November 17, 2025 • 44 mins
TaxTalk4U.com Should I Start My Own Business 5 reason to start your own business, 5 reason to not start your own business Reasons Why and 5 More Why Not to Start Your Own Business "startup," "business plan," and "small business ideas," strategy, operations, finances, and marketing. Trucking success as a Owner Operator. Business Tax problems IRS payroll taxes, Trust fund penalties
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#Trucking #businessstartup #businessowner
Tax Talk 4 U is broadcast live Mondays at 10AM ET and Music on W4CY Radio (www.w4cy.com) part of Talk 4 Radio (www.talk4radio.com) on the Talk 4 Media Network (www.talk4media.com). Tax Talk 4 U is viewed on Talk 4 TV (www.talk4tv.com).
Tax Talk 4 U Podcast is also available on Talk 4 Media (www.talk4media.com), Talk 4 Podcasting (www.talk4podcasting.com), iHeartRadio, Amazon Music, Pandora, Spotify, Audible, and over 100 other podcast outlets.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/tax-talk-4-u--6333550/support.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The topics and opinions express in the following show are
solely those of the hosts and their guests and not
those of W FOURCY Radio. It's employees are affiliates. We
make no recommendations or endorsements for radio show programs, services,
or products mentioned on air or on our web. No
liability explicitor implied shall be extended to W FOURCY Radio
or it's employees are affiliates. Any questions or comments should
be directed to those show hosts. Thank you for choosing
(00:21):
W FOURCY Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Barry G.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Fowler EA brings you tax talk for you right here
on W four CY Radio and talk for TV. As
an enrolled agent and a national leader in tax resolution
as well as Trucker bookkeeping and tax planning. With over
thirty years of experience, Barry will break down taxes, bookkeeping,
(00:49):
tax planning, and tax relief for individuals and businesses just
like you. So let's have some tax talk for you
with your hosts.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Barry G. Ho Hey, good morning and welcome. Hopefully you
just finished watching or listening to asked the experts that
preceded us here, and I was just doing a show
with Steve O and asked the Experts talking about IRS
problems and problem resolutions. You can find those podcasts. Ask
(01:21):
the Experts has them on all the I Heart, Spotify,
you name it, it's there. We have some great shows.
We've been doing some shows with him for many many years.
Asked the Experts, has this come on and talk about
tax relief? Hey, this show tax talk for you. You know,
I enjoyed doing this because we get to bring out
(01:43):
new information or go back through and talk about different
things that can help you. The today's show came about
because we got a number of questions people asking, Hey,
should I go into business? You know, what do I
need to do? If I'm going into business or thinking
(02:04):
about getting out into business? Is this a good idea? Well,
first off, I can't tell you point blank for you personally,
if you going into business is the right move for you?
You know, if maybe you've been a W two employee
all your life, you're just not sure by going into business.
(02:28):
That is the first decision you've got to really make,
you know, So is this the right thing to do
for me to go out in the business? One? The
first question do you have what it takes? The drive?
Can you be success driven? Can you be self driven,
(02:52):
and are you self motivated? See those are the three selves.
Because if you you're elf, can't accomplish those three things
and be those three things, and business is probably not
right for you. You need somebody that's getting you and
(03:12):
driving you to be a success as opposed to you
being a success on your own. Now that could be
you know, your husband or your wife helps drive you,
and then maybe you can do a business together and
be driven to success. When you're a W two employee,
(03:33):
you're responsible to somebody else. You have that one person
or multiple people above you that are your bosses that
are pushing you to get your work done, or you're
going to be terminated, buyered, you're out of here. It
doesn't work that way when you're going to go out
in business. So you have got to be self motivated
(03:55):
and self driven. It's for that success for yourself and
for your family. Because going into business one, it takes
a lot of work. And I've been dealing with entrepreneurs
and owner operators and truck drivers for you know, more
than thirty plus years, and I've never seen anybody that
actually is going to work less in a startup business
(04:18):
while they're building their business. Then when you were an employee,
and when you're an employee, you clock in, you clock out.
It's your forty hours and maybe some overtime here and
there that you're going to go work. When you're running
your own business, that could be eighty hours a week.
It could be seven days a week working. It could
(04:39):
be not nine to five. Your business could be from
eight in the morning till eight or ten o'clock at nine,
depending on what you're going to be doing in your business.
So these are the things that you've got to think
about as you step out to go into business for yourself.
