3 high impacts business owners should do today!

Delta Airlines.  Harley Davidson.  Starbucks.  Hewlett Packard.  Household names in wildly different fields, but each with the same key to success – managing indirect costs.

 

Business is built on tension between driving revenue and improving efficiency.  The systems underlying financial success tend to be hidden, sometimes dull, often tedious…and critical.  However, there’s some good news – small, simple tweaks can impact the overall financial health of your business.

 

Just like a household budget, start with cost reduction.  Think about your last balance statement.  Odds are, credit card transactions now make up the majority of your sales, and you’re by no means alone.  On average, businesses in the U.S. spend between 2%-5% of their annual revenue on credit card processing fees, and this doesn’t account for the added costs of machine rentals, contracts, and hidden fees. Most businesses are overpaying on transaction fees, and can partner with specialized organizations to negotiate lower rates on multiple charges without changing processors.  Imagine the savings!

 

Now, let’s talk cost segregation. Chances are you’ve probably heard about those who use it successfully – in a nutshell, it’s accelerated depreciation to get enhanced tax breaks for your business, allowing you (as a franchise owner) to benefit from bigger tax write offs, sooner.

 

Engineered cost segregation is a specialized engineered study, that seeks to accelerate depreciation of each building component for both an owned new build  or renovation or a build out or renovation for a leased property.  For example each loses value at a different rate; cost segregation allows you to claim deductions based on these accelerated depreciation schedule vs straight line depreciations schedule and reduce your tax burden.

 

Last but not least is hiring incentives.  Most employers know the basic math – the more employees hired, the bigger the tax burden.  BUT WAIT – there’s an alternative to that inevitable equation – the Work Opportunity Tax Credit, or WOTC for short.  Maybe only 1/3 of companies use WOTC, but claim $1B in savings each year because of it – in short, WOTC rewards employers for hiring the right people!

 

Employers who hire WOTC qualified candidates (for example, a veteran, a returning citizen, or a person with cognitive impairments, to name a few) can receive between $2,000-$9,600 in tax credits per employee, with no limit on how many employees they can hire.  Plus, there’s a simple, free calculator online to help find all the tax breaks you might be missing.  Human resources becomes a profit center, your business gets more quality candidates, and our entire community grows.

 

At the end of the day, the health of your business is the health of your bottom line.   Now is the time to build a plan for the year ahead; check your credits, use these resources, and you’ll be well on the way to great success.

 

Jim Stowe runs FreshHR , a Macomb Township Michigan consulting organization helping coach companies get better HR systems, and vendors, saving money in unexpected areas.  Jim has an extensive background in HR services including 15 years at ADP among others and holds a Master’s Degree in International Business from Central Michigan University.

 

Click here for more about cost segregation:  Click to estimate your benefit

 

Click here to read more about the Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC): http://myfreshhr.com/business-tax-reductions/new-hire-tax-credits/

 

Click here to learn more about Fresh HR & how we can help your business: http://myfreshhr.com/hr-services/