (the garbagemen).
I have also finished scanning of our personal bills from 2016. I have maybe 30 bills for our business which I will scan tomorrow. The box from 2007 has been refilled with bank statements from 2016 and the personal bills from same - the business bills will be added. The information used to do our and the business’s income taxes are also in the box (but not the copies of the returns - they are in my accounting file drawer for my accounting practice - although they are also scanned into the computer as I also do with clients’s returns.
Right now my office is a mess. I end up emptying the shredded papers into our garbage pail in the office as the shredder fills. While I have a fairly heavy duty shredder, it can fill our 13 gallon garbage pail at least 3 times. Pouring this into the larger pail invariably ends up with shreds of paper all over - they have a good deal of static electricity and stick to things. I have promised husband now that I am finished I will vacuum the office tomorrow to clean it up - okay, they followed me out of the office door (it is a spare upstairs bedroom) into the hall and partially down the stairs and that will also need to be vacuumed.
After I scan the 2016 business records into the computer I will add them to the box. I have already gone through our personal and our business file drawers and pulled any records which are not needed at hand for last year and put them in the box. Before putting the box back into the closet I will take a folder in our file drawer marked “last year to file” and add some papers to the 2015 box. These are papers which for whatever reason were not stored or were not able to be stored away when I did this last year for 2015 (which replaced 2006 in a box). I know that something will always turn up which is why I have this file.
I also have a file called “this year”. It is the place I throw anything I want/need to keep and don’t know where to file - it is gone through when I do this switch over and the papers will either go into the 2016 box, be tossed or in some cases left in the folder. To give an example - we receive in the mail a card each from our election board each year with voting information for the year - where to vote, what votes there are and when they will be. I keep this card so when we go to vote we can figure out which of the, constantly changing in location, tables is the one for us to vote at. I keep it until the next year’s cards arrive. Last year we did not receive the cards when they were mailed for the primary (I telephoned and was told we should have received them and confirmed where we should go to vote) and we brought the one from the year before to help us figure out where to go in the room. (Mysteriously they did arrive, several months late, before the actual election.) Normally when we get the new cards I shred the old ones and throw them out - but they “reside” in this folder.
In past years in going through the records to be shed from the older year, I have found interesting items such as paper items from our 25th anniversary stay at a Colonial Williamsburg restored tavern - I did not keep any longer, but it was nice to remember the stay. (Yes, one can stay in restored houses and taverns on streets within the restoration as part of their hotels. It is rather pricey by our standards and this was the only time we did so - and even then, we stayed there for 3 nights during a reenacting weekend and stayed at a regular - much cheaper - hotel the rest of the stay.) This time I could tell by various papers and checks I found that this was the year husband quit his job (which is when I thought he did). Hard to believe that 10 years has passed.
Oh - you may wonder why 9 years in boxes - why not an even 10? Two reasons. The boxes were sold in packages of 3 boxes. Also I can fit 9 boxes on top of the closet in our office, but not 10. I figure that with the current year I have 10 years of records for taxes - and with scanning - even more.
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -
How do your store your old records? Presuming that you are in the U.S. you need to keep at a bare minimum 3 years of records for income taxes. Ten are generally recommended. IRS and states can generally audit you or say that there is an error for 3 years after you file a tax return, 7 years if after the due date if you do not file a return. (General rule - states can always have their own laws.)
I know that in the past our state has had “amnesty” periods when one can file a tax return which one has not filed and/or pay any taxes owed and apply to have any penalties on that amount waived so that one only pays the tax and interest (and sometimes one does not even have to pay the interest). I know that clients, as well as us, have received notices during these amnesty periods for return which were filed and paid. When I contacted the state about it being too long after the returns were filed and paid as no notices were receive before and it was past the 3 or even the 7 years I always got the same response - “We mailed you notices and we do not know why you did not get them so the action was started within the required 3 years.”
As a result of this I tell clients to keep all payments for taxes forever. This is the checks which pay estimated taxes or the final payment, W2 forms with withholding. 1099 forms of any type which have taxes withheld (these are the forms you receive in January for interest, dividends, stocks etc sold, amounts you received from pensions IRAs or 401k plans etc), Forms K1 from partnerships, small business corporations or LLCs, etc. You can scan in them into your computer to keep them or keep them as paper copies or both. I keep copies of same of ours.
First the scanning - Last month I decided and posted about - 4-13-17 POST
- deciding to scan in bills as I pay them. Understand if I pay a charge card bill, I am only scanning in the statement, not every slip - even I am not that crazy - this is to make it easier if I need to view or need a copy of what I paid. Per the earlier post this is the result of needing a bill from last year and not being able to find it. I was lucky enough to have a scan of the bill and was able to use that for reference.
So I have since been scanning each bill as I pay it. For our personal checking account I am scanning them into my data drive. I set up a folder for the year with a subfolder for each month to make it all easier to find. For our business checking account I am just using a folder for the year as we write very few checks. I will go back when I have a chance shortly and scan in the bills from earlier in the year.
Once a year I empty out the oldest storage box of records - I have 9 boxes so it is the one from 9 years before - and refill it with the previous year. I cannot do this in earlier in the year as I want to include in the new year’s storage, the papers needed for income tax and our bank statements through the end of the prior year and I like to have the last statement we have at hand - some of our statements come in quarterly, so this can not be done before mid-April at the earliest and generally later than that. This year since I did not put our business return on extension I was ready to do this switch over now. I have been getting rid of 2007 records to make room for storage of 2016 records.
I was already to get rid of the 2007 records when the thought hit me - why not scan in the 2016 bills so I have them for reference before I store them away.
Second, the shredding - Before I get rid of the old records (in this case 2007) I shred them. I shred and shred and shred. I actually ended up with almost 39 gallons (3 kitchen bags) of shredded papers. Some papers I toss in the shredder without looking at, others I check first.
Which ones do I check? I look through the checking statements - personal and business - and keep any checks which paid income taxes or sales taxes (for the business). I keep these (or a scan of them - front and back) forever. I set them aside in my “to file” holder on my desk to file at the end of the week when I do filing. They will go in my tax files - personal or business - depending on what they are for. I also go quickly through our credit card statements. I look for any large amounts (over $100) and check what they are for. If they are for hotels, food, etc. I just skip them. If they are for a specific thing I look at them. This is especially true for expenditures for the house which may add to its cost (technically its “basis”) when we or our heirs one day sell the house and will lessen the profit on that sale. Anything else large I look at and sometimes discuss with my husband if we need to keep it for any reason. Almost always anything other than house related bills go into the shredder. For 2007 there were few bills that I looked at and those were large food bills or hotel bills. One bill was for a clothing item for me to wear when reenacting. I pulled that bill and made a note of the name of the company as reenacting friends have asked where I bought it and I did not remember. Now I have the name to give them.
Now here is where I took a big chance on being able to do two things at once. I had the large plastic box of 2007 records and a cardboard box (that originally held large manila envelopes) which was holding our 2016 bills. Two tasks to do - which to do?
Both of course. I would put a bill from 2016 in the scanner and hit the scan buttons. I would then take a handful of papers from the 2007 box and shred them - setting aside the bank and credit card statements. I did this for 3 days - working in checking the statements and shredding them also. I managed to not shred any of the 2016 records and not scan any of the 2007 records.
As of tonight I have finished shredding all of 2016 and the 3 white kitchen size bags of same have been put into a large black garbage bag - so that one cannot see what is in the bags through the white plastic - and the large black garbage bag is out at the curb for pickup tomorrow morning by the Town sanitation department (the garbagemen).
I have also finished scanning of our personal bills from 2016. I have maybe 30 bills for our business which I will scan tomorrow. The box from 2007 has been refilled with bank statements from 2016 and the personal bills from same - the business bills will be added. The information used to do our and the business’s income taxes are also in the box (but not the copies of the returns - they are in my accounting file drawer for my accounting practice - although they are also scanned into the computer as I also do with clients’s returns.
Right now my office is a mess. I end up emptying the shredded papers into our garbage pail in the office as the shredder fills. While I have a fairly heavy duty shredder, it can fill our 13 gallon garbage pail at least 3 times. Pouring this into the larger pail invariably ends up with shreds of paper all over - they have a good deal of static electricity and stick to things. I have promised husband now that I am finished I will vacuum the office tomorrow to clean it up - okay, they followed me out of the office door (it is a spare upstairs bedroom) into the hall and partially down the stairs and that will also need to be vacuumed.
After I scan the 2016 business records into the computer I will add them to the box. I have already gone through our personal and our business file drawers and pulled any records which are not needed at hand for last year and put them in the box. Before putting the box back into the closet I will take a folder in our file drawer marked “last year to file” and add some papers to the 2015 box. These are papers which for whatever reason were not stored or were not able to be stored away when I did this last year for 2015 (which replaced 2006 in a box). I know that something will always turn up which is why I have this file.
