September Newsletter
/This is Anlo’s September Newsletter. If you would like to receive our newsletter, which has lots of great tips and updates, please add your email to the list! Simply subscribe by filling out the form.
Preparing for the end of the year
What a year 2020 has been!
It is important not to look back in anger (for all my millennial friends that listened to Oasis in their youth) but see how we can make the last few months of 2020 count and get our ducks in a row 😊.
We would like to encourage everyone to let us know how we can assist them with getting their financial affairs in order and up to date. We are working hard to finalise the February 2020 retainer client’s financial statements, but if you have any questions or concerns, please get in touch.
It is also the EMP501 mid-year reconciliation submission deadline at the end of October, so please send your information through as soon as possible so that we can prepare this.
Tax planning and saving is always very important and something we like to help all of our clients with. We can only help with tax planning if we are prepared and do the financials and tax calculation as soon as possible, so please speak to us if you are concerned or just want to chat and feel assured that everything is okay.
We want to understand and build a trust relationship with our clients and this is only possible with regular and constructive communications.
I am sure everyone knows how overwhelming emails can get, and to try and assist with this, Esmerelda and Annja are considering a 15 min online meeting system where clients can book short discussions with us. Please let us know if this is something that appeals to you, and we will get this implemented sooner rather than later.
Home office expenses for full time employees during lockdown
If you are a full time employee and working from home since March 2020, you might be able to claim home office expenses if you worked from home for 6 months during the 2021 tax year as a result of the pandemic.
The South African Revenue Service (SARS) has confirmed that employees that work from home under full time employment will be able to claim home office expenses if they
Work from home for a period of 6 months
Their duties are mainly performed at home
The work area must be specifically equipped for work and be exclusively used for working from home. You cannot claim if you work from your dining room table!
Expenses that you will be able to claim are:
Interest on your bond (not the full mortgage) or part of your rental expense
Rates and Taxes
Water
Electricity
Stationery
Data costs
Wear and tear on office equipment
To calculate the deduction, you need to take the floorspace that is used for business divided over the total floor area i.e. 10 square meters of office space divided over 100 square metres for the total house. Sadly you cannot deduct all your home expenses.
It should be noted that if your employer reimbursed you for any of the expenses incurred, then you won’t be able to deduct the expense or the qualifying expense will be deducted with the amount reimbursed by the employer.
Annja suggests that taxpayers start collecting all this information and send this to Anlo as soon as possible so that they can ensure that all qualifying expenses are included in their 2021 tax return ( 1 March 2020 – 28 February 2021) that is due next year.
Supporting documents are not required to be sent to Anlo but should be kept safe if SARS requires supporting documentation to be sent as part of a tax review or audit.
We will only require you to send a schedule with the qualifying expenses and the home office area as well as the total area. Please also remember to inform Anlo if you have been refunded or reimbursed for any expenses.
Usually home office expenses are not allowed as a deduction for full time employees unless they earn commission income or variable income/payments as part of their employment, but SARS acknowledges that employees have had to make sacrifices and they should receive a tax deduction in recognition of this.
Coaching
Esmerelda and Annja started a coaching course recently as well as starting work with a business coach to help them navigate these strange times.
This has really been an enlightening few months working on both our business and personal development and we hope to use what we’re learning to assist our clients and our staff
We realise how important it is to find the “WHY” we do what we do so that we can focus on serving our clients and understand why clients use us, and keep using us.
We would like to thank everyone for completing the survey we sent out, and we appreciate the feedback. This information is what we use to understand the WHY and HOW going forward for our business.
We wrote down what we think is the ‘why we do what we do’, and we use the surveys to test this theory and improve the customer experience where we can.
There is a saying; ‘what gets measured gets done’ and we can see this from a short period from working with Wicus from the Business Doctor.
In the leadership coaching course we have learnt about how coaching is a partnership between the coach and the client for the benefit of the client and we believe that this is something that we can use in our business going forward.
Here is a summary of the things we have learnt so far and would like to share with a fabulous community:
Effective communication is key to developing a trusted relationship. Broadcasting is not communication and it is important not to think that emails are the only medium of communication. Make time to build relationships and trust. It is so worth it.
It is important to understand your businesses value proposition and test this. If you don't understand what your clients want and need, you can’t deliver and improve their client experience.
‘Start with the end in mind’ by Stephen R Covey is a valuable way to make your intentions come true. It is said that everything happens twice, once in your mind and then in real life 😊. It is a good idea to revisit your end goals regularly to see how you are doing.
It is important to align what you are selling with what people are buying to ensure there are no misunderstandings and that your business can thrive.
So often people start a business and only focus on what the product or service is and how much this will be sold for. They do not understand what value or solution they will bring for the customer and if they don’t understand why customers are buying from them, then they will get to a certain point and not be able to grow any further.
Watch this space because we will share more of our learnings with everyone.
