The organized freelancer will make sure the amount here is right.; Credit: Photo by Great Beyond via Flickr Creative Commons

For freelancers, consultants, actors and other self employed people, life gets complicated this time of year. Digging around for the paperwork to fill out tax forms practically qualifies as exercise.

"They have a nightmare trying to find receipts," said accountant Tristan Zier.

Zier founded Zen99 to help freelancers manage their finances, including filing their taxes.  His most important advice to freelancers: keep track expenses and receipts year round rather than pursuing a paper chase as April 15 nears.  

"When they can’t find receipts, they can’t write off their expenses," he said. "And they’re paying more money to the government instead of keeping it for themselves."

Zier and others have come up with a lists of common mistakes freelancers make at tax time. 

Here are seven don't - or, deadly sins, for freelances at tax time:

1. Not knowing what they owe.  Zier says there are 20 different 1099 forms that get sent out to workers to track freelance gigs.  One of them is the 1099-K, which only has to be sent to you by a company in paper form if you make over $20,000. "People think, 'Great, no paper form, no taxes on that," says Zier. "Big mistake there.  You still have to self-report the income."   
2. Not knowing WHEN they owe.  For freelancers who owe more than $1,000 in taxes for a year, tax time comes more often than just April 15.  They have to pay taxes quarterly. But then it's not coming out of paychecks like it does for permanent employees. 

3.  Not tracking and writing off the right types of business expenses. Zier says many freelancers fail to realize they can write off part of their cell phone bill as a business expense.  Expenses vary by the type of work.  "A rideshare driver's biggest expense will be related to their car, while a web developer's biggest expense might be their home office," Zier says. "Figuring out what expenses are important to your type of work is important is maximizing your tax savings."

4. Writing off personal expenses.  This goes back to that cell phone.  If you use the same phone for personal and business purposes, don't be tempted to write the whole bill off. Estimate the amount you use it for your work. The same goes for your vehicle. Don't go trying to write off miles driven to the beach. 

5. The Double No-No: counting expenses twice.  Speaking of vehicles, Zier says most people use the Standard Mileage Rate ($0.56/mile for 2014), which factors in gas, repairs and maintenance and other costs like insurance and depreciation. But if you use this rate, you can't also expense your gas receipts and repair bills.  

6. Employee AND employer.  At lifeofthefreelancer.com, financial consultant Brendon Reimer reminds freelancers they play both roles. For regular employees, Federal, State, and payroll taxes are withheld from a paycheck, and distributed on the employee’s behalf. It's how Social Security and Medicare are funded. The IRS mandates that the employer must pay half of every employee’s payroll tax, and the employee is responsible for the other half.  Independent contractors have to handle both halves.  "The IRS does give you a small benefit by letting you deduct the half that you pay yourself as a business expense," Reimer writes. Zier said the freelancer's sin here is believing he or she pays more taxes than the regular working stiff.  

7. Not keeping adequate records. The IRS requires you to keep proof of all business receipts, mileage, etc.  If you can't show these, the IRS  could refute the expense and force you to pay back taxes. Zier says the good news is there are other ways to prove expenses if you've lost the receipt. A bank or credit card statement with the date and location might do the trick. "The IRS is surprisingly accommodating if you are doing your best," Zier says. "If you're being a headache, they're going to be a headache as well." 

In separate reports, Zen99 and the consumer finance web site nerdwallet ranked Los Angeles the best city for freelancers.

Each considered housing and health care costs, the percentage of freelancers in an area as factors. Zier said even before the sharing economy began to take off, the entertainment industry and growing tech scene were already strong sources of freelance gigs in L.A.

"Even back in 2012, L.A. had twelve percent of people report themselves as self-employed on the Census," Ziers said.   "You know your Ubers and companies like that  are really bringing a lot of attention to the contractor market, but it was a very robust community before."