I also have a file called “this year”. It is the place I throw anything I want/need to keep and don’t know where to file - it is gone through when I do this switch over and the papers will either go into the 2016 box, be tossed or in some cases left in the folder. To give an example - we receive in the mail a card each from our election board each year with voting information for the year - where to vote, what votes there are and when they will be. I keep this card so when we go to vote we can figure out which of the, constantly changing in location, tables is the one for us to vote at. I keep it until the next year’s cards arrive. Last year we did not receive the cards when they were mailed for the primary (I telephoned and was told we should have received them and confirmed where we should go to vote) and we brought the one from the year before to help us figure out where to go in the room. (Mysteriously they did arrive, several months late, before the actual election.) Normally when we get the new cards I shred the old ones and throw them out - but they “reside” in this folder.
In past years in going through the records to be shed from the older year, I have found interesting items such as paper items from our 25th anniversary stay at a Colonial Williamsburg restored tavern - I did not keep any longer, but it was nice to remember the stay. (Yes, one can stay in restored houses and taverns on streets within the restoration as part of their hotels. It is rather pricey by our standards and this was the only time we did so - and even then, we stayed there for 3 nights during a reenacting weekend and stayed at a regular - much cheaper - hotel the rest of the stay.) This time I could tell by various papers and checks I found that this was the year husband quit his job (which is when I thought he did). Hard to believe that 10 years has passed.
Oh - you may wonder why 9 years in boxes - why not an even 10? Two reasons. The boxes were sold in packages of 3 boxes. Also I can fit 9 boxes on top of the closet in our office, but not 10. I figure that with the current year I have 10 years of records for taxes - and with scanning - even more.
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -
How do your store your old records? Presuming that you are in the U.S. you need to keep at a bare minimum 3 years of records for income taxes. Ten are generally recommended. IRS and states can generally audit you or say that there is an error for 3 years after you file a tax return, 7 years if after the due date if you do not file a return. (General rule - states can always have their own laws.)
I know that in the past our state has had “amnesty” periods when one can file a tax return which one has not filed and/or pay any taxes owed and apply to have any penalties on that amount waived so that one only pays the tax and interest (and sometimes one does not even have to pay the interest). I know that clients, as well as us, have received notices during these amnesty periods for return which were filed and paid. When I contacted the state about it being too long after the returns were filed and paid as no notices were receive before and it was past the 3 or even the 7 years I always got the same response - “We mailed you notices and we do not know why you did not get them so the action was started within the required 3 years.”
As a result of this I tell clients to keep all payments for taxes forever. This is the checks which pay estimated taxes or the final payment, W2 forms with withholding. 1099 forms of any type which have taxes withheld (these are the forms you receive in January for interest, dividends, stocks etc sold, amounts you received from pensions IRAs or 401k plans etc), Forms K1 from partnerships, small business corporations or LLCs, etc. You can scan in them into your computer to keep them or keep them as paper copies or both. I keep copies of same of ours.
Thursday, May 4, 2017
BACKING UP COMPUTER FILES SO YOU DON'T USE THEM
I have written before about my regular daily back up of my data and my archiving it at the end of the year. There is other backing up that I do that I thought I would tell you about.
I was very careful about backing up - day after day - and then I realized I had problem with the data to my organizer. There was a problem (I forget what by now) and unfortunately both my daily backups (A and B) were bad - for over a week. Now I had to go and try to figure out what went wrong and when and come up with replacement info about what I had done. (Remember I use my organizer for appointments, to dos, anniversary/birthdays, my contacts directory and memos - things to buy, info I need, etc.) I managed to get it corrected. I was lucky that I make a monthly backup on an exterior hard drive.
Once a month I run software to copy my computers to an external hard drive. The idea is that if my computer hard drive crashes I can restore it quickly and easily. Of course this sometimes goes awry since one does not know if the backup worked unless and until one needs to use it. I also copy my data and organizer separately at the same time to the same external hard drive. So lucky me, I had organizer data from less than a month before to help me catch back up.
To prevent the loss of data backup from overwriting the backup daily - even with A and B alternating backups - I came up with the idea of - yes - another backup. I took a flash drive (you can see I love these things) and made a folder - “Backup” and another “Calendar” (meaning everything from the organizer), and another one “client name” for each client. On a Friday I backed all my data from these assorted sources to this drive. I call it my weekly drive. The following Friday I went and added the date of the first backup to the names of the backup files I had made and made new “backup”, “calendar”, and “client’s name” files. I ran the backups again. Now I have a backup as of the end of “this” week and one from the end of last week. If I overwrite the data and backups with the same error - I have a backup from only a week ago. I kept doing this for 4 weeks. At then end of 4 weeks I had the latest weekly backups which just had the names of the backups and 3 backups from the prior 3 weeks - each labeled with the date they were backed up. What then? Well, I again added the date to last Friday’s backups, but this time I removed the date from the oldest backups - putting them back with their original names and ran an update backup. This is what I do each week now - add the date to last week’s backups and remove the date from the oldest backups - and update them.
So now I am backing up my data and calendar daily to flash stick drives (A and B) and then backing up my data weekly to a different flash stick drive, and monthly to an external hard drive, when I back up my computers to same.
I think, but I am not sure, that I have mentioned I do a backup once a month to still another flash stick drive (and yes, they are very well labeled so I know which is which and what is on them) that also has a copy of my annual archive on it, which I bring to my bank safe deposit box for “offsite” storage. I used to send this drive to work with husband when he worked in an office which was not in our house. He would take the drive to work and bring back the one he already had there. Now I take the one I just updated to the bank box and bring home the one from last time. The one from last time will be updated just before it goes back to the bank box.
One would think this was enough backups - right?
My external hard drive was getting a bit old (and therefore is rather small). It suddenly dawned on me that if the external hard drive went bad, I would lose the data and if the computer crashed, well I would be stuck (sort of like when we bought a new internal hard drive due to problems with my old one and the backup had not worked).
So - I bought a new larger drive (the storage was a lot larger, the physical drive only a bit larger). So now I back up my computer and assorted data onto this drive monthly - and I have new software so hopefully if I need to use it, it will work. I then backup to the old external hard drive quarterly - just as, well, a backup of the backup. I work on the idea that more backups make it harder to lose data or computer hard drive.
Now, I know I am backing up way more than anyone short of a major corporation does, but I don’t want to lose my data or my hard drive again.
Do you back up? You really need to. I lose business type data - if you have your photos on the computer you could lose the photos if you lost your drive. At least get a couple of fairly inexpensive flash drives and make copies in an alternating pattern .
Oh, another advantage to my keeping my data on flash drives is that they are small. I can take them from once computer to another - very easily. I can also put all of my flash drives in the pocket of my jeans - at the same time - if I needed to take them - which leads to -
I have mentioned that I have a grab and go folder for financial stuff - last bank statements, insurance policies, copies of deed, mortgage payoff and car titles, duplicate birth and wedding certificates and such. I also have a copy of the latest archive on DVD. If we need to leave the house in an emergency we can grab this folder (actually a sectioned “file wallet” with a top that closes) drop in the lastest data drive and run in an emergency and have as much info with us as we can. If you have precious photos you can keep a copy of them in there also - DVDs are more definite than flash drives (another reason I keep a lot of backups - flash drives can go bad) and you will not have lost info you need plus personal photos and infos you would miss. (Remember you can scan in your child’s art work, etc. also.)
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
It is May. While I know the weather is odd this year, we are over a quarter of the way through the year and well onto halfway through the year. Don’t wait any longer. Do something towards getting rid of clutter and beginning to organize and clean up.
Today I had my embroidery chapter meeting. We have the room until 2 pm. Most, sometimes all, the other members leave at the end of the program- between noon and 1 pm generally. I always have some embroidery project (or two) with me. Today two other members were staying and working on their needlework after the others had left. I took out one of the projects from my bag and started stitching. I did not get a lot done as this particular project is a slow one with tiny stitches and one strand of cotton embroidery floss at a time, but I am now that much further along on the project - not even a ful petal of a flower - but I am that tiny bit closer to finishing it.
Each step you take towards getting organized - throwing even one item out or otherwise getting it out of your house - is a bit less that needs to be done. Small amounts add to large ones. There is a quote (I think from Patrick Henry) “I have never seen a man devour an entire bunch of grapes at one time, but I have seen a man accomplish the same thing, by plucking the grapes and eating them one at a time.” In the same way we cannot accomplish everything needed to declutter, organize, and clean everything at once - but we can do this a bit at a time - so do something as the first step and then tomorrow do something else, and so on.
I was very careful about backing up - day after day - and then I realized I had problem with the data to my organizer. There was a problem (I forget what by now) and unfortunately both my daily backups (A and B) were bad - for over a week. Now I had to go and try to figure out what went wrong and when and come up with replacement info about what I had done. (Remember I use my organizer for appointments, to dos, anniversary/birthdays, my contacts directory and memos - things to buy, info I need, etc.) I managed to get it corrected. I was lucky that I make a monthly backup on an exterior hard drive.
Once a month I run software to copy my computers to an external hard drive. The idea is that if my computer hard drive crashes I can restore it quickly and easily. Of course this sometimes goes awry since one does not know if the backup worked unless and until one needs to use it. I also copy my data and organizer separately at the same time to the same external hard drive. So lucky me, I had organizer data from less than a month before to help me catch back up.