It's going to t take a lot of work. Stepping
(05:01):
out into business is going to cause a lot of worry,
and that's hard to avoid. You're going to be worried
about making payroll, what your future holds, what the uncertainty
is about income and paying your bills, if you're growing,
how you're going to grow, how you're going to hire,
the risks that you're going to have to take for
credit lines, paying back lines of credit money that you
(05:24):
owe to other people, or maybe you've brought in investors,
paying back investors money that you spend based on future
projections and profits. So It's a lot of stress that's
involved failure. It's always a possibility. Failure can cost you
big time. Businesses do fail. Trust me, Not everybody going
(05:48):
out into business is one hundred percent successful. That's why
not everybody goes out into business. Some people have to
be employees and have a W two paycheck. Know, otherwise
everybody be in business, you know, for themselves, and it's
not always your fault that they fail, or the fault
(06:08):
of the owner. You know. Even great decisions and good
decisions can have bad outcomes, could have a negative impact.
There's a lot of other factors that you can't control
in business, you know, and that failure out there can
cost you relationships and as possibility is something you can't
(06:30):
deal with personally, so you don't really want to go there.
I always like people telling me, man, you know, Verry,
this is the greatest thing because you are your own boss.
I laugh. I don't ever think of myself as my
own boss. You know. Maybe when I first started out
and doing taxes and stuff, I felt empowered to be
(06:54):
my own boss. But as you continue to grow and
you continue to take on clients, your client it's become
your bosses. So I don't report to just one boss.
I report to hundreds to thousands of people that are
now my bosses demanding, Hey, we need tax planning this
time of the year, we need taxes done. You know,
(07:17):
it's now in their hands to help control and impact
what we've got to do and what we've got to
accomplish here. So, you know, even sometimes you feel like
the employees you hire are your boss with their demands
of what they want or can't do or can do,
and you've got to work around it because sometimes hiring
(07:38):
is hard to do, especially finding good quality people. So
you're not going to be your own boss, but you
might feel empowered. So, you know, do I really want
to be in business? Hey? These are the negative things
so far that we're talking about. And I'm going to
guarantee you one thing. You will make the stack yep.
(08:01):
As a business owner, you will make mistakes. And if
you can't live with making mistakes, don't start your own business.
If it's going to affect you and your attitude, You're doomed.
It's done, it's over. The writing's on the wall. Before
you ever get started. You're going to make wrong turns,
you know, sometimes heading into businesses like walking through a
(08:24):
forest without a trail, you're setting your own trail. You
need to find your own paths. Sometimes you're going to
make it right and you should have made a left.
Sometimes you're going to make a left and you should
have made it right. Sometimes you just needed to keep
going down the path you were on and stay straight. Hey,
the good news is is if you can get around
those things and you can overcome the little mistakes that
(08:45):
you make in business, you can survive, and you survive them,
you come out stronger. Your business comes out stronger. So
sometimes make those little mistakes makes businesses stronger on their
good point and realize, hey, we need to go from
here to there. So maybe you made that left and
(09:07):
you need to turn back around, and you turn and
get back to where you were on that straight path
and fix the things and make it stronger going forward.
So maybe that's the fun part about being in business
is knowing that you can make a mistake and straighten
it out and continue to move forward stronger and better
(09:31):
as an organization and better as a person. Now we're
going to talk about some of the good things that
you can do and things and reasons you might want
to be in business for yourself, and we're going to
do that right after this.
Speaker 3 (09:50):
We have only scratched the surface of today's show. Please
stand by as Barry Chief Fowler will be right back
with tax talk for you. If you owe the IRS
or are going through an IRS audit, don't go at
it alone. Call Taxation Solutions Tax Relief at eight eight
(10:10):
eight nine three zero one zero one six. We are
your solution for IRS debts, audits, back taxes, garnishments, leans
and levees. Whether you're an individual or business, you need
a solution and a strong, aggressive tax resolution. Don't let
(10:31):
the IRS walk all over you. Stop the IRS now
call eight eight eight nine three zero one zero one
six or go to Taxationsolutions dot net now for a
free no obligation consultation. Let's get back to tax stock
(10:51):
for you with more tax stock once again, here's your host,
Barry G.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Feller. You know, welcome back. Looking at where I started
many many years ago to decide I'm going to go
into business and everything. I came out of college and
did what everybody else did, and as a CPA way
back in the eighties was get out to the you
(11:17):
know Big eight public accounting and you know, work in
that industry and then move from there to uh, you know,
out in the corporate world and rise to the corporate ladder.
