"Your life is an occasion. Rise to it"

ZTD

Ellidee wrote: »

Well if you're prepared to give me some 'lessons'

I always am. Especially to the naughty ones.

Karmacat

Oh my. I see its still going what strength, what virility ... oh okay

Quietish day today, except I'm off to a couple of local (walking distance) events, working on local contacts on stuff that actually interests me, we'll see how that goes.

Nothing else, really, except I'm going to clear the decks on my dining table, and put the accounts papers on there so I can see if I have a cat in hell's chance of doing the accounts myself, and may well take the lappie down there if so, as I now have a beautiful spreadsheet
:j:j:j


:kisses3: to Maty

taxi73

good luck with accounts..I'm too much of a wuss to totally do mine myself

MatyMoo

How is the spreadsheet going????

mizmir

KC - you OK? You haven't fallen asleep over those accounts have you?

Karmacat

I did fall asleep, but not over the accounts! In fact, I didn't even manage to get all the stuff on the table, tho *nearly* all of it is ... I was so, so tired when I got in, then did a bit of gardening when I recovered, and I was dizzy with tiredness by 8'm .... I think I've been overdoing it a bit so I went to bed really early, and slept longish hours again.

And today I'm out for a while too - and I *have* to do some work on the lappie for my youngest nephew, helping him find his feet jobwise. So, a little bit tough out there, but I'm sure I'll be able to get the papers together and give it a quick look before I go out ....

My net connection dies in the evening, so I probably won't post for the rest of the day, but I'm okay, just tired and getting by.

I've also been chatting to the worms where I want to dig in the blueberry plants, asking them to leave a space of a couple of square feet, so I don't kill any in making the holes .... thats pretty important too.

MatyMoo

KC, Accounts are like housework. Small bites, 15 minutes at a time and you will get there. It is far too daunting to try and do it all in one go. You pace yourself quite well in normal life so you just need to slot this in to your routine.

It may help to start off with 12 piles of paper, each covering one month. You can then put away 11 and start to work on one.

We usually send everything to the accountant with the receipts/invoices in 12 large envelopes, one for each calendar month, and a copy of the spreadsheet. We also email them a copy so that they can manipulate the figures from there if they want too.

Once you are up to date, start a new spreadsheet for this year and put a 15 minute slot in the diary weekly and you will never have to do a whole year at a time. Just tell that to my builder pal who turns up annually with a box full of crumpled, dirty, paper shouting help! the tax man is threatening me :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

gilligansyle

Once you get all the paperwork sorted, it will become clearer. If you were a big organisation, with staff etc. it would be different, but at least you can give it a go. And if for this year you decide to let the accountants do it, then that's fine, at least you've tried, and can look to organise yourself for next year.

My accounts were all done online to the accountants, which made life very easy for me; I just bundled all the relevant paperwork together once I'de submitted it,and put the submission reference on. They then sent a spreadsheet with the breakdown. They also didn't want the paperwork, I scanned it to them.

Split it into months may be an easier way to go. So get it into date order, then put each month into a pile. Start with April

Karmacat

Thanks both! My paperwork is actually *fairly* well ordered - into subject matter! I'm going to get the stuff together, get the lappie plugged in down there, and sort it.

The little and often approach is absolutely right, I know. I wasn't saying I'd do it all in one go - impossible! - but that maybe I'd make the decision about whether to go with the accountant in one go.

Today, tho, is maybe not the day - off to my sister's and leaving the house in half an hour, she wants to buy me a new mattress, bless her, and we also need to be out of her house to talk about a career issue for family, which is pretty delicate. I've been hovering about the jobs forum on here collecting website addresses, which I hope will be useful.

Thank you both again - I'm trying to help with a family bugbear, but accounts are my very own bugbear, for real :kisses3::kisses3:

mizmir

Like the 15 minutes a week idea - might have to give that a go with mine. I do mine and OH's but they are at the moment both very much part-time extra income so not too onerous. And we do have the big box of papers which is sorted out when the time comes. Would be far better to do it as we go along - and will certainly be needed when I am self employed full time.

Good luck with the family issue - sounds like you have ways of helping though. And bless your sister for the mattress - what a lovely thought!

Have a good day - and thanks for letting us know not to worry!