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

So i have some doubts regarding my freelance income and the tax and gst on it.If i file under section 44ada , the thing is if i have income of 40lakh and i file tax on 20lakh (50%) than how can i justify if i invested around 16lakh in stocks and suppose 8 lakh i payed for the prep

Hello everyone,I've recently transitioned into freelancing in IT (software development & support) after a decade in a salaried role. I've learned that I may need to register for GST and apply for an LUT. Could anyone guide me on the key steps I should take? I currently have one US-ba

Sie wollen höhere Rankings in Suchmaschinen und stärkere Conversions auf den Landingpages für Ihren Onlineshop oder digitales Produkt? Dabei helfe ich Ihnen mit Texten entlang der Customer Journey mit folgenden Texten: - SEO-optimierte Blogartikel für hohe Rankings, die Besucher bringen - überzeugende Website Texte, die Interessenten zeigen, dass sie auf der richtigen Seite sind. - konversionsstarke Landingpages, die auf Ihre Zielgruppe abgestimmt sind. - verkaufspsychologisch aufgebaute Salespages, die… | Marcus Schweizer – Augsburg

Das BAR sucht Freelance Junior Motion & UI DesignerIn Kurz und bündig: Ich führe ein kleines, etabliertes Designbüro in Köln mit festen Kundenstamm und interessanten neuen Projekten. Das Leistungsspektrum meines Büros reicht von Corporate Design, (Employer) Branding bis User Experience Design und User Interface Design. Ich suche eine(n) freiberufliche(n) Junior Motion & UI DesignerIn als Verstärkung für ein aktuelles Projekt und ggf. darüber hinaus. Du denkst visuell und gestaltest digital? Du bist… | BAR – Buero Ansgar Rolfes – Köln

Billing your customers is, of course, vital -- but even more critical is getting paid for those bills. Thanks to the ongoing evolution in the payments industry, there are more payment tools and platforms to choose from to help find the perfect option for your business based on how many payments you receive, the type of business you have and your budget.

complete article

As a freelance writer, you’re going to run into a lot of clients that are petrified by the idea of plagiarized or stolen content. That fear is not without reason. Search engines are capable of sniffing out plagiarism or duplicate content and they penalize the blogs and websites that engage in it. That fear of […]

The post Why You Shouldn’t Use a Plagiarism Checker as a Freelance Writer appeared first on Leaving Work Behind.

Finding work as a freelance writer is hard enough even in fields with little competition. However, there are several niches where that competition is off the charts. If you plan to make a living writing about one of those, you’ll need to bring your A-game. Some examples of highly-contested niches include finance and (surprisingly) psychedelics. […]

The post What Are the Most Contested Fields for Freelance Writers? appeared first on Leaving Work Behind.

These days, anyone can start a blog or create a simple website in a matter of hours. However, getting that website to work and look just the way you want it to takes a lot more time. Most people don’t realize that and end up giving up long before the work is done. If you don’t have […]

The post How to Create a Blog or a Freelance Writer’s Portfolio Using Propel Site appeared first on Leaving Work Behind.

Should you narrow your focus and choose a copywriting niche? Check out top niches you should consider in 2023.

The post Best copywriting niches for new freelancers appeared first on Coaching and training to scale your copywriting business, plus programs for new copywriters, startups, and marketers.

I used to keep the records on my clients, projects, invoices, etc. in Excel sheets and to generate my monthly invoices manually. However, with growing client base, invoicing became a time-consuming and annoying work that had to be performed at the … Continue reading →

No es fácil ser traductor o intérprete freelance en la era de la IA. Pero tampoco es imposible. Si quieres saber cómo salir adelante y triunfar en estos momentos, sigue leyendo. Si alguien te dijo alguna vez que ser traductor o intérprete freelance es fácil, te engañó....

La entrada Ser freelance en la era de la IA aparece primero en Traducción Jurídica.

Freelance 2024 facilitates enhanced connectivity, faster data transfer, more precise control and monitoring of data together with an improved network performance.

Get Any Work Done Online.

The rapid pace of technological change is making a big impact on hiring. Some organizations are dynamically securing freelance workers through platform apps like Upwork and Freelancer. Other companies are investing heavily in work enabled by artificial intelligence. John Winsor and Jin Paik say these structural changes call for a reimagining of your talent strategy — one that is open to flexible, project-based work for talent inside or outside your organization — and they explain how to go about it. Winsor is the founder and chair of Open Assembly and an executive-in-residence at the Laboratory for Innovation Science at Harvard. Paik is a cofounder and managing partner at the AI consultancy Altruistic and a visiting research scientist at Harvard Business School. Together, they wrote the book Open Talent: Leveraging the Global Workforce to Solve Your Biggest Challenges and the HBR article "Do You Need an External Talent Cloud?"

Discover effective pricing strategies for digital projects. Learn how to balance fixed pricing, time and materials, and value-based approaches while managing client expectations and scope creep.

What Does It Take to Be a Freelance Artist?

More than 100,000 people have been laid off in the technology industry alone this year, and — either by circumstance or choice — at least some of them are not heading back into exclusively full-time work. LinkedIn launched a freelancer marketplace in 2021 to capture some of that activity. Now, at a time when other […]

© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.

