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Dec 19 2015

HOW TO GIVE THE MOST MEMORABLE GIFT EVER!

Amina

Each year as the Christmas season nears, the advertisements’ get hot and heavy for anything and everything that a person can shop and purchase as a gift for Christmas. Turn on the TV and you see ads that basically say you don’t love your girl if you don’t buy her diamonds. Flip through a magazine and it’s loaded with more advertisements than content. Sign online and no doubt you will find tons of ads that scream BUY, BUY, BUY!

We all like to get gifts, that’s a given. But have we become so material oriented that we’ve forgotten about the greatest gift of all? The gift of love, of giving of oneself, far outweighs any amount of money that could be spent and any material things money could buy. The old saying that money can’t buy love hasn’t changed.

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Many folks in today’s world are in such a hurry. We have instant oatmeal, instant coffee, instant messaging, microwave dinners, etc. We are in such a hurry to get somewhere that we fail to stop and see the beauty of where we are right now. It’s go, go, go, and don’t slow down for anything. While we are in such a hurry, we forget to take time and enjoy life. We often spend outrageous sums of money buying things for the people we love, yet deny them the greatest gift of all… ourselves. Come January we find ourselves in a perpetual state of debt again!

There is one perfect holiday gift. It’s a gift that can be shared and used throughout the entire year. It never gets overused. It never runs out of battery power. It never needs to get replaced. It’s the one thing you can never have too much of. That perfect gift is YOU!

Instead of spending a load of money for Christmas and going deeper into debt, wrap up something new and different this year. Wrap up a nice note that gives the gift of your time to those you love and that love you. Rather than trying to buy loads of stuff for your friends, kids, spouse, and loved ones, give the best gift there is, the gift of your time.

For instance this year, my family and I (6 of us including my husband, child, parents, father-in-law, sister and I) are each contributing $50 and buying a Christmas for a less fortunate family, including Turkey and all the trimmings and a gift for each child.

The most memorable Christmas gifts won’t be the ones that you spent hundreds of dollars on. It’ll be the gift where you gave yourself, when you spent time with the people that love you and that you love.

With this message in mind, I hope you give the most memorable gift to those you love and also receive the same from those that love you.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

To your Wealth!

Amina

Please “like” my facebook page here Please follow me on twitter here

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Written by Dwania Peele · Categorized: Amina Mohamed · Tagged: agift, Amina Mohamed, buy, Canadian Small Business Women, christmas, debt, entrepreneur, holiday gift, instant, material things, memories, money, mortgage, spend time

Aug 26 2015

Best Practice record keeping

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  1. What documents and information should a business provide to its accountant in order to file its business taxes, specifically payroll, HST and income tax?

 

  1. If you do your bookkeeping yourself, provide a softcopy of your records (eg., Quickbooks or Simply Accounting file)
  2. A copy of all your Bank statements for the year. Note: if you do your own bookkeeping, then ensure you provide a copy of your year-end bank reconciliation
  3. A copy of all your business credit card statements for the year. Note: if you do your own bookkeeping, then ensure you provide a copy of your year-end credit card statement bank reconciliation
  4. Cancelled cheques, cheque stubs and bank deposit book for the year
  5. Copies of all invoices issued
  6. List of Accounts Receivables
  7. List of Bad debts
  8. List of year-end inventory (including the cost)
  9. Invoices for capital assets purchased during the year (eg computers, furniture etc)
  10. Details of assets disposed of during the year (even if you got no money when the asset was disposed of)
  11. Copies of all expense receipts
  12. List of Accounts Payable
  13. Details of all bank loans
  14. List of all payroll payments during the year showing gross amount, withholdings and net amount paid. You should also indicate how paid (cheque, cash or direct deposit)
  15. Your accountant should have access to your CRA account data , so it will n ot be necessary to provide CRA correspondence, unless it is of a non-routine nature, and one which your accountant would not have access to
  16. Mileage log detailing business kilometers driven
  17. Record of any expenses you paid for the business (out of your personal funds)
  1. Tips on recordkeeping
  • It is very important to have a record keeping system in place from the first day of business operations. It is best practice to consult with your accountant on what records to maintain. The accountant should have readily available, a checklist of record required. This makes the first year of filing much easier, and you are less likely to make mistakes which have to be fixed in later years due to lack of knowledge
  • After your tax filing deadline, consider filing your income and expense receipts in “tax” folders, as opposed to putting them in categories. If you are audited, then all the data used in the tax return is in one place. You simply pick up the folder, and hand it to the auditor. You can use tabs to separate the docs in the categories on the tax return
  • Manual record keeping – this can be as simple as an accordion folder where you drop all invoices, expenses, bank statements and other required documents, in the separate sections. Then give this folder to the accountant to summarise and use to prepare taxes.
  • To reduce accounting bill, you can summarize the receipts for your accountant. This is most applicable to a Sole Proprietor, where the basis of the tax return is your income and expenses, as a full financial statement is not required. However, for a corporation, expense summarization doesn’t help too much, as the basis of your corporate tax return is your Bank statement.
  • Electronic recordkeeping is strongly suggested for a corporation. Simply because of the details required to be reported, as well, CRA requires a full financial statement – Income Statement and Balance Sheet (which is not required for Sole Proprietors)
  • Stay on top of your recordkeeping