I didn't like playing politics with bosses and everything else.
I had to make a decision earlier what did I
really wanted to do. And I decided I wanted to
(11:40):
help people. I wanted to do taxes. I've always been
doing taxes. Helped my dad when I was a kid
doing taxes. He worked at one of those you know,
box firms, uh part time, you know, on the weekends
and everything for a little more money. Since there were
five kids that he was feeding, you know, so there
were seven of us in the household, bus a dog,
(12:02):
and so you know, he was at that time the
only one working. So he was doing everything he could
to make ends meet. And we would go with him
and we could I could help to taxes, pen and paper,
pencil and paper, a lot of fun. But I really
reached back and decided this is something I wanted to do.
Be out in business for myself. But I had to
(12:23):
figure out what did people want or need and how
can I provide that niche to be a success in business.
So if you're thinking about going out in a business,
and that's maybe one of the first things you got
to look at, especially when you're starting to put together
maybe a business plan, which is really key to get
(12:44):
in your business started as well. How are you filling
avoid Is it something people want or neat? Do people
really want what you're going to be selling or the
service you're going to be providing. So if you're providing
a service that makes people feel better, maybe sleep better,
maybe learn better, live better, product everybody once, hey, go
(13:09):
out there and go after it. You know, you can
look at some successful startups and how they were built
around things that made life better. You know, computers. I mean,
who would have thought way back in the day computers
would be so portable That first compact portable computer that
was there that weighed fifty pounds and had the little
green screen. And I'm dating myself, but I'm gonna know
(13:32):
I already know them old that we would lug from
one place to another became these laptops that we carry
around that are no more than you know, two to
five pounds, really kind of cool, or you know, iPads,
whatever it may be. You know, the progress of transportation,
(13:52):
web applications, tutoring, tax preparation, i RS, problem resolution, all
these things that you know, we've jumped into and people
have jumped into over the years that have become hugely
successful because it fit a need, built a need, or
they establish a need for those products. Now, another reason
(14:17):
for starting a business is maybe you're going to be
better off. So hey, this this spands full range of
situations from making more money to being home more to
be with your children. Maybe you can do a part
time business, be successful and have more time for your kids.
Maybe you'd be able to live in a better place.
(14:39):
Maybe at some point you'd have more time. So there's
fundamentally some good reasons that can spill over to family
life that can help you. If it's a business that
you can run part time and spend more time with family,
great if it substitutes the income that you were making
for your w two wages. Again, you got to be
(15:04):
self driven though during times to make ends meet, make
it work, and continue to grow that business. Maybe you
can involve other family members or loved ones that can
work in the business and help the business grow. And
now you've got a family business and everybody you know,
(15:24):
you're raising the ship for everybody out there you know,
looking back for me, one of my main drivers wanting
to do business for myself was wanting to be able
to do things my own way, being that I was
self driven in to get the business going, and I
could spend the time that I needed focused on business
(15:49):
for my clients. That my days didn't have to be
technically from eight to five. I could be at work
and doing things early in the morning, take a little
break in the afternoon, and come back. Can do things
at home at night for taxes, bookkeeping, whatever it was
that we were promoting and pushing to grow our business,
tax resolution, We can do things that didn't require set
(16:13):
office hours, and it made our life happier because we
could focus on things that the kids can do to
make their life better such as sports, you know, baseball
and swimming, things like that, and so we could do
those kind of things, you know, so it made our
(16:33):
lives happier. Another thing that you can consider is you're
going to be able to control your own destiny. You know,
I built a business, You could build a business. So
maybe you want to be an owner operator truck driver
out there, but you're a W two driver right now,
Do I really want to jump out and become an
owner operator. Well, you've got to consider your control, self awareness,
(16:57):
what can you do, self motivation, all the things that
we talked about, and negatives on the self side can
be turned around as positives. Out here. You can control
your own destiny and you're how much you're driven to
be a success. You know, you've got to realize that
being a success means you're going to be putting your
credit online, You're going to be buying a new truck.
