Oh Great! I Have Been Entering Info. Wrong!

[melilley]

This is the first year that I have had my daycare business and am starting to freak out about doing taxes. I have been reading and watching Tom's blog/videos and there are things that I have done wrong! Now I don't know if I can go back and fix them.

For instance, I just watched a video on tracking hours while children aren't in care. I have been doing it wrong the whole time! I have MMK and instead of entering the hours day by day and entering the times I have done things, I just averaged so many minutes/hours per day that I have done a particular activity.

Can I go back and fix that? Or just take a loss?
I just learned that I can average 2 months and use it for the year, but it's already almost December.

I am so nervous about the whole tax process. I have been looking around for tax preparers in my area who know about fcc's and taxes, but have been coming up empty!

[TwinKristi]

Do you have a local R&R agency? Mine suggested a couple people and my friend uses another one but sends all her papers to him and he does them so even though he's not in our area.

[melilley]

Do you have a local R&R agency? Mine suggested a couple people and my friend uses another one but sends all her papers to him and he does them so even though he's not in our area.

Thanks, I didn't think of asking them....duh!

[TwinKristi]

Our R&R agency is awesome! We had a tax class and I learned a lot, even for my dh's business! I do my own but I know there's some little things specific to daycare I probably don't fully understand yet. Last year was my first year and it actually benefitted me to only use my income and no deductions. It's kept decreasing my refund when I put expenses in because I was on a cusp of getting a bigger or smaller refund by how much I made. I got myself almost $2k just by taking off all my deductions. It was crazy. This year I know it won't be that way because I've made probably 3x as much.

[melilley]

Our R&R agency is awesome! We had a tax class and I learned a lot, even for my dh's business! I do my own but I know there's some little things specific to daycare I probably don't fully understand yet. Last year was my first year and it actually benefitted me to only use my income and no deductions. It's kept decreasing my refund when I put expenses in because I was on a cusp of getting a bigger or smaller refund by how much I made. I got myself almost $2k just by taking off all my deductions. It was crazy. This year I know it won't be that way because I've made probably 3x as much.

Thanks, that reminds me, there is a class coming up in Jan. on taxes and record keeping. I'm so going to take that, I forgot all about it!

[TomCopeland]

Hours

This is the first year that I have had my daycare business and am starting to freak out about doing taxes. I have been reading and watching Tom's blog/videos and there are things that I have done wrong! Now I don't know if I can go back and fix them.

For instance, I just watched a video on tracking hours while children aren't in care. I have been doing it wrong the whole time! I have MMK and instead of entering the hours day by day and entering the times I have done things, I just averaged so many minutes/hours per day that I have done a particular activity.

Can I go back and fix that? Or just take a loss?
I just learned that I can average 2 months and use it for the year, but it's already almost December.

I am so nervous about the whole tax process. I have been looking around for tax preparers in my area who know about fcc's and taxes, but have been coming up empty!

You can go back and fix it. Track hours from now through a few weeks into January to get your two months worth for 2013. Track another 2 months for 2014. Here's the video she is talking about.

http://www.tomcopelandblog.com/2013/11/how-to-track-hours-using-minute-menu-kids-pro.html

[melilley]

You can go back and fix it. Track hours from now through a few weeks into January to get your two months worth for 2013. Track another 2 months for 2014. Here's the video she is talking about.

http://www.tomcopelandblog.com/2013/...-kids-pro.html

Thank you, I will do that!

[dave4him]

Does that mean you can use up to two months during the whole year in work you do outside of your daycare hours??

[TomCopeland]

Hours

Does that mean you can use up to two months during the whole year in work you do outside of your daycare hours??

I'm not sure what you mean. You can keep careful track for two month of the hours you work in your home after children are gone and use the average number of hours for these two months for the rest of the year. Track two months every year.

[dave4him]

SO you just enter those numbers in all the other months during a random day?

[TomCopeland]

Hours

SO you just enter those numbers in all the other months during a random day?

Yes, that's right. If you track carefully two months each year and enter the average number of hours on a random day for the other 10 months, you will be fine.

[Punkin.Butts]

You can go back and fix it. Track hours from now through a few weeks into January to get your two months worth for 2013. Track another 2 months for 2014. Here's the video she is talking about.

http://www.tomcopelandblog.com/2013/...-kids-pro.html

I don't have a program that I am using, I have been filling out a "time card" spread sheet I made up that tracks care hours, and after-care hours I put in. I tallied it for a weekly basis and they vary quiet a bit. then I added them up for a grand total of care and after care hours....
I know you can do the "average" but it shouldn't hurt me doing it the way I did will it?

[littlelionspreschool]

You can go back and fix it. Track hours from now through a few weeks into January to get your two months worth for 2013. Track another 2 months for 2014. Here's the video she is talking about.

http://www.tomcopelandblog.com/2013/...-kids-pro.html

I just watched your video Tom. I have a question -- am I able to choose one category on the MMK for each day and just add everything I did for the day on that one category? I saw you chose planning/prep but also included an hour of cleaning that was on the same day as well. This year I recorded a separate category for each task I did each day (which ended up being 2-5 categories per day). It gets to be very time consuming. I run a preschool/daycare in home, so I do planning, cleaning, record keeping, cooking, etc. for a few hours each day, and choosing one category per day for recording would save me so much time!