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Small Business

Financial management strategies and tools for small business owners

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Your Employee Just Got Deployment Orders: What USERRA Requires of You, Even If They're Your Only Employee

USERRA covers every US employer with no headcount minimum. When an employee is called to military service, you must reemploy them promptly at the "escalator" position they would have reached, continue health coverage for up to 24 months, credit seniority and pension benefits as if they never left, and honor return deadlines of 14 or 90 days depending on service length. This guide lays out the five reemployment conditions, the anti-discrimination rules, what federal law does not require, and a before-during-after bookkeeping checklist for small employers.

mike

compliancepayrollemployee-benefits

Water Softener Dealer Bookkeeping: Salt Routes, Service Contracts, and the Warranty Reserve

A water conditioning dealership runs four businesses on four different clocks — equipment installs, salt delivery, service plans, and rentals. Split them into separate income accounts, defer prepaid service revenue under ASC 606, accrue a warranty reserve at 2–5% of equipment sales under ASC 460, and capitalize rental units over a 7–10 year life instead of expensing them.

mike

small-businessbookkeepingrevenue-recognition

Window Screen and Screen Door Repair Bookkeeping: Costing Every Stop, Tracking Every Roll, and Surviving the Winter Trough

A bookkeeping guide for window screen and screen door repair businesses. Separate revenue lines for rescreens, frame rebuilds, doors and landlord contracts; track mesh by grade (fiberglass, aluminum, solar, pet-resistant) as cost of goods sold; log mileage per stop at the 2026 IRS rate of 72.5 to 76 cents; and bank spring surplus to cover three to four months of fixed costs through winter.

mike

bookkeepingsmall-businesstrades

401(k) Forfeiture Accounts: The 12-Month Deadline for Unvested Match Dollars

When an employee quits before the employer match vests, the unvested dollars land in the plan's forfeiture account. The IRS's proposed rule would give sponsors 12 months after the plan year closes to use them — on plan expenses, on reducing future employer contributions, or by reallocating to participants — and stale multi-year suspense balances are already a standard audit finding.

mike

retirement-plansemployee-benefitscompliance

Running an AI Red-Teaming Consultancy: Bookkeeping for $8K-to-$150K Engagements and Monthly Retainers

AI red-teaming firms bill two ways — $8,000-to-$150,000 project engagements and $1,500-to-$15,000 monthly retainers — and the books must keep them apart. A practical guide to the chart of accounts, ASC 606 treatment of deposits and milestones, per-engagement job costing, utilization and realization targets, 13-week cash forecasting, and contractor tax compliance.

mike

consultingrevenue-recognitiondeferred-revenue

Brazil's Dual-VAT Reform Is Quietly Pushing Small Businesses Out of Simples Nacional: A B2B Seller's Guide to the New IBS/CBS Credit Chain

Brazil's IBS/CBS dual VAT replaces five consumption taxes, and a Simples Nacional supplier now passes on a smaller input credit than a regular-regime competitor quoting the same price. A guide to the September 30 and November 1, 2026 deadlines, the 2027 end of cash-basis Simples, and what the credit chain changes in B2B pricing and bookkeeping.

mike

vatinternational-taxtax-compliance

Why Your Business Emails Land in Spam (and How SPF, DKIM, and DMARC Fix It)

Gmail, Yahoo, and Outlook filter mail from domains without SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, and bulk senders must also keep spam complaints under 0.3% and offer one-click unsubscribe. Here is what each DNS record proves, how to publish all three in about an hour, the seven mistakes that keep small-business invoices in spam, and why unread invoices show up in your receivables.

mike

small-businessinvoicingaccounts-receivable

The $25 Business Gift Rule: What You Can Deduct, and Why Employee Gift Cards Are Wages

Federal law caps the business-gift deduction at $25 per recipient per year — a limit unchanged since 1962 — while incidental shipping, wrapping, and $4-or-less branded items sit outside it. Employee gifts follow different rules: gift cards and cash equivalents are always taxable wages, and only small, infrequent tangible items qualify as de minimis fringe benefits.

mike

tax-deductionssmall-businesspayroll

Dim Sum Restaurant Bookkeeping: Carts, Tea Charges, and High-Volume Low-Ticket Margins

A per-person tea charge is a service charge, not a tip — it is taxable revenue, and any share paid to staff is wages subject to withholding. This guide covers dim sum bookkeeping specifics: cart versus order-sheet labor tracking, prime cost at or below 60–65 percent, food cost of 28–33 percent, weekend labor per cover, and the cash controls a stamp-card room needs.

mike

restaurantbookkeepingpayroll

After the DMEPOS Freeze: What the 2026 CMS Fraud Crackdown Means for Your Medical Supply Business

CMS froze new DMEPOS Medicare enrollment from February 27 to August 27, 2026, barred 11 suppliers tied to $3.4 billion in suspected fraudulent billing, and suspended $5.7 billion in Medicare payments during 2025. Here is what actually changed for legitimate medical supply businesses and the seven billing and bookkeeping controls that keep claims paid and supplier numbers intact.

mike

healthcarecompliancefraud-prevention
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