To prevent the loss of data backup from overwriting the backup daily - even with A and B alternating backups - I came up with the idea of - yes - another backup. I took a flash drive (you can see I love these things) and made a folder - “Backup” and another “Calendar” (meaning everything from the organizer), and another one “client name” for each client. On a Friday I backed all my data from these assorted sources to this drive. I call it my weekly drive. The following Friday I went and added the date of the first backup to the names of the backup files I had made and made new “backup”, “calendar”, and “client’s name” files. I ran the backups again. Now I have a backup as of the end of “this” week and one from the end of last week. If I overwrite the data and backups with the same error - I have a backup from only a week ago. I kept doing this for 4 weeks. At then end of 4 weeks I had the latest weekly backups which just had the names of the backups and 3 backups from the prior 3 weeks - each labeled with the date they were backed up. What then? Well, I again added the date to last Friday’s backups, but this time I removed the date from the oldest backups - putting them back with their original names and ran an update backup. This is what I do each week now - add the date to last week’s backups and remove the date from the oldest backups - and update them.
So now I am backing up my data and calendar daily to flash stick drives (A and B) and then backing up my data weekly to a different flash stick drive, and monthly to an external hard drive, when I back up my computers to same.
I think, but I am not sure, that I have mentioned I do a backup once a month to still another flash stick drive (and yes, they are very well labeled so I know which is which and what is on them) that also has a copy of my annual archive on it, which I bring to my bank safe deposit box for “offsite” storage. I used to send this drive to work with husband when he worked in an office which was not in our house. He would take the drive to work and bring back the one he already had there. Now I take the one I just updated to the bank box and bring home the one from last time. The one from last time will be updated just before it goes back to the bank box.
One would think this was enough backups - right?
My external hard drive was getting a bit old (and therefore is rather small). It suddenly dawned on me that if the external hard drive went bad, I would lose the data and if the computer crashed, well I would be stuck (sort of like when we bought a new internal hard drive due to problems with my old one and the backup had not worked).
So - I bought a new larger drive (the storage was a lot larger, the physical drive only a bit larger). So now I back up my computer and assorted data onto this drive monthly - and I have new software so hopefully if I need to use it, it will work. I then backup to the old external hard drive quarterly - just as, well, a backup of the backup. I work on the idea that more backups make it harder to lose data or computer hard drive.
Now, I know I am backing up way more than anyone short of a major corporation does, but I don’t want to lose my data or my hard drive again.
Do you back up? You really need to. I lose business type data - if you have your photos on the computer you could lose the photos if you lost your drive. At least get a couple of fairly inexpensive flash drives and make copies in an alternating pattern .
Oh, another advantage to my keeping my data on flash drives is that they are small. I can take them from once computer to another - very easily. I can also put all of my flash drives in the pocket of my jeans - at the same time - if I needed to take them - which leads to -
I have mentioned that I have a grab and go folder for financial stuff - last bank statements, insurance policies, copies of deed, mortgage payoff and car titles, duplicate birth and wedding certificates and such. I also have a copy of the latest archive on DVD. If we need to leave the house in an emergency we can grab this folder (actually a sectioned “file wallet” with a top that closes) drop in the lastest data drive and run in an emergency and have as much info with us as we can. If you have precious photos you can keep a copy of them in there also - DVDs are more definite than flash drives (another reason I keep a lot of backups - flash drives can go bad) and you will not have lost info you need plus personal photos and infos you would miss. (Remember you can scan in your child’s art work, etc. also.)
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
It is May. While I know the weather is odd this year, we are over a quarter of the way through the year and well onto halfway through the year. Don’t wait any longer. Do something towards getting rid of clutter and beginning to organize and clean up.
Today I had my embroidery chapter meeting. We have the room until 2 pm. Most, sometimes all, the other members leave at the end of the program- between noon and 1 pm generally. I always have some embroidery project (or two) with me. Today two other members were staying and working on their needlework after the others had left. I took out one of the projects from my bag and started stitching. I did not get a lot done as this particular project is a slow one with tiny stitches and one strand of cotton embroidery floss at a time, but I am now that much further along on the project - not even a ful petal of a flower - but I am that tiny bit closer to finishing it.
Each step you take towards getting organized - throwing even one item out or otherwise getting it out of your house - is a bit less that needs to be done. Small amounts add to large ones. There is a quote (I think from Patrick Henry) “I have never seen a man devour an entire bunch of grapes at one time, but I have seen a man accomplish the same thing, by plucking the grapes and eating them one at a time.” In the same way we cannot accomplish everything needed to declutter, organize, and clean everything at once - but we can do this a bit at a time - so do something as the first step and then tomorrow do something else, and so on.
Thursday, April 27, 2017
CATCHING UP
Well tax season is behind me now and I am trying to catch up on everything which fell by the wayside.
It amazes me that when I was working full time in the first 4 months of the year I would do payroll taxes for 10 business clients twice each - January & April - and the January ones involved typing W2s for all the employees of the clients, corporation or partnership returns for the businesses, year end sales tax for most of them (NY has a sales tax year which ends the end of February and is due in March), and personal returns for about 40 clients while also keeping house, dealing with Easter and Passover, a trip out of state for my husband’s birthday, and towards the end of April - a trip to Maryland for a reenactment event, plus dealing with my embroidery chapter and reenactment unit’s treasuries and renewal of membership for the reenactment unit. It exhausts me to just list all of this.
These days I have about 6 tax returns, two corporations and a partnership (and only one of the businesses is not ours), three sales tax returns, payroll taxes for one company which has one employee, little to do for the holidays or husband’s birthday, and no trip to Maryland (too cold for RV to be dewinterized). Still dealing with the two treasuries and the renewals for the reenactment unit. Yet, I still have trouble finishing it all up timely. It is true that work expands to the time allotted to do it. Maybe this thought comes to mind just because I am watching the series on TV about Einstein and that brings to mind his relativity theory.
Think about it - you look around. The house needs decluttering and cleaning. If you have guests coming over on Friday - you are going to do what you do before Friday, if they are not coming until the first of next month - the same work will take you until then - right? We used to have a room where no one could go when we had people in also. When I was a girl it was my bedroom closet. Mom would tell me periodically (I am guessing when people were going to be coming or she just could not look at it any more) to clean my room. I would do as much as I could - then what was left would be tossed into the bottom of my closet. (Sound familiar?) Once or twice a year I would even be told to clear out the bottom of my closet - generally I would find items such as the bag with most of my Trick or Treat candy in it around May or June - that was a toss out as mom told us we would get sick if eat anything that old. One problem was that no one ever actually explained to me the concept of throwing things out or passing them along, to me cleaning was put everything out of site. I have since learned better.
So now I am dealing with the catchup. The stack on my desk - on top of my “todo folder”, which means that these items must be done before I can start on what I have to do - is shrinking.
I spent an afternoon dealing with items waiting for me from our reenactment unit. In addition to being treasurer I am also the membership chair as it is easier for one person to do so. Dues are long ago collected, the dues collected for our national went out on time back in March. Membership cards had been typed up (yes, typed on a typewriter) and given to the unit commander to mail to members. I had managed to get to the bank and deposit the dues check - and one for an event the unit did in January. But, some members have been waiting to be paid for money laid out and I had to pay them. One of our unit insurance policies had come in and I paid it. I had the forms that members had filled in which had to be scanned into the computer so I could shred and toss the originals. I had to make up the membership list for the year. I worked on all this - all done except it took until today to get a clarification from one member as to whether the new phone number she gave me was her home or cell number that had changed. I heard from her today - the new list will be out to the commander to email out by this weekend - I hope.
I managed to keep up on paying the bills for my embroidery chapter - most were to third parties, and were paid right away. A couple of checks to members for, again, money laid out just were written. Our national embroidery group has a membership year that runs from June through the following May (yeah, it confuses the heck out of me why that is the year for membership dues - the financial year is a calendar year, and somehow in the change from quarterly renewals based on when members had joined to an annual one - we paid for the month of June twice one year) and while I am not the membership chair, I help her as the treasurer. I do serve as the newsletter editor and today wrote the May newsletter for the chapter, which is also the meeting notice for our upcoming meeting. This one was a bit harder than most. Last week chapter president had emailed her message for the month which included talking about the program for the meeting - which was not exactly what I remembered and had on our website as the meeting program. I had a hands on project - she had a “fashion show” of what I had us doing - she had in mind the idea that we had sort of worked on this all year and members should show what they have done on the project. I doubled checked with her and yes, that was the meeting program. Yesterday I got an email from the VP of the chapter and she had the info to do the project I thought we were doing - and she was the leader of the project. I also had an email from the chapter president saying a sort of “whoops - I guess I thought about it differently” and that I should go ahead with the project as the meeting and maybe include bring in items started. I had to combine both ideas. The president had told me to dump her message, but I managed to work it into a version of what she wanted for the meeting as a side to the hands on project. Plus I had a lot of related exhibitions to list, so what should have taken half an hour to put together - 2 hours! Then after it was emailed out (and I email out one version to our members and some region people and the same with a “you asked for this, let me know if you don’t want it” message to people who have asked for info about our chapter) I realized that I had forgotten something urgent. Yes, I forgot to tell the members that it is renewal time. So I sent out a separate addendum to the only the members.