Islamabad : Parliamentarians and civil society representatives while participating in a virtual conference urged the government to urgently develop an integrated mechanism engaging different stakeholders and active civil society organizations to reach out to a variety of daily workers and...

Company: Bruhat Insights Global Private Limited
Experience: 4 to 14
location: Chennai, Coimbatore
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Summary: Title:Mentoring Purpose of job: Mentoring for adolescents girls from underprivileged background studying in Government Schools

Trevor Bayliss's plans of embarking on a freelance T20 coaching career at the end of his England reign have been put on hold by the breakdown of the Bangladesh Premier League .

The organized freelancer will make sure the amount here is right.; Credit: Photo by Great Beyond via Flickr Creative Commons

For freelancers, consultants, actors and other self employed people, life gets complicated this time of year. Digging around for the paperwork to fill out tax forms practically qualifies as exercise.

"They have a nightmare trying to find receipts," said accountant Tristan Zier.

Zier founded Zen99 to help freelancers manage their finances, including filing their taxes.  His most important advice to freelancers: keep track expenses and receipts year round rather than pursuing a paper chase as April 15 nears.  

"When they can’t find receipts, they can’t write off their expenses," he said. "And they’re paying more money to the government instead of keeping it for themselves."

Zier and others have come up with a lists of common mistakes freelancers make at tax time. 

Here are seven don't - or, deadly sins, for freelances at tax time:

1. Not knowing what they owe.  Zier says there are 20 different 1099 forms that get sent out to workers to track freelance gigs.  One of them is the 1099-K, which only has to be sent to you by a company in paper form if you make over $20,000. "People think, 'Great, no paper form, no taxes on that," says Zier. "Big mistake there.  You still have to self-report the income."   
2. Not knowing WHEN they owe.  For freelancers who owe more than $1,000 in taxes for a year, tax time comes more often than just April 15.  They have to pay taxes quarterly. But then it's not coming out of paychecks like it does for permanent employees. 

3.  Not tracking and writing off the right types of business expenses. Zier says many freelancers fail to realize they can write off part of their cell phone bill as a business expense.  Expenses vary by the type of work.  "A rideshare driver's biggest expense will be related to their car, while a web developer's biggest expense might be their home office," Zier says. "Figuring out what expenses are important to your type of work is important is maximizing your tax savings."

4. Writing off personal expenses.  This goes back to that cell phone.  If you use the same phone for personal and business purposes, don't be tempted to write the whole bill off. Estimate the amount you use it for your work. The same goes for your vehicle. Don't go trying to write off miles driven to the beach. 

5. The Double No-No: counting expenses twice.  Speaking of vehicles, Zier says most people use the Standard Mileage Rate ($0.56/mile for 2014), which factors in gas, repairs and maintenance and other costs like insurance and depreciation. But if you use this rate, you can't also expense your gas receipts and repair bills.  

6. Employee AND employer.  At lifeofthefreelancer.com, financial consultant Brendon Reimer reminds freelancers they play both roles. For regular employees, Federal, State, and payroll taxes are withheld from a paycheck, and distributed on the employee’s behalf. It's how Social Security and Medicare are funded. The IRS mandates that the employer must pay half of every employee’s payroll tax, and the employee is responsible for the other half.  Independent contractors have to handle both halves.  "The IRS does give you a small benefit by letting you deduct the half that you pay yourself as a business expense," Reimer writes. Zier said the freelancer's sin here is believing he or she pays more taxes than the regular working stiff.  

7. Not keeping adequate records. The IRS requires you to keep proof of all business receipts, mileage, etc.  If you can't show these, the IRS  could refute the expense and force you to pay back taxes. Zier says the good news is there are other ways to prove expenses if you've lost the receipt. A bank or credit card statement with the date and location might do the trick. "The IRS is surprisingly accommodating if you are doing your best," Zier says. "If you're being a headache, they're going to be a headache as well." 

In separate reports, Zen99 and the consumer finance web site nerdwallet ranked Los Angeles the best city for freelancers.

Each considered housing and health care costs, the percentage of freelancers in an area as factors. Zier said even before the sharing economy began to take off, the entertainment industry and growing tech scene were already strong sources of freelance gigs in L.A.

"Even back in 2012, L.A. had twelve percent of people report themselves as self-employed on the Census," Ziers said.   "You know your Ubers and companies like that  are really bringing a lot of attention to the contractor market, but it was a very robust community before."

