Optimizing Your Tax Preparation and Submission

Businesses of all sizes seem to fall into two distinct categories when it comes to taxes. There are those who are prepared to file because they stay ahead of the game and those who scramble to pull everything together right at the buzzer. Which side does your company fall on?

The truth is that business tax preparation can be a headache for owners. Even the most well-managed wineries can fall behind or underestimate just how much time and energy it will take to file. At times, monitoring day-to-day business expenses may obscure future financial requirements.

Despite these challenges, filling out and submitting your small business tax schedules is a necessity. Preparation allows you to stay on top of taxes on payroll and any taxes you may still owe. Let’s explore the steps that are required for accurate and timely filing and how tax preparation services can help.

Handling Winery Tax Schedules Effectively 

There are a few key steps that vineyards, wineries, and other beverage-industry businesses need to complete each year. Each one is critical to the tax-preparation process. If you skip or fail to execute one of these steps correctly, you may have to resubmit your taxes or find yourself caught up in an audit.

Gather Financial Information and Reports

Collecting the financial information for your winery or vineyard tax schedules is the pillar of filing your taxes accurately. This step also offers the most potential for businesses to introduce errors into their forms. There are many documents you need to have on hand, including management account data from balance sheets and Profit and Loss reports, plus payroll information.

These reports can be tricky to compose and keep track of, which is why many companies rely on bookkeeping services. If you choose to handle these reports internally, you’ll need to be sure they are accurate and well-organized. 

Select the Correct Tax Schedules

The next piece of the puzzle is determining which tax forms you are required to fill out. The size, classification, and investments of your business will all impact the collection of schedules you must submit. For example, LLCs and LLPs have different forms than standard or S-corporations.

It’s important to remember that there are both state and federal tax requirements as well. You may need to pay state income tax through your personal taxes if you own a small business. Rather than resorting to guesswork and searching for the appropriate forms, you could lessen the hassle by hiring a tax services specialist.

Keep Track of Deadlines

“Tax Day” is often lauded as April 15th. While this might be true for filing personally, that deadline doesn’t apply to wineries and other businesses. In fact, there’s a variety of deadlines that businesses need to adhere to.

Payroll taxes and W-2 must be sent off before the end of January. Depending on the structure of your business, your other tax schedules may be due between March and July. Even when businesses are aware of the date they must adhere to, it’s not uncommon for tax preparation to be pushed off to the latest point possible. While you can file for an extension, that simply prolongs the inevitable.

Fill Out Tax Schedules and File

The last step is to fill out the tax schedules for your winery or vineyard and file them. Doing so successfully is dependent upon having accurate reports, the correct forms, and enough time for your team to complete them. You must also be able to interpret your financial data and translate it to the forms correctly. If one of these pieces is missing or incorrect, you can expect to amend your taxes later. 

Why to Outsource Winery Tax Services

Timely tax filing is both necessary and challenging. There are multiple pieces that must come together each step of the way in order to prevent errors. Although this is not an impossible feat for businesses to complete on their own, it can put undue strain on the company. 

Maintaining compliance requires greater levels of manpower and financial expertise than is needed for daily operations. Some companies choose to reassign personnel to tax preparation for a concentrated amount of time. However, this can put additional strain on your resources without adding expertise. 

How Protea Can Help

You don’t have to flounder or stretch your team thin to prepare your taxes. When you hire the Protea team, our focus will be to provide you with the resources you need. We will keep your books ready for tax preparation throughout the year and work with your CPA to develop your return.

We are experts at taking the hassle out of tax season, especially for wineries and vineyards. You can trust us to gather your financial information, guide you to the right tax schedules, and ensure your taxes are submitted on time. Don’t spend another day scrambling and allow us to prepare and submit your taxes instead.