Banking: Washington Mutual offers free business checking with no balance requirement. Plus, you can sign up for free enrollment into the WaMoola For Schools Program where you can benefit your local school with Debit Mastercard purchases. You can get downloads of your banking account information into Quickbooks. Payroll: I met Brian Barrett from Prime Pay, [...]
Archive for November, 2006
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NY XPo For Business Highlights
November 30th, 2006 
Stephens Yesterday, I attended the New York Expo for Business, and I got a wealth of information for small businesses. Plus, I got a CD of Microsoft Accounting 2007 which I plan to install today. There were a lot of vendors who are great resources for my bookkeeping client and there were vendors who may to [...]
Trademark Advice
November 26th, 2006 Stephens My business colleague, Nance Schick, offers excellent advice about trademarks and intellectual property. Make sure you know the differences among the various forms of intellectual property (IP). Many agencies, including attorneys, prey on entrepreneurs who do not know the differences. Trademarks, service marks, copyrights, and patents all describe different types of IP, and each has [...]
1099s
November 14th, 2006 Stephens If you are a small business owner, you may very likely have independent contractors working for you. You must sent out 1099 tax forms to contractors by January 31. Now is the time to evaluate whether the independent contractor is eligible. If they provided more than $600 of services, then they must be sent a [...]
How Will The New Congress Affect Small Businesses?
November 8th, 2006 Stephens I don’t have a crystal ball, but I hope that taxes will not be raised. In the meantime, get to know your new congressman, senator,or governor. Find out if he/she is pro-small business. Now is the time to reach out and make a connection. BTW, If you contributed to a political campaign, make sure you [...]
Instant Assessment BullPen: November 29
November 6th, 2006 Stephens From the New York City Business Solutions website: The New York Business Solutions will conduct the 2nd annual Instant Assessment Bullpen at the NY Xpo for Business on November 29, 2006, at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center. The Instant Assessment Bullpen will bring together over 20 business experts, from City, State, and Federal agencies, [...]
Creative Public
November 6th, 2006 Stephens If you need to develop contracts and/or service level agreements with your clients, then you may want to check out Creative Public.Com . It’s more effective to get the terms of an agreement up front in writing before any work is done in avoid to hassles later. Also, if their are problems later, re-communicate to [...]
This Does Not Compute
November 5th, 2006 Stephens Why would banks offer business checking accounts that do not have compatibliity with Quickbooks so that users can download banking information? It’s outrageous that it is not available since the account data should be easily downloaded. Some banks have the download ability for Quicken, but Quicken is more often used for personal finance. By the [...]
Microsoft Accounting
November 1st, 2006 Stephens For the longest time, Intuit’s Quickbooks has been THE software for small businesses. There is some good functionality to Quickbooks and compared to other software, it is OK. However, as I continue to work with Quickbooks to service my bookkeeping clients, I find that it could be better especially with online retail businesses that employ [...]
South DaKota is Most Small Business Friendly State
November 1st, 2006 Stephens The Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council created an index that measures that are the most and least friendly to small businesses. South Dakota was named number in the country. The least small business friendly, after the District of Columbia, are, in order, New Jersey, California, Rhode Island, Maine, Minnesota, New York, Hawaii and Massachusetts. What [...]
