It’s tax time and shaving the amount of the check you’re going to write to Uncle Sam is a top priority.

“Typically, people undervalue what they give to charity,” says Bill Reed, Income Dynamics.

Which is unfortunate, since as long as you’re giving stuff to charity, you might as well get the full benefit of your donation. A software product called, “It’s Deductible,” can help. The IRS allows you to take the fair market value of each item and “It’s Deductible” does the legwork for you.

“We’ve gone out to thrift and consignment stores. We’ve conducted actual in-store audits throughout the country,” Reed says.

So all you have to do is plug in the name of the charity, list the items and decide whether they are in good, fair or poor condition. For example, a silk tie is worth a $9 deduction. If it were a designer tie the fair market value would be $17.

“Last year, the users of It’s Deductible saved an average of $526. That means they had a deduction of around $2,000 and that’s additional money back in their pocket year after year,” Reed says.

It’s Deductible costs $30 and the company guarantees if you don’t save $300, you get your money back.

Now, once you’ve got your deductions lined up, wouldn’t it be nice to know where your W2 is? Especially now that it’s tax time? A new online payroll company called Surepayroll allows you to access your pay information, 24/7 from any computer in the world with internet access.

“You can get on Surepayroll, check your account, download your W2s, print them out, your last paycheck, your entire history of paychecks within the last 2 years are all available online,” says Amanda Lannert, president of Jellyvision.

Which is especially helpful if it’s April 14 and you can’t find your W2.

“As you log in, you can see all your pay information. You can see all your tax information, such as your W4 withholding, you can see your vacation balance, so no more having to ask your boss how many days do I have left in the year?” says Michael Alter, Surepayroll.

Surepayroll also handles all of the tax filings for both employers and employees.

“The government level, state level and the local level. We pay it in and we take care of all the hassles of the quarterly returns and the year-end returns, the W2s and a company’s payroll taxes,” says Alter.

And it’ll save your company money as well.

“It’s actually less expensive than the traditional payroll service we were using before,” says Lannert.

While giving you more control over your finances.

RESOURCES

SurePayroll – Online Payroll Service

Published: May 27, 2003