Author: Becky Daniels

Keep your receipts.

I don’t know a single person who started a business so that they could have mounds of receipts that they needed to keep in order to protect themselves from the government.

No one likes to do this, but you absolutely must.

When you make a purchase, write a note on the receipt about what the expense is about, and take a picture.  If you do nothing else, at least take these steps.

If you want extra credit, you can upload to DropBox, and file it by month.  

If you want to be a National Merit Receipt Keeper, you can save it in Quickbooks Online with the expense.  There is a super easy way to do this, that I would be happy to tell you about.

I always ask my clients if they would rather have me after them or the IRS.  

Today we are talking about something very practical and tactical.

Plan next week on Friday afternoon.

Every Friday I clear my inbox, then schedule the next week out.  I have a printable template that I use to block my time as needed.  This is where I see what next week’s priorities, time constraints, and plans are.

This will ensure that your priorities don’t get lost in your to-do’s.

I want to be clear…I never ever ever stick to my plan completely.  But that 30 minutes I spend planning my time out allows me to see whether I really have time to get everything done next week or not.  It allows me to see when I have conflicts of time, or priorities.  There isn’t a more valuable 30 minutes in my entire week.

Only intentionality will move the ball forward.

If you want a copy of my simple planning template (I will even send you an example of what I do), comment here that you would like it.  

If you sometimes ask employees to pay a business expense and then be reimbursed, you need a good system for them to do this.

1- This minimizes the opportunity for fraud.

2- This ensures that they get reimbursed in a timely manner (it really isn’t okay to ask an employee to front your business money, then take forever to pay them back).

3- It creates a document trail in case you are ever audited by the IRS.

There should be a form that includes space for the date of the expense, the purpose of the expense, and the total.  There should be approval initials for anyone in that decision chain.  The employee should attach receipts.

It isn’t hard, but it should always be done.  

If you want a copy of the policy and form I use with my clients, comment below or send me a message.  I would love to share!

I have worked with businesses that have cash flow issues and those that don’t.

One of those types of businesses isn’t really profitable.  Wanna guess which one?

If you have cash flow issues, you must cut expenses.  If you don’t cut expenses, you won’t live to see another day.  Rip off the band-aid, and start cutting expenses.

Once you get the cash flow under control, you can start to really increase revenue.  You can’t meet the demands of increased business without some capital.  You only get capital with positive cash flow.

If you have some crazy opportunity to significantly increase revenue (AND profit), but you need capital to do so, you can open a line of credit.  This should absolutely only be used to cover expenses above what are usual to create an unusual revenue.  Make it a safety net to make great opportunities possible, not life support to give you the impression that your business is okay when you are really cash flow negative.

Cash is king.  

You also need to stay on top of Accounts Payable (A/P).

A couple of questions…

1. Do you like it when your clients don’t pay you on time or when you have to chase them down to get that payment?
2. Does that history make you less likely to provide above and beyond service the next time they are in a bind?

That’s how your vendors feel when you don’t pay them on time.  This needs to be a scheduled priority.

You also don’t want late fees.  That’s the A/P equivalent of an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty for celebrating too much after a touchdown.  Just wasteful.

Pay your bills.  Pay them ontime.