Green Meikle & Smith Chartered Professional Accountants

Authorized to practice public accounting by the Chartered Professional Accountants of Ontario

1020 Matheson Blvd. E. Unit 10

Mississauga, ON L4W 4J9

905-919-3543 Ext 101

647-338-5306 (cell)

greenmeiklesmith.com

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Written by Dwania Peele · Categorized: Green Meikle & Smith · Tagged: accountant, assets, Bank statement, Bank Statements, best practice, bookkeeping, business, business development, business plan, Canadian Small Business Women, cash, cheque, CRA, credit card, debt, direct deposit, documents, expense receipts, Green Meikle and Smith, HST, income tax, inventory, invoices, loans, payroll, Quickbooks, reconciliation, record keeping, Simply Accounting, tax filing, tax return, taxes

Dec 19 2014

FINDING PASSION IN WHAT YOU DO!

Amina

The other day I was speaking with a friend I had not seen in over a year and we got to talking about kids, family, marriage and finally work.  She asked me if I was enjoying my work after having had a great career in film and tv.  She had been working in the same job for the last 18 years and while she was building up a great pension, she had lost the passion for what she was doing and needed a change of life, so to speak!

Personally, I never thought after working in film and television that I would find something that had made me as happy as I was then – but I was wrong!  I am absolutely loving what I do now and I will give you the same reasons I outlined for her.

I get to meet new people every day that need solutions to their current problems. For instance, perhaps it’s the clients, who were facing a possible bankruptcy and I was able to come up with a solution for them, which helped them avoid the bankruptcy, refinance their current mortgage and see a way to the future with one payment instead of 10 separate payments with all of their debts; or it was the client who had 10 days to close on an investment purchase or be liable to be sued by the seller and I was able to get them a mortgage that the bank turned them down for and add to their investment portfolio.;  or it could be the client, who came to me after approaching the bank and two other seasoned brokers because her case would have proven to be difficult – which it was – and I was able to get her out of her 7% – 1st mortgage, her 14% – 2nd mortgage and her $100K in debts and in the end got her a 4.7%- 1st mortgage for 80% LTV that helped her save her sanity and got her out of debt.  She has now been able to follow her life-long dreams of becoming a drug counsellor because of the amount of money she was now saving, which was put to further education for her degree.

These are the stories that keep me going every day!

Another reason I love this career is that I get to put the same tactics for lack of a better word, that I used in film and tv to each mortgage case and/or client.  What do I mean? – well for instance, with every film or tv project that I was producing and/or production managing, I would start with a budget – I do the same for each client as I want to see where I can save them money.  Next I would look at what each project needed – everything from casting, wardrobe, sets, etc.  I do the same with a mortgage – what does the client need? Is it s a straight refinance, purchase or debt consolidation?

Each mortgage is different and the parameters are never the same –if we treated each mortgage and/or client like a one-size fits’ all situation, not only would we be failing as mortgage agents, but we would end up failing our clients as well.  Being able to use the same “out of the box” thinking that I was able to use in my previous career, keeps me waking up every day with a smile on my face, ready to welcome any challenge presented to me.

Have I found passion in what I do? Absolutely and I am greatful for this new-found passion everyday!

 

To your wealth!

Amina 

Please like my facebook page here

Please follow me on Twitter here

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Written by Dwania Peele · Categorized: Amina Mohamed · Tagged: Amina Mohamed, bankruptcy, business development, Canadian Small Business Women, debt, entrepreneur, ivestment, marriage, mortgages, Passion, problms, purchase, refinance, seller, small business, solutions

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