What the Tech: Apps can make filing taxes easy
AUGUSTA, Ga. (WRDW/WAGT) - The tax deadline for 2022 returns was April 17th and you may be wishing you would have stayed better organized to make preparing taxes easier.
Do you still save paper receipts and write down mileage for tax purposes?
If so, you know it can take days to compile them all for your ant or tax preparer. Your smartphone camera can be a huge help when it comes to saving receipts.
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You’ll find many apps that will take and save photos of receipts. Most require a subscription and you can’t be too sure about privacy with some of them, these are safe and easy to use.
Evernote can scan receipts using its companion Scannable app. Scan the receipt with your camera, give it a name, and save it to a notebook in Evernote. At tax time, you won’t need all that paper but if you do, just print what you need or share the pdfs with your tax preparer.
iPhone s can do this with the stock Apple Notes app. You can take a snapshot and save it as a photo, but we suggest scanning it instead in case you need to print it out. You can create a receipts folder and save them there to stay organized.
Android and iPhone s can use the app Google Keep to save receipts and share them with their tax preparer.
For small business owners and side hustlers, there’s Quickbooks, an app and website to help you organize receipts, travel expenses, utilities, taxes, and fees. Quickbooks connects to your bank s to track money going out and coming into the business. At tax time, you can share it all with your ant in an email.
Many people miss deducting mileage for business which is around 63 cents a mile. The app Mile IQ automatically detects when you’re driving and makes it easy to log miles as either personal or business. At the end of the year, MileIQ generates a mileage report for the IRS and saves the report in case you are audited.
It’s easy to miss or forget qualified deductions and you can pay a lot more in taxes than you should. Tax preparers say it’s much easier to stay organized throughout the year and save receipts as they come in rather than all at once when taxes are due.
If you didn’t get your taxes filed by April 17th you can file an extension and have until October 15th to get them filed.
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