What is Better - Drawings or Wages?

Clients often ask which is the best way to pay themselves from their company - drawings or wages? Here is an explanation of the differences. Drawings Taking drawings from your business is not a tax deductible cost - you should be aware that you will need to put aside a bit of money for income tax as well. For example say you take $800 per week drawings you want to be saving at least an additiona... More

Topics: Employing PAYE Salary & Wages Drawings KiwiSaver

Posted 24/09/2014 – Updated 22/12/2014

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What is Provisional Tax?

When you first go into business you don't actually have to pay any income tax to IRD for quite some time (unless you are going to be earning over $180K in profit for your first year - then different rules apply). So say your first financial year will end at the 31 March 2015 - then your financial accounts and returns are prepared and any income tax payable for that year is due to Inland Revenue b... More

Topics: Income Tax Terminology Provisional Tax Starting Business

Posted 23/09/2014 – Updated 30/09/2014

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Closing Your Business and GST Claimed on Assets Kept

A reminder that if you decide to end your business (or sell it) but want to keep some of its assets (and you have claimed GST on these assets) you will have to pay some GST back to IRD based on the current market value of the assets kept. Also IRD have a helpful video about closing down a business... http://www.ird.govt.nz/help/demo/closing-bus-vid/ More

Topics: GST Tax Compliance Guides Private Use

Posted 22/09/2014 – Updated 23/09/2014

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New Team Member Starting Monday

We're excited to welcome Nicky Coombs to Kiwitax. Nicky will be taking care of our office administration and helping the client care team, allowing Rowena to move to full time client care role. Nicky is a super lovely person and will be a wonderful addition to the team. More

Topics: Kiwitax News Client Care

Posted 19/09/2014

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Due Dates for September 2014

PAYE: 1 Monthly PAYE return and any payment for August is due 22 September. GST: 1 Monthly GST return and any payment for August is due 29 September. Any questions please ask. More

Topics: Due Dates

Posted 4/09/2014

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New Website Now Live

Our new website is now live! Some changes we hope you enjoy are... Refreshed mobile friendly design. More secure client sign in are for uploading files with a nice drag and drop uploader. Combined the News and Infobase now called Updates - we'll post due dates here too each month. The calculators have been tidied up and a new hourly rate calculator added. If there's a calculat... More

Topics: Kiwitax News

Posted 3/09/2014 – Updated 4/09/2014

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New Website Coming Soon

We're almost ready to press the go button for our new website. There's some final polishing happening and will be live in the next week or two. Please note this website uses a newer more secure membership system so if you've created a sign in at our current website (for uploading files etc.) you'll need to create a new one at the new site. Some changes and improvements to look forward to... Com... More

Topics: Kiwitax News

Posted 20/08/2014

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July 7 Deadline

A quick reminder if you / your business has an accountant / tax agent the 7 July deadline most likely isn’t for you, an extension of time to 31 March applies. The main reason the extension wouldn't apply is if tax returns weren't filed with IRD in time for last financial year. This means for Kiwitax clients, don't panic! (Unless you didn't have your income tax returns in to IRD by the due d... More

Topics: Income Tax Tax Returns Due Dates

Posted 2/07/2014

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Calling Trade Me "In Trade" Badge Traders

With the new Trade Me "in trade" badge coming into effect for sellers on 17 June 2014 - it will become very easy for IRD to identify which traders are "in business". These people are required by IRD to keep proper records and prepare business accounts and file income tax and possibly GST returns. If unsure about this or not already set up we highly recommend discussing how best to go forward with... More

Topics: Income Tax Accounting Business Tax Compliance

Posted 12/06/2014

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New Client Care Team

To better care for Kiwitax clients we've created a new Client Care Team! The goal is to provide clients with additional people to contact anytime they would like... Someone to chat with about anything related to their accounting and tax. More detailed advice / thorough answers to tax and accounting questions. Anything explained clearly making it easier to understand. People to talk to about ... More

Topics: Kiwitax News Client Care

Posted 26/05/2014

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Getting a New Loan in Your Company?

A tax area Inland Revenue are focusing on relates to interest claims on company loans. If you are taking out a new loan or hire purchase – where possible get the agreement in the company name. If this isn’t possible and can only be done in your personal name, let us know as soon as you have the paperwork and we will prepare some minutes and resolutions (small cost of $60 + GST) to decl... More

Topics: Claimable Expenses Loans

Posted 15/04/2014

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Living Outside of NZ But Have Rental Property Here?

IRD are paying close attention to the residency status of individuals who have left New Zealand but still have a dwelling here which they could live in. A recent court case saw IRD win and were able to determine a client was a tax resident of NZ even though the taxpayer had been out of NZ for several years! This means that the taxpayer had to declare their worldwide income and tax paid in their NZ... More

Topics: Rental Property Non-Resident

Posted 15/04/2014

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Thinking of Buying a Holiday Home?

The tax rules around holiday homes have changed significantly making many formerly available tax deductions unavailable. If considering buying a property to be available for short term hire e.g. a holiday home which is rented out to the public for short periods and you also want to make use of the property - please contact us first for advice! If buying such a property for tax relief it's now not... More

Topics: Income Tax Rental Property Record Keeping

Posted 15/04/2014

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Terminal Tax Due Today

Reminder: Today (April 7 2014) any terminal tax payments for year ending 31 March 2013 are due today for people who have an IRD extension of time. Any questions please ask! More

Topics: Due Dates

Posted 7/04/2014

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Financial Year End Checklists

We're preparing client annual accounting checklists and will be mailing out very soon - the checklists will also be available to download. Please look out for them and read carefully as there's important information on what to do around 31 March, some tax saving tips and how to have your annual accounts and income tax returns prepared and filed. If you're a client and changed your mail address ... More

Topics: Client Care

Posted 17/03/2014

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