That leaves bank statements to reconcile, a month’s worth of filing for our reenactment unit papers (I managed to do the month’s worth of personal, business, and embroidery chapter filing over last weekend), and an assortment of other items to do - including scanning in our personal tax return and papers and printing a copy of same for my records. (Right now there is a stack - you know about stacks right? - of the tax papers in front of the office closet waiting for me.) If I had one day to sit and work.... Tomorrow I have to go to Manhattan to my remaining business client (other than our businesses) and do the books and payroll taxes.
I also need to pull out the 2007 box of old records. I will shred almost all of what is in the box. I scan the credit card and other bills to see if there is anything I need to hold onto. With the credit cards I will scan each for amounts over $100 to see what they are. Sometimes there may be a reason to keep a larger receipt - generally not and they will be shredded also. I will also pull out any checks, W2, or 1099 forms which paid income taxes (for the business if it paid corporation taxes, sales taxes, or annual filing fee) and keep them. I always do that. It is good to always keep proof that taxes were paid.
I will then refill the box with the matching paperwork from 2016, change the label on the box to 2016 and put it back in the top of the office closet. To make this easier I have different color labels on file folders in my files for permanent (leave everything in this folder in it) and annual (check this folder every year to see if anything should stay in it - or be put in the annual box). I use red or yellow for annual and blue or green for permanent - red and blue are used for our personal files and for my embroidery chapter files, yellow and green for our corporation files and our reenactment unit files. I also have a folder with items which need to be added to the 2015 box. Then I will be able to open the office closet door again without having to move stacks of paper. :-)
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -
Take a deep breath and start doing a bit of “spring cleaning”. If nothing else switch whatever you need to from winter to spring. If you put away winter clothes - see what you will not want next year and either donate it now or put it in a labeled box for the fall to donate then, if where you donate will only take seasonal items. This way you can donate it without having to look at it again then.
Remember that time is relative, but one can only do so much.
And - if you live near where Carvel is located and you read this post early enough - Thursday, April 27 is free cone day this year.
It amazes me that when I was working full time in the first 4 months of the year I would do payroll taxes for 10 business clients twice each - January & April - and the January ones involved typing W2s for all the employees of the clients, corporation or partnership returns for the businesses, year end sales tax for most of them (NY has a sales tax year which ends the end of February and is due in March), and personal returns for about 40 clients while also keeping house, dealing with Easter and Passover, a trip out of state for my husband’s birthday, and towards the end of April - a trip to Maryland for a reenactment event, plus dealing with my embroidery chapter and reenactment unit’s treasuries and renewal of membership for the reenactment unit. It exhausts me to just list all of this.
These days I have about 6 tax returns, two corporations and a partnership (and only one of the businesses is not ours), three sales tax returns, payroll taxes for one company which has one employee, little to do for the holidays or husband’s birthday, and no trip to Maryland (too cold for RV to be dewinterized). Still dealing with the two treasuries and the renewals for the reenactment unit. Yet, I still have trouble finishing it all up timely. It is true that work expands to the time allotted to do it. Maybe this thought comes to mind just because I am watching the series on TV about Einstein and that brings to mind his relativity theory.
Think about it - you look around. The house needs decluttering and cleaning. If you have guests coming over on Friday - you are going to do what you do before Friday, if they are not coming until the first of next month - the same work will take you until then - right? We used to have a room where no one could go when we had people in also. When I was a girl it was my bedroom closet. Mom would tell me periodically (I am guessing when people were going to be coming or she just could not look at it any more) to clean my room. I would do as much as I could - then what was left would be tossed into the bottom of my closet. (Sound familiar?) Once or twice a year I would even be told to clear out the bottom of my closet - generally I would find items such as the bag with most of my Trick or Treat candy in it around May or June - that was a toss out as mom told us we would get sick if eat anything that old. One problem was that no one ever actually explained to me the concept of throwing things out or passing them along, to me cleaning was put everything out of site. I have since learned better.
So now I am dealing with the catchup. The stack on my desk - on top of my “todo folder”, which means that these items must be done before I can start on what I have to do - is shrinking.
I spent an afternoon dealing with items waiting for me from our reenactment unit. In addition to being treasurer I am also the membership chair as it is easier for one person to do so. Dues are long ago collected, the dues collected for our national went out on time back in March. Membership cards had been typed up (yes, typed on a typewriter) and given to the unit commander to mail to members. I had managed to get to the bank and deposit the dues check - and one for an event the unit did in January. But, some members have been waiting to be paid for money laid out and I had to pay them. One of our unit insurance policies had come in and I paid it. I had the forms that members had filled in which had to be scanned into the computer so I could shred and toss the originals. I had to make up the membership list for the year. I worked on all this - all done except it took until today to get a clarification from one member as to whether the new phone number she gave me was her home or cell number that had changed. I heard from her today - the new list will be out to the commander to email out by this weekend - I hope.
I managed to keep up on paying the bills for my embroidery chapter - most were to third parties, and were paid right away. A couple of checks to members for, again, money laid out just were written. Our national embroidery group has a membership year that runs from June through the following May (yeah, it confuses the heck out of me why that is the year for membership dues - the financial year is a calendar year, and somehow in the change from quarterly renewals based on when members had joined to an annual one - we paid for the month of June twice one year) and while I am not the membership chair, I help her as the treasurer. I do serve as the newsletter editor and today wrote the May newsletter for the chapter, which is also the meeting notice for our upcoming meeting. This one was a bit harder than most. Last week chapter president had emailed her message for the month which included talking about the program for the meeting - which was not exactly what I remembered and had on our website as the meeting program. I had a hands on project - she had a “fashion show” of what I had us doing - she had in mind the idea that we had sort of worked on this all year and members should show what they have done on the project. I doubled checked with her and yes, that was the meeting program. Yesterday I got an email from the VP of the chapter and she had the info to do the project I thought we were doing - and she was the leader of the project. I also had an email from the chapter president saying a sort of “whoops - I guess I thought about it differently” and that I should go ahead with the project as the meeting and maybe include bring in items started. I had to combine both ideas. The president had told me to dump her message, but I managed to work it into a version of what she wanted for the meeting as a side to the hands on project. Plus I had a lot of related exhibitions to list, so what should have taken half an hour to put together - 2 hours! Then after it was emailed out (and I email out one version to our members and some region people and the same with a “you asked for this, let me know if you don’t want it” message to people who have asked for info about our chapter) I realized that I had forgotten something urgent. Yes, I forgot to tell the members that it is renewal time. So I sent out a separate addendum to the only the members.
That leaves bank statements to reconcile, a month’s worth of filing for our reenactment unit papers (I managed to do the month’s worth of personal, business, and embroidery chapter filing over last weekend), and an assortment of other items to do - including scanning in our personal tax return and papers and printing a copy of same for my records. (Right now there is a stack - you know about stacks right? - of the tax papers in front of the office closet waiting for me.) If I had one day to sit and work.... Tomorrow I have to go to Manhattan to my remaining business client (other than our businesses) and do the books and payroll taxes.
I also need to pull out the 2007 box of old records. I will shred almost all of what is in the box. I scan the credit card and other bills to see if there is anything I need to hold onto. With the credit cards I will scan each for amounts over $100 to see what they are. Sometimes there may be a reason to keep a larger receipt - generally not and they will be shredded also. I will also pull out any checks, W2, or 1099 forms which paid income taxes (for the business if it paid corporation taxes, sales taxes, or annual filing fee) and keep them. I always do that. It is good to always keep proof that taxes were paid.
I will then refill the box with the matching paperwork from 2016, change the label on the box to 2016 and put it back in the top of the office closet. To make this easier I have different color labels on file folders in my files for permanent (leave everything in this folder in it) and annual (check this folder every year to see if anything should stay in it - or be put in the annual box). I use red or yellow for annual and blue or green for permanent - red and blue are used for our personal files and for my embroidery chapter files, yellow and green for our corporation files and our reenactment unit files. I also have a folder with items which need to be added to the 2015 box. Then I will be able to open the office closet door again without having to move stacks of paper. :-)
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -
Take a deep breath and start doing a bit of “spring cleaning”. If nothing else switch whatever you need to from winter to spring. If you put away winter clothes - see what you will not want next year and either donate it now or put it in a labeled box for the fall to donate then, if where you donate will only take seasonal items. This way you can donate it without having to look at it again then.
Remember that time is relative, but one can only do so much.
And - if you live near where Carvel is located and you read this post early enough - Thursday, April 27 is free cone day this year.
Thursday, April 20, 2017
BOUNCING CHECKS?
I am an accountant - since I was 12. A few years ago I found the columnar book I used when I was in college to keep track of the cash I spent while in college. (Never a boring thing - I found out which was the first Broadway show husband and I saw together as we each paid for ourselves - something which greatly upset my mom - and I had my ticket purchase recorded in the book, what a nice memory from such a dreary thing). And yes, I used to always have cash I spent which did not make it into the book - adjustments the end of every week. I keep our records on Quickbooks so everything is accounted for and my arithmetic is doublechecked by the computer. We pay every bill in full - every month. No part payments on credit cards. I am sooo careful!
