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EOFY top tips from ABN members

ABN shares members' most common advice for bookkeepers to get through 2023-24 EOFY deadlines and concerns

Over the years the Australian Bookkeepers Network (ABN) have engaged the industry’s best to lend their advice to other bookkeepers on how to get through the End-Of-Financial-Year (EOFY) period.

ABN Director, Peter Thorp, says that while no one size fits all for bookkeeping businesses, there are common techniques that have seen success across the industry.

“This time of year is an opportunity for bookkeepers to show off what they can do,” said Peter. “For many that comes from a continual process of learning what works well and repeating it the next year.

“From those experiences and talking with our members the ABN has noticed there are things that work well across different bookkeeping businesses, no matter their size or the industry they specialise in.

“As a profession we are at our best when we band together, so to us at ABN it is important we share those insights that will guide bookkeepers to achieve their best at this time,” said Peter. “We pair this with a raft of EOFY checklists and resources in our members portal.”

Key bookkeeping tips to make it easier to achieve during EOFY:

• Checklists are a big help: A lot of these end of year compliance requirements are only done once a year so it can take a while to refresh the memory. Creating checklists and adding to them help bookkeepers get back into the swing of things more quickly and protect against errors.
• Business workflow software is great for a growing team and client list: So much of a team’s overwhelm is having too much information in their head. A good workflow management system set up with checklists keeps a team accountable, on task and on deadline. The system can also automatically notify clients via email and SMS to send through information, so they can be told early and repeatedly to get things to their bookkeeper. That’s another task off the team’s plate.
• Find efficiencies in repeated processes: Preparing for EOFY starts from June at the beginning of the year to record all repeated information the same way and collate it in one place. For example, if you’re doing taxable payment reporting, it’s quicker at tax time to have subcontractor payments consistently coded and have it all going to a single subcontractor expense account.
• Prioritise Super Guarantee contributions and tax debt compliance: The ATO’s biggest fines and charges are applied to delayed super and debt payments, with the bigger the sum the bigger the cost to the business. Understanding the repercussions to the business with any delays will help sort out priorities.
• Make use of ATO’s simpler Lodgement Deferral System if you need: BAS Agents are now in a more comfortable position to prioritise clients’ books with responses to deferral requests back to agents within 48 hours. The ATO introduced the system last financial year to allow agents to request up to 40 deferrals at a time and view requests they’ve submitted in the last 60 days. It interacts live with ATO systems to pre-populate information for the client/s bookkeepers are seeking a deferral for, saving bookkeepers time and ensuring the ATO has accurate information. BAS Agent deferrals are available for quarterly and annual Activity Statements, annual GST returns, PAYG payment summary annual reports and TPAR annual reports.
• Keep a record of client correspondence chasing up information: Because of the harshness of the Super Guarantee Charge regime and other ATO costs incurred from delayed lodgements, when fingers start pointing bookkeepers don’t want to be in the vicinity. A good record that proves a BAS Agent has been diligent and taken all reasonable measures to secure client information protects the BAS Agent.

Open to members and non-members this year, we invite you to join our 2023-24 EOFY Bookkeepers Radio episode being broadcast on Wednesday 12 June. You will receive an invitation in the weeks ahead and we look forward to you joining us.