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Everybody says we are, but an economist claims that the data show otherwise.

Company said the product is also suitable for SMEs with turnover below £1.5m.

Would you like to break out of a regular job and start freelancing? Perhaps you've got the skills, but are not quite sure where to start looking for work, or how to deal with the business side of freelance work? If you have web design or development, graphic design, programming, writing or translation skills then you will find opportunities waiting for you, if you know where to look.

Online Publishers LLC brings together clients and freelancers in one convenient platform to connect and help one another reach a new level of success.

TOP platform is an international campaigner that invites all freelancers no matter where they might be in the world to sign up and explore the opportunity to make money online by offering services through this digital marketing agency.

When you’re a freelancer and you start to work directly with your clients, there’s something crucial you need to know. Your design is not the one and only, most important aspect of the transaction. While presenting your client with an amazing design is the final goal, there are a lot of other things at stake […]

Read More at 7 Biggest Mistakes Freelance Designers Make That Will Ruin Their Career

Freelancing can be a tough gig, but there is no better time than a new year to begin building (or rebuilding) a fantastic new business where you can do what you love. Being successful has a lot to do with your drive and passion, but depends largely on your efficiency, workflow and presentation. In this […]

The post 25 Best Freelance Tools to Enhance Your Business for Free appeared first on Web Designer Wall.

I'm looking for a couple of hours a week of someone's time indefinitely to help with social media. Current project is I'd like to highlight some local artists whose work is being "shown" at our airbnb guest house so was thinking that I'd start an instagram account? Ideal person would have some level of experience with linkedin, instagram, etc. If you have a basic level of experience managing websites that could be helpful too - not building but just updating. Virtual is fine.

#architektura #architekt #dom #design

#architektura #architekt #dom #design

#architektura #architekt #dom #design

If you want to succeed as a freelancer, you can’t compete for scraps. That’s the message that Kaylee White of Kaylee Writes puts forth in her new book, How Not to Be Just Another Freelancer, but how do you find the GOOD clients that will push you and your business into the next level? 

Kaylee talks with Kyle about what it means to step away from the pack and run a successful business for yourself, and the very important steps you need to take to do so! 

Today’s links: 

• https://www.kayleewrites.com/
• Kaylee Writes Youtube channel
• How Not to Be Just Another Freelancer!
• Theme song by topmen.bandcamp.com!

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Download here!

Freelancers and small companies are getting hit especially hard by the corona crisis. DER SPIEGEL has learned that the federal government is planning a massive financial aid package. It would mark the end of Germany’s balanced budget policy.

Twenty eight-year-old freelance journalist, Rizwana Tabassum, committed suicide by hanging herself. Samajwadi Party leader Shamim Nomani has now been arrested for abetting the extreme step after a suicide note recovered from her room blamed him.

"Shamim Nomani is responsible," her suicide note said. Tabassum killed herself in Harpalpur of Varanasi district on Monday.

SSP's PRO Sanjay Tripathi, told IANS on Tuesday that Shamim had been formally arrested. He was detained and interrogated on Monday night.

The PRO further said that the post mortem report of Rizwana had confirmed death by hanging.

According to Varanasi Sadar CO, Abhishek Pandey, a case has been registered against Lohta resident Nomani on the charge of abetment to suicide under Section 306 on Tabassum's father complaint.

Nomani has been detained for interrogation and the body has been sent for post-mortem.

Shamim and Rizwana reportedly were friends for a long time but no one is aware of what happened suddenly.

According to reports, when Tabassum did not come out of her room on Monday, they called out to her but there was no response.

The police were informed about the incident and when the policemen broke open the door, Tabassum's body was found hanging from the ceiling fan.

Her father said, "She never told about anything nor did she have any enmity with anyone. She was a good daughter as well as a good journalist."

She had completed Mass Communication from Banaras Hindu University and worked as a freelance journalist for several portals and publications.

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This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed, agencies. Mid-day accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability, trustworthiness, reliability and data of the text. Mid-day management/mid-day.com reserves the sole right to alter, delete or remove (without notice) the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever

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Company: TFG Digital India
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Company: Transgnx HR Solutions Private Limited
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Inheritance tax rules are due for a shake up - FT Money editor Claer Barrett asks whether efforts to simplify the system can ever shake off its claim to be "Britain's most hated tax"? Next, experts discuss whether the IR35 tax rules are flawed or not. And finally, Alan Livsey, the FT's wine buff talks about an investment that is literally liquid - fine wine.

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