This has been a busy tax season for me - not exactly so much from the actual tax return preparation but on a personal level lots of things have gone wrong and we were busy trying to do things. I spent last weekend through Monday night finishing up our personal return and our business return. We mailed out our personal return Monday at the post office and picked up the mail in our post office box and then returned home so I could finish the business return.
In the mail at the box was a letter from our bank to my husband. I almost set it aside as I figured it was something about his IRA account. I am so glad that I did not. I opened the envelope and glanced in just to check what it was ----- A BOUNCED CHECK NOTICE??? How could that be? Impossible!
We normally deposit money we receive in our savings account and then once a week I transfer money to our checking account to cover the upcoming bills plus a cushion for anything which might arise during the week.
However, we had needed a lot of money in our checking account all at once and it had to come from husband’s IRA. We had a huge credit card bill due to my new eyeglasses, husband’s teeth, and regular expenses, plus our real estate tax was due and so on. That money had to go directly into our checking account and it did - or so I thought.
As I started pulling out papers in the office to see what could have happened - Did we forget to make the deposit? Did the bank make a mistake? I felt like I was going to have a heart attack. In addition to this check certainly more checks must have also bounced - with a fee of $34 per check this could cost us real money - plus it was the large credit card payment - there would be interest and fees there also as well as on the other end of whatever else had bounced. My head was swimming. I kept hoping it was a bank error as then there would be no bank fees from then and apology letters to where the checks had bounced and reimbursement for the costs resulting from same (or so I hoped). I found the deposit slip and found it is was my error - out of force of habit I had deposited the check to our savings account!!!
I sat down to call the bank - I could barely see the phone pad to dial and could not see the deposit. Husband offered “Do you want to go to the bank to deal with this?” I looked at the clock - only 3:30 - we went to the bank.
One of the higher level tellers who knows me said hello and came over and asked how they could help. I managed to get out that I had deposited the money in the wrong account. He nicely told me that all I would need to do is transfer the money from one account to the other. I sort of sputtered out that no, I needed to see one of the platform (desk) people as checks were bouncing.
Luckily the person we spoke with was a woman I had worked with before for other more normal matters. She also tried to calm me down. She pulled up our account - two other checks had come through before a later transfer I had made into the checking - and they had both been paid despite the lack of money in the account as they were small amounts - but of course they each had a $34 charge. Finding this out I felt a bit better - I had envisioned maybe 10 checks bouncing and the work that would be needed to be done, as well as the expense, as well as needing to transfer money to cover the cost of the fees on the checks.
She transferred the money to our checking account for us. She then checked and since we have not had any other bounced checks or such in the last 2 years (on her records - maybe 35 years for us and then the checks bounced because my pay check bounced) she could reverse up to 3 fees for us - just the number of fees we had. Oh, I was feeling a bit better. We thanked her and headed home.
I then telephoned the credit card company. I explained to the employee what had happened. I think she could hear the panic in my voice as she was very reassuring. She, of course, saw on our record what had happened and asked if I wanted her to debit our checking account to pay the bill. I thanked her and said that I was going to ask if she could do that. It was done and the payment was made. I was very lucky. I mail the payments at least a week before payment is due. This payment was due on the day this was happening. I checked with her and this counted as paid in full, on time - no interest due! I asked her what the bounced check fee was - $25. I was about to ask if she could waive it, when she said that she was going to check to see if she could. Again, since we pay in full every month with no prior problems or fees, she was able to waive the fee. I thanked her. (I was going to fill in the survey that was suppose to follow and compliment her profusely, but it never came on the line and I hung up.)
I started to breathe normally again.
Then I remembered that we had also received a letter from our RV insurance company asking again for the premium payment - per the transaction listing from the bank this was one of the checks paid without funds. Panic started again. Was this just a question of the second bill and our payment crossing in the mail or had it actually bounced. I telephoned the insurance company and it was just a case of paperwork crossing in the mail - thank goodness. The ability to breathe returned to me again.
I looked husband in the eye over the desks and told him that he could yell at me all he wanted to about this - “tomorrow” - I could not deal with it that day as we still had the business return to finish and send out the next day. He is not a yeller, but sometimes out of frustration yells, and I could see this being one of those times. He calmly said that he was not going to yell, but thinks it would be a good idea for him to check things as we go along and that I should do the same for him as he is forgetting things and getting confused. I told him this was fine with me as I keep trying to get him more involved in our money management (we are the opposite of the normal “husband deals with the money and the wife has no idea about it”) and it would be fine with me.
The corporation return went out on Tuesday on time. Finished - except for all the catching up.
Important to note is the fact that I was able to get all the fees waives as it was a one time occurrence. My hard work at keeping all our bills paid timely and in full paid off again in this situation. It was obvious that it was some sort of one time unusual problem and not us bouncing checks at random.
The fact that it was dealt with immediately also helped as there was no time for additional charges to occur - if I had called the credit card company the next day, my payment would be late and I would either be asking for the interest payment to also be waived or paying the interest - on our largest credit card bill in years.
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -
It should be obvious after the above that my thought is that it is very important to make payments on time and in full - or at least the entire amount of the minimum amount due or more. When one has a good record with the various companies one does business with (and yes, your personal finances are doing business with the various companies you deal with) it is recognized when help is needed.
In addition, hopefully you have all filed your income tax returns if you are in the U.S. or at the very least have filed an extension. Start working to make next year’s return easier to do. At the very least set up a folder or large envelope and drop bills which will be deductible next year into it. Drop income items into it also. Put a large X or * next to expenses paid by check or credit card payments which pay same if they are tax deductible. A program such as Quickbooks or Quicken or a simpler program can be a big help if you use it. A spread sheet that you make up in Excel or similar can also help. I personally do not keep anything in “the cloud” and want my data here in the house, but if that is what you prefer that can help you also. (“The cloud” is actually just someone else’s hard drive and since it on the Internet it can be, and most of them have been, hacked.)
This has been a busy tax season for me - not exactly so much from the actual tax return preparation but on a personal level lots of things have gone wrong and we were busy trying to do things. I spent last weekend through Monday night finishing up our personal return and our business return. We mailed out our personal return Monday at the post office and picked up the mail in our post office box and then returned home so I could finish the business return.
In the mail at the box was a letter from our bank to my husband. I almost set it aside as I figured it was something about his IRA account. I am so glad that I did not. I opened the envelope and glanced in just to check what it was ----- A BOUNCED CHECK NOTICE??? How could that be? Impossible!
We normally deposit money we receive in our savings account and then once a week I transfer money to our checking account to cover the upcoming bills plus a cushion for anything which might arise during the week.
However, we had needed a lot of money in our checking account all at once and it had to come from husband’s IRA. We had a huge credit card bill due to my new eyeglasses, husband’s teeth, and regular expenses, plus our real estate tax was due and so on. That money had to go directly into our checking account and it did - or so I thought.
As I started pulling out papers in the office to see what could have happened - Did we forget to make the deposit? Did the bank make a mistake? I felt like I was going to have a heart attack. In addition to this check certainly more checks must have also bounced - with a fee of $34 per check this could cost us real money - plus it was the large credit card payment - there would be interest and fees there also as well as on the other end of whatever else had bounced. My head was swimming. I kept hoping it was a bank error as then there would be no bank fees from then and apology letters to where the checks had bounced and reimbursement for the costs resulting from same (or so I hoped). I found the deposit slip and found it is was my error - out of force of habit I had deposited the check to our savings account!!!
I sat down to call the bank - I could barely see the phone pad to dial and could not see the deposit. Husband offered “Do you want to go to the bank to deal with this?” I looked at the clock - only 3:30 - we went to the bank.
One of the higher level tellers who knows me said hello and came over and asked how they could help. I managed to get out that I had deposited the money in the wrong account. He nicely told me that all I would need to do is transfer the money from one account to the other. I sort of sputtered out that no, I needed to see one of the platform (desk) people as checks were bouncing.
Luckily the person we spoke with was a woman I had worked with before for other more normal matters. She also tried to calm me down. She pulled up our account - two other checks had come through before a later transfer I had made into the checking - and they had both been paid despite the lack of money in the account as they were small amounts - but of course they each had a $34 charge. Finding this out I felt a bit better - I had envisioned maybe 10 checks bouncing and the work that would be needed to be done, as well as the expense, as well as needing to transfer money to cover the cost of the fees on the checks.
She transferred the money to our checking account for us. She then checked and since we have not had any other bounced checks or such in the last 2 years (on her records - maybe 35 years for us and then the checks bounced because my pay check bounced) she could reverse up to 3 fees for us - just the number of fees we had. Oh, I was feeling a bit better. We thanked her and headed home.
I then telephoned the credit card company. I explained to the employee what had happened. I think she could hear the panic in my voice as she was very reassuring. She, of course, saw on our record what had happened and asked if I wanted her to debit our checking account to pay the bill. I thanked her and said that I was going to ask if she could do that. It was done and the payment was made. I was very lucky. I mail the payments at least a week before payment is due. This payment was due on the day this was happening. I checked with her and this counted as paid in full, on time - no interest due! I asked her what the bounced check fee was - $25. I was about to ask if she could waive it, when she said that she was going to check to see if she could. Again, since we pay in full every month with no prior problems or fees, she was able to waive the fee. I thanked her. (I was going to fill in the survey that was suppose to follow and compliment her profusely, but it never came on the line and I hung up.)
