Business Owners: How To Keep Your Books Ready For The IRS

As a business owner, you should deposit all business receipts in a separate bank account. If possible, you should also make all disbursements by check. In regard to all business entities, with the exception of corporations, a disbursement from the business account is not necessary to qualify the expenditure as a business expense. A check written on a personal account for business purposes will qualify if that expense is otherwise allowable. It is important to document both business income and business expenses.

Write checks payable to yourself only when making withdrawals of income from your business for your own use. Avoid writing business checks payable to cash as it is important to identify which disbursements are business and which are personal. In the event of an IRS audit, this is an area that will get close scrutiny. The IRS auditor will not only look at each check to see to whom it was paid, but will also look at the reverse of the check to see by whom and how the check was endorsed. If you must write a check for cash to pay a business expense, include the receipt for the cash payment in your records. If you cannot get a receipt or a cash payment, put a statement in your records at the time of the transaction to explain the payment.

Get receipts for all business expenditures. For all business trips, make sure always to get receipts from hotels and motels. Toll receipts can also help to substantiate travel expenses. Obtain receipts from the post office when you purchase stamps and mail larger envelopes and packages. You should establish a petty cash fund for small expenses. All business expenses paid by cash should be clearly substantiated by documents showing their business purpose.

Support your entries with sales slips, invoices, canceled checks, paid bills, duplicate deposit slips, and any other documents that explain and support entries made in your books. File these materials in a safe place. Memorandums or sketchy records that approximate income, deductions, or other items affecting your tax liability will not be considered adequate by the IRS. Remember, where the IRS is concerned, the burden of proof is on the taxpayer. You will not be given the benefit of the doubt.

Classify your accounts by separating them into five groups:

1. Income
2. Expenses
3. Assets
4. Liabilities
5. Equity (net worth).

For your assets, record the date of acquisition, cost or other basis, depreciation, depletion, and anything else affecting their basis. Basis is the amount of your investment in a property for tax purposes.

Keeping Records: You must keep the books and records of your business available at all times for inspection by the IRS. Records must be kept as long as they may be needed in the administration of any Internal Revenue law. Keep records supporting items reported on a tax return until the period of limitations for that tax year has expired. Usually, this is the later of:

1. Three years after the date your return is due or filed; or
2. Two years after the date the tax was paid.

However, you should keep some records indefinitely. For example, if you adopt the last-in first-out (LIFO) method of valuing your inventory or change your accounting method, records supporting these decisions and approvals from the IRS may be needed for an indefinite time.

You should also keep records that support your basis in property for as long as they are needed to figure the correct basis of your original or replacement property (including capital improvements). Keep copies of your tax returns. They will help you in preparing future tax returns and in making computations if you later file an amended return or a claim for a refund.

Using Microfilm For Recordkeeping: Microfilm and microfiche reproductions of general books of accounts (such as cash books, journals, voucher registers, and ledgers) are accepted by the IRS for recordkeeping purposes if they comply. If your micrographic system does not meet the requirements of Revenue Procedure 81-46, you may be subject to penalties.

Using Computerized Recordkeeping: If you maintain your records with an automated data processing system, you must be able to produce legible records from the system to provide the information needed to determine your correct tax liability. You must keep a complete description of the computerized portion of your accounting system. This documentation must be sufficiently detailed to show the applications being performed; the procedures used in each application; or the controls used to ensure accurate and reliable processing; and controls used to prevent the unauthorized addition, alteration, or deletion of retained records. These records must be retained for as long as they may be material in the administration of any Internal Revenue law.

Use A Detox Diet Plan As An Alternative Health Treatment

Is a detox diet plan for yoy? Many people pursue alternative health treatments when traditional medical procedures are not being as effective as they are needed to be. Some, such as rolfing, acupuncture, and chiropractic procedures should only be done with a professional in the field. However, other kinds of alternative medical practices can be discussed with your doctor and then practiced in your own home. One such alternative type of therapy that you can do without the help of a medical professional for daily or weekly treatments is the detox diet plan.

Traditionally, the detox diet is used for those who are struggling to quit drug or alcohol abuse. There are now many other known ways in which this can help a person's health as well. Detox diets include more than simply removing addictive substances from your menu-and the diet itself is quiet complicated if you do not first research and understand the food that you should be avoiding in your daily diet. Your doctor can help you plan your detox diet so that you are eating the most beneficial foods possible. Be sure to discuss this treatment with him or her before you begin, so that you can be sure it is a healthy diet for your specific medical condition.

Detox stands for detoxification, and generally these detox diets plans are ones that remove harmful environmental toxins from your body by eliminating the source-poor food choices. First, you should minimize and eventually stop eating foods that contain harmful additive chemicals. Organic food is substituted instead. Next, add foods to your diet that promote healthy detoxification by providing the nutrients your body needs. Lastly, foods that are high in fiber and water are very important so that toxins can be drawn out of your body quickly and regularly.

Detox diet plans can be used to help with skin problems, digestive diseases, addiction, and other health concerns. It is important to be sure that you are eating in a way that is healthy for your body, so if you have other conditions, such as an eating disorder, diabetes, epilepsy, cancer, heart disease, ulcers, or low blood pressure, check with your doctor before beginning this new type of diet. It is also not suggested for those who are pregnant or nursing. If you have an adverse side effect, such as diarrhea, stomach pains, or drastic weight loss, talk to you doctor. When beginning a detox diet plan, you may experience headaches or be tired. This is normal, but if it does not improve, see your doctor.

Feeling the Rainbow: What is Color Therapy?

Believe it or not, colors affect the way we think, act, and feel more than most people would like to admit. Scientists have proven that various colors bring out different emotions in a person, affecting mental and biological processes in ways that we are only beginning to understand. In fact, some practitioners of alternative medicine have turned to colors as an answer to the health problems affecting some people. Color therapy, or chromotherapy as it is called in scientific circles, is the use of colors to affect and change moods and both physical and mental conditions.

Those who practice color therapy are few and far between, but there has been a long history of the use of colors in medical practices. Dating back to ancient Egypt, people have turned to colors to help them balance themselves and make them feel happier in their lives. In fact, the whole scheme of color therapy revolves around balance. Practitioners of color therapy use different colors to help move the energy of a person to wherever it is needed so that there is balance, allowing the person to feel at peace with him or herself. This involves all aspects of a person, whether it is mental, emotional, or even physical.

The way color therapy works is based on vibrations. Every cell in the body is composed of energy which gives off a certain vibration. It's when these vibrations are imbalanced that negative reactions begin to take place within the body. Scientists have found that colors give off vibrations as well. In fact, every color gives off a different and specific vibration. When a body is put into contact with the vibrations of a certain color, its own vibrations are then shifted. A skilled color therapist can use these vibrations to bring balance in a body, thus healing it.

How do you find out what vibrations are necessary to bring about balance? The reaction of a person to a certain color can indicate where the problem lies and what color could then help bring this balance. One way to test this is by using Luscher's Color Test. In this test, you pick colors on a screen at random, then after a couple minutes, you do the same thing, choosing first colors that appeal to you the most and moving on from there, ending with the color that appeals to you least. It's this test that gauges a person's emotional and physical state, giving the color therapist a place to start.

Although it is often viewed with skepticism, color therapy has definitive scientific information backing it up. Since we are still only beginning to understand how color affects us, color therapy is bound to grow and expand and possibly become used more often in society. Already, color is taken into account when designing rooms in a hospital, for example. Only colors that have been known to soothe people are used in decorations there. It is applications such as these where color therapy begins to break new grounds in alterative medicine.