With apologies to Andy Williams and the song “It’s a most wonderful time of the year”, because this surely is not the most wonderful time of the year!  Here in the US, it’s tax season, with the April 15th deadline for filing income taxes looming large on the horizon, many of us are going through our annual stress test.  Normally I just waltz over to computer, click a few buttons and produce a printout that I give to my accountant and I am done.

All of that changed this year because I changed status from being an employee to starting my own business.  This occurred at the beginning of November and with all I have had on my plate, I just overlooked keeping the entries up in my accounting program.  Up until today, the last time I made an entry was in the beginning of October.  When I logged in today to have it download all my transactions from my checking account, all of the transactions from October and November were no longer available from my bank!  That meant that I had to hand enter 60 days of wild spending!

Part of my problem was that making the switch from employee to business owner means that I now get to file a Schedule C in addition to my normal Schedule A.  What expenses go where?  Can I deduct this?  What about that?  Does it go on C or A?  Yikes!  I think I need to see an accountant!

So, in order to mend my evil ways I have been on the hunt for something that is aimed at small businesses like mine.  Something that will automatically help me with my Schedule C reporting, my Profit and Loss, and oh yeah, something that will calculate my Estimated Tax payments and remind me to send them in!

Lucky for me, I found Outright.com!  It’s designed especially for the small business owner.

From their website, the following paragraphs really caught my eye:

“Automated bookkeeping software for entrepreneurs & bookkeepers. Track income and expenses from credit cards, invoices, receipts, or even merchant accounts.”

And then this one: “Know right now what you can deduct come tax time. Stay on top of tax deadlines, manage W-9s, file 1099s, and automate your Schedule C; avoid costly fines and late fees from the IRS.”

So, I signed up.  The first thing I had it do was to import my business checking account info from Wells Fargo.  It was smart enough to only import the 2010 transactions (Obviously, I have turned over a new leaf and will be on top of things for this year!).  Next I had it import my PayPal account.  And finally, my business credit card.  Once I had all of the expenses in the program, I went through each item and made edits to show the purpose of the expense, and also what line item on a Schedule C it belongs in.  I can also add my income items to see an instant P&L graph.

There is more to it, but this is all that I have worked with so far, so I’ll close.  But, not before telling you that it is absolutely free!  Again from their website “Outright is free, simple bookkeeping and will remain so. We do plan to charge a nominal fee for innovative services yet to come.”

Drop everything and go check it out!  And, if you know of some other free software or websites that are designed for the sole proprietor or small business person, please do leave a comment and share the love with us all!