I started to breathe normally again.
Then I remembered that we had also received a letter from our RV insurance company asking again for the premium payment - per the transaction listing from the bank this was one of the checks paid without funds. Panic started again. Was this just a question of the second bill and our payment crossing in the mail or had it actually bounced. I telephoned the insurance company and it was just a case of paperwork crossing in the mail - thank goodness. The ability to breathe returned to me again.
I looked husband in the eye over the desks and told him that he could yell at me all he wanted to about this - “tomorrow” - I could not deal with it that day as we still had the business return to finish and send out the next day. He is not a yeller, but sometimes out of frustration yells, and I could see this being one of those times. He calmly said that he was not going to yell, but thinks it would be a good idea for him to check things as we go along and that I should do the same for him as he is forgetting things and getting confused. I told him this was fine with me as I keep trying to get him more involved in our money management (we are the opposite of the normal “husband deals with the money and the wife has no idea about it”) and it would be fine with me.
The corporation return went out on Tuesday on time. Finished - except for all the catching up.
Important to note is the fact that I was able to get all the fees waives as it was a one time occurrence. My hard work at keeping all our bills paid timely and in full paid off again in this situation. It was obvious that it was some sort of one time unusual problem and not us bouncing checks at random.
The fact that it was dealt with immediately also helped as there was no time for additional charges to occur - if I had called the credit card company the next day, my payment would be late and I would either be asking for the interest payment to also be waived or paying the interest - on our largest credit card bill in years.
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -
It should be obvious after the above that my thought is that it is very important to make payments on time and in full - or at least the entire amount of the minimum amount due or more. When one has a good record with the various companies one does business with (and yes, your personal finances are doing business with the various companies you deal with) it is recognized when help is needed.
In addition, hopefully you have all filed your income tax returns if you are in the U.S. or at the very least have filed an extension. Start working to make next year’s return easier to do. At the very least set up a folder or large envelope and drop bills which will be deductible next year into it. Drop income items into it also. Put a large X or * next to expenses paid by check or credit card payments which pay same if they are tax deductible. A program such as Quickbooks or Quicken or a simpler program can be a big help if you use it. A spread sheet that you make up in Excel or similar can also help. I personally do not keep anything in “the cloud” and want my data here in the house, but if that is what you prefer that can help you also. (“The cloud” is actually just someone else’s hard drive and since it on the Internet it can be, and most of them have been, hacked.)
Thursday, April 13, 2017
SCANNING TO MAKE IT EASIER TO FIND PAID BILLS
Last October - October 26, 2016 post I posted on the usefulness of having a printer and a scanner to help one get organized and keep papers organized. Here’s an additional thought on that subject.
I am good - really good - at keeping track of bills to pay and paid bills, after all, I am an accountant. I have a paid bills file next to my desk - one of those large wallet things with sections in it. When I pay a bill I post it in my Quickbooks program, mark it paid, attach any charge slips, etc and then file it in the appropriate section of the paid bills file. I generally have a section for each credit card and type of bill. The credit card we use most often actually has two sections - bills paid January through June and bills paid July through December as there are a lot of charge card slips. The sections for taxes have folder in them to further divide the bills. I will not go into all of the sections right now as I am already digressing too much.
Early in January I pull out all of the paid bills from the year before. Other than tax related bills, the bills are put into an old manila folder box which is redated with a black marker for the year of the bills in it. These bills will sit in this box until around May when I go through my other files for last year, add the paid bills, tax returns, etc and box them up in a box in the top of my office closet. I pul out the oldest box up there - when I do this for last year I will be pulling out the 2007 box - basically shred what is in the box, relabel the box with the new year and store it all in the box, which is returned to the top of the closet.
The tax related bills when pulled in January for the prior year I combine them all in one folder which will generally not be used until towards the end of the following year and put them where I will be putting clients’s tax information. The remainder of the tax info folders, now empty, go back in the paid bills file.
Okay, that is the background of my paid bills.
We have a VERY small RV. We have a contract from a company for road service for the RV in case it breaks down, has a flat tire, etc. Sort of like the Automobile Association of America (of Canada, etc.), but for RVs. (Yes, these companies often also cover one’s cars and AAA will cover some RV problems but one will not have a specialist in RVs come if one calls AAA.)
When paying bills late last Friday (after business hours anywhere in the lower 48) I noticed that I have the renewal for this RV road service policy is due April 25. I double checked that I did not have the bill and then did what any wife would do - I asked my husband if “we” (meaning he) has an online account for the company. He did.
He attempted to sign in and was told that since the account was expired more than 90 days ago, he no longer had an account. He tried to sign in with their alternate method, in case he made a mistake in his sign in info. This required the RV manufacturer’s name from a list and the RV’s VIN number. The list of RV manufacturers was rather short and our RV was not on the list. Husband starts to get upset.
As usual his first reaction is that I did not do something I should have done - or did it wrong. “Are you sure you paid the bill last year?” I told him I did and would get the paid bill for him. I climbed up and took down the box of last year’s paid bills. I went through all of the bills - I could not find it. So - what do we all do? I went through them again. No paid bill.
Perhaps it was with the tax related papers? The RV is not tax related, but our car and van are partially so and I tend to keep the car related bills together. No, not there - again I checked twice.
I looked the payment up in Quickbooks Yes! I did pay it - on March 31 and it cleared the bank on April 7 last year. I found the copy of the canceled check in with the bank statement. (This was in the drawer in the file cabinet for personal items - having the info from Quickbooks made it easy and, well, quick to find.) Proof I paid it and it was not my fault.
But a copy of the bill? Then I remembered. Last year I scanned in one of each type of bill to the computer with the idea that if something happened to me, husband could bring up the scanned copy of a bill of that type and see what I did when I paid it. (The bill is scanned in, and then the items I send - check, stub, envelope - are scanned on the last page of the file.) So there was a scanned copy of the bill in that file. I printed out the first page of the bill - showing all the info needed and set it aside to telephone the company on Monday.
Thinking about this over the weekend I decided two things. First, I would create a separate folder in the paid bills, tax related sections for all car related items. Second, it was so convenient to pull up the copy of the missing bill that I will scan in all paid bills in the future. Understand, I will still keep the hard copy as they have the assorted credit card slips and other supporting papers attached to them and I will not scan in all these attachments, but I will scan in the bills themselves for quick and easy reference if needed. I plan to set up a folder for “paid bills” with 12 folders in it - one for each month - and label the scan of each bill with the check number which paid it. I hope this will make it easier in the future to quickly find bills for reference.
Oh, in case you are wondering - I telephoned this past Monday and had a terribly odd conversation with an employee of the company. He first was confused as our plan ended April 25, 2016 - huh? I told him that I had our canceled check for the year ending April 25, 2017,which cleared our bank on April 7, 2016. (See how useful the payment info is.) “Oh, yes. There is an error, I see the payment. I’ll update the computer. I then asked him if this means that we have had no coverage for the past year - despite paying for it. He, of course said no. When I pushed him as it what would have happened if we needed service - “Service would have called us and we would have found the error and fixed it.” What if I needed the help, say last Friday - they keep business hours in the office? “Oh, you would have just paid for the service call and we would have reimbursed you.” The fact that I would not have known who to call and would have needed to have money to pay them for the tow, well that did not make sense to him. He wanted me to renew by credit card over the phone. “Do you even still deal with my brand of RV, since it is not on your list of RV companies?” Of course they do, just that if one gets a new policy it has to come through the RV company - which makes no sense as to why the company is not on their alternate ID for sign in list. I asked him to mail us a bill to pay.
He seemed a little too quick and pat with the answers and husband went looking on the Internet, Yes, this has happened to a number of people. Our RV company has it’s own road service company now - so they would not be signing us up with them. In addition they have dropped the inexpensive basic policy we had for one which is more than three times as much cost. So after all this we are looking for a different company - but at least I will be able to find the paid bills as we go forward as they will be scanned into the computer.
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -
I feel odd about this thought it is different than my usual posts for same and it is not intended to be religious or political, although it is a bit of both, but I intend it to be more of a any person to any person idea.
As the Jewish people celebrate Passover and the Christians celebrate Good Friday and Easter this week, please take to heart the idea of all of us being siblings. Be a little nicer to people in your daily life - strangers as well as those you know.
Say please and thank you a bit more - even in situations where you might not normally think to do so. Hold the door open for someone - even if they capable of doing so on their own. Help a mother who is juggling child, purse and lunch tray as she tries to move a high chair. Smile at someone who looks a bit upset - it is an amazing feeling when one does this and the other person smiles back and then, at least, seems a little less upset - a bond between two people of only seconds. (These are all things I have done during the past week - and try to do when I can.)
Let us - even those not of a religion celebrating these holidays - be a bit more neighborly to those we see during the day. Not only will the other person feel better, it is amazing how long the memory of the smile from a stranger lasts - no matter which of us initiated it.
