Auckland Accounting Services – Tax Advice and Preparation

You Must File Taxes Correctly – Tips From An Auckland Accountant

As government tax laws get more complicated and affect more aspects of our lives, accounting services are essential to modern business and private life. But most people do not fully understand what accountancy services are.  Here are some brief notes to explain the outlines of the basic services most accountants offer.

 

There are four main categories:

 

1 Tax

Governments love to tax people and businesses and it seems every year they come up with new ways to extract more tax from us.

There are many types of tax.  These include income tax, sales taxes, company tax, taxes on company perks and payroll taxes.  In some countries there are also taxes on capital gains, property and many types of investments.

 

No-one wants to pay more tax than necessary and it is perfectly acceptable to minimise your taxes if work within the law. However as the regulations become more complicated you need to work with an accountant to help you.

 

2 Business services

There are a few different aspects to business services.  The most common two are preparing the Annual Accounts for a business so that you can see how profitable your company is.  It also determines how much tax your company will have to pay.

 

The second most common service that accountants provide for businesses is to submit the annual information to the various government departments.  This can be the accounts or the files for the department that overseas companies. This has different names in each country but the job is to see that companies are providing the right data for shareholders and suppliers to be able to check on the activities of that company.

 

Other business services can include cash-flow forecasting, business planning and even due diligence for sale or purchase of a business.  These services are often grouped as business advisory services.

 

3 Estate planning

Increasingly people are looking at estate planning as a way to protect assets and also to reduce tax liability. For many people this can be in the form of a Family Trust.  Accountants can help set up a trust, handle the transfer of assets and then undertake the complex administration so that they trust remains within the law.

 

4 Systems support

Another area that is also increasing for many accounting practices is that of business support services.

 

This could be bookkeeping, managing accounting software packages and increasingly handling online banking systems for their clients.

 

Dangers of not paying your taxes

One of the most common reasons businesses and private individuals go into bankruptcy is due to non-payment of taxes.  The tax department will definitely take people to court for unpaid tax and with tight finances around the world, the tax offices are getting tougher about unpaid taxes.

 

Therefore, it pays to make sure you are complying with the latest tax regulations.  And because the tax laws are so complicated, hiring an accountant is the only way for most people to achieve this.  So be sure to find a good accounting firm in your area but remember that there are many accounting services that they offer, not only filing tax returns.