Now is the time to begin closing your business books for year end. Chances are that the fiscal year for your nurse entrepreneur business is January 1 - December 31 unless you have a very good reason for choosing a different fiscal year. If your fiscal year coincides with the calendar year, it's time to be wrapping up your business accounting for the year end.

What you do and how you do it will depend somewhat on what accounting method you are using for your nurse business. You will either be using a cash method or an accrual method. If you are using the cash method your income and deductions are taken as they are paid or received. If you are using the accrual method your income and deductions are applied as they are incurred. You will have elected which method of accounting you would be using when you set up your nurse business.

When you set up your business you probably also made a decision as to if you would do your bookkeeping on paper or on your computer. When I first started, I had few transactions in my nurse entrepreneur business so I kept track of them on paper. As my business grew I converted to keeping track of my accounting on my computer. This has made getting information ready for my accountant so much easier! There are a number of software programs from which to choose if you are going to do your bookkeeping on your computer. I use QuickBooks Pro and find that it works very well for me.

At this time of year it is a good time to review your accounting and be sure that you have entered everything that needs to be entered. Don't forget to track travel expenses, mileage, parking, entertainment, and other deductions for which you might need a receipt.

If you need a form for recording your travel expenses, use one of the following links to download our travel expense report forms:
Resolve to record your business travel expenses as you go!
Business Travel Expense Reports

Lastly, be sure you use some type of method to back up your system if you are doing your bookkeeping on your computer. Computers do crash and you don't want to lose the information you have worked so hard to input!