Our world is in a state today that I, for one, find scary. Perhaps the more of us who show small kindnesses to others, the better the world can be.
I am good - really good - at keeping track of bills to pay and paid bills, after all, I am an accountant. I have a paid bills file next to my desk - one of those large wallet things with sections in it. When I pay a bill I post it in my Quickbooks program, mark it paid, attach any charge slips, etc and then file it in the appropriate section of the paid bills file. I generally have a section for each credit card and type of bill. The credit card we use most often actually has two sections - bills paid January through June and bills paid July through December as there are a lot of charge card slips. The sections for taxes have folder in them to further divide the bills. I will not go into all of the sections right now as I am already digressing too much.
Early in January I pull out all of the paid bills from the year before. Other than tax related bills, the bills are put into an old manila folder box which is redated with a black marker for the year of the bills in it. These bills will sit in this box until around May when I go through my other files for last year, add the paid bills, tax returns, etc and box them up in a box in the top of my office closet. I pul out the oldest box up there - when I do this for last year I will be pulling out the 2007 box - basically shred what is in the box, relabel the box with the new year and store it all in the box, which is returned to the top of the closet.
The tax related bills when pulled in January for the prior year I combine them all in one folder which will generally not be used until towards the end of the following year and put them where I will be putting clients’s tax information. The remainder of the tax info folders, now empty, go back in the paid bills file.
Okay, that is the background of my paid bills.
We have a VERY small RV. We have a contract from a company for road service for the RV in case it breaks down, has a flat tire, etc. Sort of like the Automobile Association of America (of Canada, etc.), but for RVs. (Yes, these companies often also cover one’s cars and AAA will cover some RV problems but one will not have a specialist in RVs come if one calls AAA.)
When paying bills late last Friday (after business hours anywhere in the lower 48) I noticed that I have the renewal for this RV road service policy is due April 25. I double checked that I did not have the bill and then did what any wife would do - I asked my husband if “we” (meaning he) has an online account for the company. He did.
He attempted to sign in and was told that since the account was expired more than 90 days ago, he no longer had an account. He tried to sign in with their alternate method, in case he made a mistake in his sign in info. This required the RV manufacturer’s name from a list and the RV’s VIN number. The list of RV manufacturers was rather short and our RV was not on the list. Husband starts to get upset.
As usual his first reaction is that I did not do something I should have done - or did it wrong. “Are you sure you paid the bill last year?” I told him I did and would get the paid bill for him. I climbed up and took down the box of last year’s paid bills. I went through all of the bills - I could not find it. So - what do we all do? I went through them again. No paid bill.
Perhaps it was with the tax related papers? The RV is not tax related, but our car and van are partially so and I tend to keep the car related bills together. No, not there - again I checked twice.
I looked the payment up in Quickbooks Yes! I did pay it - on March 31 and it cleared the bank on April 7 last year. I found the copy of the canceled check in with the bank statement. (This was in the drawer in the file cabinet for personal items - having the info from Quickbooks made it easy and, well, quick to find.) Proof I paid it and it was not my fault.
But a copy of the bill? Then I remembered. Last year I scanned in one of each type of bill to the computer with the idea that if something happened to me, husband could bring up the scanned copy of a bill of that type and see what I did when I paid it. (The bill is scanned in, and then the items I send - check, stub, envelope - are scanned on the last page of the file.) So there was a scanned copy of the bill in that file. I printed out the first page of the bill - showing all the info needed and set it aside to telephone the company on Monday.
Thinking about this over the weekend I decided two things. First, I would create a separate folder in the paid bills, tax related sections for all car related items. Second, it was so convenient to pull up the copy of the missing bill that I will scan in all paid bills in the future. Understand, I will still keep the hard copy as they have the assorted credit card slips and other supporting papers attached to them and I will not scan in all these attachments, but I will scan in the bills themselves for quick and easy reference if needed. I plan to set up a folder for “paid bills” with 12 folders in it - one for each month - and label the scan of each bill with the check number which paid it. I hope this will make it easier in the future to quickly find bills for reference.
Oh, in case you are wondering - I telephoned this past Monday and had a terribly odd conversation with an employee of the company. He first was confused as our plan ended April 25, 2016 - huh? I told him that I had our canceled check for the year ending April 25, 2017,which cleared our bank on April 7, 2016. (See how useful the payment info is.) “Oh, yes. There is an error, I see the payment. I’ll update the computer. I then asked him if this means that we have had no coverage for the past year - despite paying for it. He, of course said no. When I pushed him as it what would have happened if we needed service - “Service would have called us and we would have found the error and fixed it.” What if I needed the help, say last Friday - they keep business hours in the office? “Oh, you would have just paid for the service call and we would have reimbursed you.” The fact that I would not have known who to call and would have needed to have money to pay them for the tow, well that did not make sense to him. He wanted me to renew by credit card over the phone. “Do you even still deal with my brand of RV, since it is not on your list of RV companies?” Of course they do, just that if one gets a new policy it has to come through the RV company - which makes no sense as to why the company is not on their alternate ID for sign in list. I asked him to mail us a bill to pay.
He seemed a little too quick and pat with the answers and husband went looking on the Internet, Yes, this has happened to a number of people. Our RV company has it’s own road service company now - so they would not be signing us up with them. In addition they have dropped the inexpensive basic policy we had for one which is more than three times as much cost. So after all this we are looking for a different company - but at least I will be able to find the paid bills as we go forward as they will be scanned into the computer.
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -
I feel odd about this thought it is different than my usual posts for same and it is not intended to be religious or political, although it is a bit of both, but I intend it to be more of a any person to any person idea.
As the Jewish people celebrate Passover and the Christians celebrate Good Friday and Easter this week, please take to heart the idea of all of us being siblings. Be a little nicer to people in your daily life - strangers as well as those you know.
Say please and thank you a bit more - even in situations where you might not normally think to do so. Hold the door open for someone - even if they capable of doing so on their own. Help a mother who is juggling child, purse and lunch tray as she tries to move a high chair. Smile at someone who looks a bit upset - it is an amazing feeling when one does this and the other person smiles back and then, at least, seems a little less upset - a bond between two people of only seconds. (These are all things I have done during the past week - and try to do when I can.)
Let us - even those not of a religion celebrating these holidays - be a bit more neighborly to those we see during the day. Not only will the other person feel better, it is amazing how long the memory of the smile from a stranger lasts - no matter which of us initiated it.
Our world is in a state today that I, for one, find scary. Perhaps the more of us who show small kindnesses to others, the better the world can be.
Thursday, April 6, 2017
HOLIDAYS AND TAXES - UNRELATED SUBJECTS
Hello again.
We did not go away for my husband’s birthday due to, yes, rain again. There is no point in going to outdoor market when a good chunk of the outdoor vendors will not be, especially if one is going to travel 3+ hours each way and pay over $20 in tolls to go there.
I have been busy finishing up client’s tax returns and have only one left to do and I am waiting for the information to do it. So I started on our personal and business returns. Money goes back and forth between us and the business - something is on our credit card for the business or vice versa, so the first thing I have to do is make sure what the business owes us is the same amount on the business’s books and on our books. Sometimes I post something on one set of books and forget to post it on the other. That took 2 days to work out - and the end of 2015 I got it to match, so the differences were all last year - finally both the business and our books agree.
Next week is holiday time - Monday night is the start of Passover and next Friday is Good Friday, followed, of course, by Easter Sunday. If you are having people in for the holidays - do you have your house ready? Now is the time to start. Try to do better than throwing everything in that extra room with door that stays closed when people are over. - You thought I didn’t know about that? I started doing this when I was a kid - cleaning my room meant throwing everything in the bottom of the closet - this would result in my finding the leftover Halloween candy sometime the following August - luckily I never had bugs or other little visitors as a result of that. Try to actually toss out some items - or take them for donation. (I took 5 suitcases today for donation - one hard side rolling bag and the rest were soft bags that I managed to fit into the rolling bag. - a little more room in a closet for other stuff.) Plan out your menu if you doing the cooking or assign who will bring which dish if you have an arrangement where everyone brings part of the dinner. I keep my recipes for the holidays on the computer. They used to be in a cooking program (technically they still are, but it needs a parallel printer to print them out and that means running cables...) I printed them out and scanned them (remember I posted last October about how great and important it is to have a scanner and a printer - this is one example) into the computer. Now I can print them out when needed. I print the recipes I will use and throw them out as they are finished with - easy to see what still needs to be done. Even if you not are not going to be responsible for the hosting or cooking - make sure that everyone’s clothes will be ready for them to wear for the holidays.
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -
Income taxes (here in the U.S.) are due April 18, a week from this coming Tuesday. There is still time to get them finished. If you find that you will not have them done - whether because you are too busy to do them, can’t find info, or did not get info from someone needed to prepare them, you can file for an extension of time to FILE. It is not an extension of time to pay - so make sure you have paid in enough for your taxes - from withholding or by filing estimated taxes - to be at least as close as possible. If your income is the same as last year as far as you know -then make sure you have paid in at least the same in taxes as your taxes were last year - 110% of last year’s if you have a high income.
