While it’s vital to make sure you’re prepared for the end of this tax year, it’s also good practice for contractors and freelancers to make sure they’re in shape for the next tax year too. A bit of organisation and preparation can save you time later on, making the whole Self-Assessment process much easier.
At Kingsbridge, we’ve been helping contractors with their insurance needs for a long time, so we like to think we’re in good position to provide some advice. So, let us share our tips for how to get yourself into shape for the 2018/2019 tax year.
Get an accounting service
Of course, the obvious thing to do is to let someone else take care of your accounts for you. This could take the form of you paying an accountant to look after everything or subscribing to an online service that just requires minimal input from you and keeps on top of it all on your behalf.
However you choose to do it, having a third party look after your accounts for you in the new tax year will drastically minimise the amount you have to do yourself and ensure it all gets done in a timely manner.
Get a filing system
It always amazes us how many contractors and freelancers just chuck invoices, receipts and other paperwork into a drawer and forget about it. Whilst there’s nothing wrong with that as long as it’s all kept safe it can make things difficult come Self-Assessment time when you have a heap of paperwork to sift through, with no idea what anything is or what order it should be in.
Introducing a filing system, however basic, will give you back valuable time when April 2019 rolls around. Everything will be labelled, in the right order and ready to go, so once your Self-Assessment is complete, you can just archive it in case it’s ever needed.
Make time for admin
‘Admin’ is a word that strikes fear into the heart of many a contractor and freelancer. It roughly translates as ‘tedious work that takes up a lot of my time but I don’t get paid for’ and tends to be something that constantly gets put back with vague promises of doing it tomorrow.
However, treating admin like this just means it stacks up, up and up — taking even more time to complete when you do finally get round to it. So, set some time once a week and blast through your admin so that you end up doing it in frequent but small bitesize chunks, rather than finding yourself with a mountain of it to get on with at the end of the year.
And if any of that admin turns out to be organising your insurance, contact the friendly team at Kingsbridge on 01242 808740 and we’ll help you get the right package for your needs.
