Whether it’s registering as a limited company, or setting up an accounting system that meets the latest digital requirements, it’s important to get the basics right.

How to tick the right compliance boxes

As a director, it’s your job to make sure your new business meets its regulatory requirements and stays compliant with the latest business and tax laws.

To help you get the basics sorted, here are 5 core areas to consider:

• Become a limited company – becoming incorporated shows you’re serious and limits your liability, separating your personal wealth from your business profits.
• Set up a bank account – as a limited company, you’re legally obliged to set up a bank account in your company name. Use this for all business transactions, and keep the company’s money separate from your personal banking.
• Choose an accounting system – keeping records of your financial transactions is mandatory, and cloud accounting software, like Xero, makes this easy – track all income and spending and give your accountant the data needed to produce accounts.
• Register for business taxes – you’ll qualify to pay corporation tax, and probably goods and services taxes too, so you need to register with your local tax authority.
• Check your other regulatory requirements – depending on your size, turnover and number of employees, there may be other legal requirements you need to factor in.

Talk to us about setting up the right foundations

As you can see, ticking those compliance boxes can get complicated. We’ll help you lighten the compliance load by getting the legal and financial foundations sorted.

Get in touch to see how we can help.

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Your business plan is the route map that defines your goals, explains your strategy and gives real direction to the everyday running of the company.

So what should you include in your plan?

5 key elements to include in your business plan

To create a truly robust and meaningful plan:

• Outline your vision – explain WHY you’re in business and how you intend to add value for customers. For example ‘We promote a healthy lifestyle through organic produce’.
• Set out your goals – outline your personal goals as a founder, and your wider strategic goals for the business. Then explain how these key goals are aligned. If your aim is to exit in 10 years, build this into your long-term plan.
• Define your funding and budget – to start trading, you need finance, so outline the investment that’s needed and how you’ll access that funding. Then break down this initial investment pot into clear budgets for each operational area.
• Forecast sales and cashflow – define the profit number you need, then calculate the volume of sales needed to deliver that income – and give a clear breakdown of the cash inflows and outflows needed to achieve positive cashflow.
• Set your timelines for success – set key milestones and give the business some concrete deadlines for meeting the goals, sales and revenues that you’ve projected.

Talk to us about creating a watertight business plan.

We’ll help you define your purpose as a business, and systematically set out how you’ll achieve your aims, giving you the best possible blueprint for success.

Get in touch and let’s start planning.

The post You need a plan for your business appeared first on Middleton Business Advisers, Accountants Merredin, Business Advisers Merredin.

With the rapid growth of online shopping and affordable ecommerce platforms, some of the traditional barriers to launching a small business are gone. You can potentially make sales without buying a shop or giving up your day job. Here’s some thoughts to help you monetise your hobby and turn your passion into a business!

1. Be prepared to lose some love – Once you turn your passion into a business, you’ll never feel the same way about your hobby again. The idealism of doing what you love for a living will collide with the reality of:

• tracking sales and cash flow
• hitting targets
• managing inventory
• watching competitors

2. Balancing creativity and commercialism – When you create something for personal fulfilment, you can make it to suit yourself. But when that creation becomes a service or product you wish to sell, you have to work within boundaries that suit your customer’s needs and requirements.

3. How do you monetise your hobby? – You’re enthusiastic about your hobby and the business idea that flows from it but ensure you fully test ideas within your market to find out what works and what doesn’t. Try to solve a problem or find a product that already exists and find how you can improve on it.

4. Building your brand with free content – Sharing relevant content is a great way of building up your customer base.

5. A pragmatic approach to social media – Find out where your audience spends their time (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram) and focus there. It sounds obvious but this simple piece of research can save hundreds of hours of lost effort.

6. Separate your personal and professional goals – When you turn your passion into a business, it’s easy to lose track of time. Both the passion and the business soak up a lot of energy – making it hard to get your work-life balance right.

Talk to us about turning your business ideas into reality.

Turning your passion into a business is an exciting prospect and you could earn money doing what you love. Talk to one of our team and we can help you to come up with a plan and put steps in place to help turn your passion into a business reality!

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They’ve got a Security Noticeboard that offers updates on known phishing and other scams, as well as any recommendations on how to protect yourself from them. Any other security related news is also published on the Noticeboard.

W recommend you keep an eye on the Security Noticeboard and of course I’ll let you know of any Xero security-related news that I receive.

The post Protect your business with Xero’s online security update appeared first on Middleton Business Advisers, Accountants Merredin, Business Advisers Merredin.

The dashboard is where you’ll see what’s in your bank account, who’s paid your invoices, and which supplier bills are due for payment – all customisable to show you the important numbers and metrics you need to stay in control of your business accounts.

The hub for your key numbers

Getting to grips with your finances can be confusing. Xero’s approach is to keep everything as simple as possible, giving you the core numbers and key performance indicators (KPIs) you need, while also tracking the accounting and tax information required by your accountant.

When you log into your Xero Dashboard, you’ll see:

• Your Xero direct bank feed– showing your bank account, balance and statement
• Invoices you’ve raised– and when your customers are due to pay you
• Bills you need to settle– and the dates when you need to pay them
• Cash in and out of the business– broken down by month to keep you in control
• Your custom KPIs– tailored to show the important metrics in your dashboard

Find out more about the dashboard in this Xero TV video

Talk to us about getting more from your Xero Dashboard.

If you’d like to customise your Xero Dashboard, we can help you create a bespoke view of your key numbers – and get you in real control of the financial health of your business.

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