There is a form from IRS to file to get the extension - it is automatic and you will have until October 15, 2017 to file. Depending on your state you might also have to file a form for an automatic extension or it might just be automatic. Again, this is an extension of time to FILE the return, not to pay the taxes.
If you do get an extension try to prepare and file your returns as soon as possible so if you do owe additional taxes you will pay as little in possible in any penalties and interest for paying late - and if you are getting a refund, don’t you want the money as soon as possible?
If you have not filed your taxes in the past - get them filed also. The April 18 date may be important for you too. If a return is filed more than 3 years late you will lose any refund due you and if you owe money on the returns you are adding penalties and interest to what you owe - every month and if you have not filed a return - then IRS (and the state’s) 3 years to go after you for taxes owed does not start to run and they can come after you until you file a return (then they have 3 years) or forever.
If you get a large refund you might want to change the amount withheld for taxes or pay less in estimates - a refund may be exciting, but IRS and your state is using your money. If you can pay less in advance without underpaying the taxes that is money in your pocket (or even better your bank account) during the year on which you can make (the current tiny rate of) interest or you can pay down a bill and pay less interest.
If you owe money - file your returns even if you cannot pay the amount due. Pay as much as you can and attach a letter explaining. Depending on how much you owe, a payment plan from IRS (state) maybe easier than you think to get - but you are paying interest (and will pay penalties for underpaying your taxes) until the amount due is paid off.
Another reason for paying your taxes is that there is a scam in which someone calls you and rather threateningly tells you that they are from the IRS (state) and you owe taxes - which won’t worry you if you know you don’t owe any taxes. In case you haven’t heard this - IRS (state) will not call you for payment of taxes without having mailed something to you first. Don’t fall for this scam. (Or similar ones claiming that if you do not pay immediately with a gift card your utilities will be shut off.) One thing to remember is that IRS, states, utilities will never tell you to buy gift cards to pay off an amount owed - especially not Apple gift cards. They will not want you to wire money to them. (There are postal laws that can be used against fraudsters, so they want they want the money otherwise sent to them - by wire, UPS, FedEx, etc.- to avoid the postal laws.) They will want payments by check. (They may also take credit cards and charge you a fee for using same.) Also if anyone ever calls claiming to be from the government or a utility and threatens you for payment. If you are unsure, ask if you can call them back - a refusal to allow you to do so is another indication that they are not legitimate. Call the government agency or the utility directly and ask them if this was a legitimate call. If you have a tax preparer - you should be able to call them for help. But again - if one is not delinquent, then one knows that one does not owe the money. Personally I do not talk to anyone who calls. We have our answering machine on all the time and we screen our calls (originally as we did not want to have to tell all the people who thought we were a pizza place, a doctor, or an eyeglass store that they were wrong, but now it is so we don’t talk to any of these con men). IRS has a link on the first page of their site to information about current scams.
I do have to give you a bit of disclaimer. I am not a CPA, just a garden variety of accountant and tax preparer. The information I have given (other than the fraud warnings) may or may not apply to you. It is always a good idea to use a legitimate tax preparer (IRS has a directory of tax preparers who meet certain education standards and have a good history of no problems with returns on their website). You can also find free help depending on your return and circumstances through various programs - check at your local library for these programs. IRS’s website is irs.gov
And don’t forget - it is never too early to start preparing for next year’s returns.
We did not go away for my husband’s birthday due to, yes, rain again. There is no point in going to outdoor market when a good chunk of the outdoor vendors will not be, especially if one is going to travel 3+ hours each way and pay over $20 in tolls to go there.
I have been busy finishing up client’s tax returns and have only one left to do and I am waiting for the information to do it. So I started on our personal and business returns. Money goes back and forth between us and the business - something is on our credit card for the business or vice versa, so the first thing I have to do is make sure what the business owes us is the same amount on the business’s books and on our books. Sometimes I post something on one set of books and forget to post it on the other. That took 2 days to work out - and the end of 2015 I got it to match, so the differences were all last year - finally both the business and our books agree.
Next week is holiday time - Monday night is the start of Passover and next Friday is Good Friday, followed, of course, by Easter Sunday. If you are having people in for the holidays - do you have your house ready? Now is the time to start. Try to do better than throwing everything in that extra room with door that stays closed when people are over. - You thought I didn’t know about that? I started doing this when I was a kid - cleaning my room meant throwing everything in the bottom of the closet - this would result in my finding the leftover Halloween candy sometime the following August - luckily I never had bugs or other little visitors as a result of that. Try to actually toss out some items - or take them for donation. (I took 5 suitcases today for donation - one hard side rolling bag and the rest were soft bags that I managed to fit into the rolling bag. - a little more room in a closet for other stuff.) Plan out your menu if you doing the cooking or assign who will bring which dish if you have an arrangement where everyone brings part of the dinner. I keep my recipes for the holidays on the computer. They used to be in a cooking program (technically they still are, but it needs a parallel printer to print them out and that means running cables...) I printed them out and scanned them (remember I posted last October about how great and important it is to have a scanner and a printer - this is one example) into the computer. Now I can print them out when needed. I print the recipes I will use and throw them out as they are finished with - easy to see what still needs to be done. Even if you not are not going to be responsible for the hosting or cooking - make sure that everyone’s clothes will be ready for them to wear for the holidays.
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -
Income taxes (here in the U.S.) are due April 18, a week from this coming Tuesday. There is still time to get them finished. If you find that you will not have them done - whether because you are too busy to do them, can’t find info, or did not get info from someone needed to prepare them, you can file for an extension of time to FILE. It is not an extension of time to pay - so make sure you have paid in enough for your taxes - from withholding or by filing estimated taxes - to be at least as close as possible. If your income is the same as last year as far as you know -then make sure you have paid in at least the same in taxes as your taxes were last year - 110% of last year’s if you have a high income.
There is a form from IRS to file to get the extension - it is automatic and you will have until October 15, 2017 to file. Depending on your state you might also have to file a form for an automatic extension or it might just be automatic. Again, this is an extension of time to FILE the return, not to pay the taxes.
If you do get an extension try to prepare and file your returns as soon as possible so if you do owe additional taxes you will pay as little in possible in any penalties and interest for paying late - and if you are getting a refund, don’t you want the money as soon as possible?
If you have not filed your taxes in the past - get them filed also. The April 18 date may be important for you too. If a return is filed more than 3 years late you will lose any refund due you and if you owe money on the returns you are adding penalties and interest to what you owe - every month and if you have not filed a return - then IRS (and the state’s) 3 years to go after you for taxes owed does not start to run and they can come after you until you file a return (then they have 3 years) or forever.
If you get a large refund you might want to change the amount withheld for taxes or pay less in estimates - a refund may be exciting, but IRS and your state is using your money. If you can pay less in advance without underpaying the taxes that is money in your pocket (or even better your bank account) during the year on which you can make (the current tiny rate of) interest or you can pay down a bill and pay less interest.
If you owe money - file your returns even if you cannot pay the amount due. Pay as much as you can and attach a letter explaining. Depending on how much you owe, a payment plan from IRS (state) maybe easier than you think to get - but you are paying interest (and will pay penalties for underpaying your taxes) until the amount due is paid off.
Another reason for paying your taxes is that there is a scam in which someone calls you and rather threateningly tells you that they are from the IRS (state) and you owe taxes - which won’t worry you if you know you don’t owe any taxes. In case you haven’t heard this - IRS (state) will not call you for payment of taxes without having mailed something to you first. Don’t fall for this scam. (Or similar ones claiming that if you do not pay immediately with a gift card your utilities will be shut off.) One thing to remember is that IRS, states, utilities will never tell you to buy gift cards to pay off an amount owed - especially not Apple gift cards. They will not want you to wire money to them. (There are postal laws that can be used against fraudsters, so they want they want the money otherwise sent to them - by wire, UPS, FedEx, etc.- to avoid the postal laws.) They will want payments by check. (They may also take credit cards and charge you a fee for using same.) Also if anyone ever calls claiming to be from the government or a utility and threatens you for payment. If you are unsure, ask if you can call them back - a refusal to allow you to do so is another indication that they are not legitimate. Call the government agency or the utility directly and ask them if this was a legitimate call. If you have a tax preparer - you should be able to call them for help. But again - if one is not delinquent, then one knows that one does not owe the money. Personally I do not talk to anyone who calls. We have our answering machine on all the time and we screen our calls (originally as we did not want to have to tell all the people who thought we were a pizza place, a doctor, or an eyeglass store that they were wrong, but now it is so we don’t talk to any of these con men). IRS has a link on the first page of their site to information about current scams.
I do have to give you a bit of disclaimer. I am not a CPA, just a garden variety of accountant and tax preparer. The information I have given (other than the fraud warnings) may or may not apply to you. It is always a good idea to use a legitimate tax preparer (IRS has a directory of tax preparers who meet certain education standards and have a good history of no problems with returns on their website). You can also find free help depending on your return and circumstances through various programs - check at your local library for these programs. IRS’s website is irs.gov
And don’t forget - it is never too early to start preparing for next year’s returns.
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