(17:17):
If you're going to be an owner operator or leasing
a truck for you know, three years, five years, whatever
it may be, you're going to be possibly get going
out and getting your own authority and then you're going
to be having to collect on invoices. Maybe you'll be
a LEAs tign driver and they're just going to give
you settlement statements. That might be the easiest route to
ease into being an owner operator out there, but again,
(17:42):
accepting loads, going after it, getting driven for a success
is going to be up to you, and you're going
to control your destiny, your financial future by how much
are you going to go out there and work? Now,
you also got to consider in this if you're going
(18:05):
to be like an owner operator is fluctuating freight prices
and fluctuating costs that just cost of fuel, repairs, things
like that. So you've got to take a little bit
of everything into consideration. So it may seem like maybe
you're making a dollar or two more a mile being
an owner operator, but then you've got more expenses over here,
(18:28):
such as owning the truck, repairs and maintenance and things
like that, lease of trailers, whatever you may be. You've
got to factor all that in to what your income
level is. So maybe you're making ten dollars more you
know out there, now you've got maybe eight dollars more
of cost, so maybe there is two dollars of flexibility
(18:50):
and more income for you. But then you've got self
employment taxes and other things out there, and you've got
other administrative costs that you've got to account for. So
those are the kind of things that you're going to
have to be looking at as all your expenses. And
then what you're going to want to do is say, hey, yes,
I am self motivated, I'm self driven, I'm self aware,
(19:12):
and I have that drive to go after this. Now stop,
take a step back, put a business plan together, and
in that business plan. Make a decision what do I
How much money do I need to be a success
to pay for the things in my life. That is
what you need to do when you're going out into business.
(19:35):
You may not be going out there to change the
world or better. You may not. You may only be
trying to change your little family world and make it better.
But maybe you have the idea of a product or
service that will make the world, the United States a
(19:56):
better place. Go for it. Hire people, pay them a
good salary. Build the business that you've dreamed of in
the business of your dreams. Be that go getter, go
after it. Maybe you want to be the next huge
trucking company, Go for it. Be self driven. So, if
your business has a purpose and you have the drive,
(20:18):
being in business maybe the right thing for you. Hey,
we're going to take a short break. When we come back,
we're going to talk about some business tax problems that
people have who have been in business and now are
looking for solutions to tax problems, and we're going to
discuss those right after this break.
Speaker 3 (20:38):
We have only scratched the surface of today's show. Please
stand by as Barry Chief Dowler will be right back with.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
Tax talk for you.
Speaker 3 (20:49):
As an owner operator, you already spend too much time
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bookkeeping in taxes. No matter what level trucker you are,
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(21:11):
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taxes again. Call Trucker Tax Tools eight seven seven nine
sixty six two four seven seven or go to Trucker
tax Tools dot com now and let the experts keep
you trucking. Let's get back to tax stock for you
(21:36):
with more tax stock once again. Here's your host, Barry G.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
Faller. Hey, welcome back. You know we're talking about going
into business and it is the right thing to do.
You know, sometimes in business you struggle. Sometimes it's money struggles.
Sometimes it's sales are struggling sales or damn, sometimes costs
are gone way up due to inflation, things like that,
(22:06):
and so you find got to find cash flow solutions, right,
and sometimes that's the consequences of taxes. We were dealing
with the client who had major cash flow problems, but
he was trying to find everything he could do to
take care of his employees had been with him a
long time, and instead of closing the business and telling everybody, hey,
(22:32):
we just can't afford to do this anymore, he just
kept making payroll. But what he was doing was in
pain in the payroll taxes. Now he's in way over
his head. And you know, if you're avoiding paying payable
taxes for cash flow, you're going to have bigger problems.
If you can't afford to pay the payroll taxes, you
(22:54):
can't afford to be in business, to be honest with you,
or you can't afford to have as many employees. Sometimes
you've got to do that reduction just to make it
make sense to keep the business afloat for those that
you can afford to keep on in business, just supported
(23:17):
by the revenues that are coming in. What happens when
you don't pay your payroll taxes, Well, the IRS comes
after you. IRS is going to be all over you,
and the IRS is going to be looking for that
money any way, shape or form. Now there are two
parts to payroll taxes. There is the part that the
(23:38):
company pays so Security and Medicare, So that's roughly seven
and a quarter percent of your payroll taxes of gross payroll.
And then there is the side that is pulled from
the employee's check, which is that matching seven and a
quarter SOI Security and Medicare and the federal withholdings. Now
(24:02):
that portion is considered pulled out in trust means you
were trusted to pull that money from your employees check
and send it to the IRS. That portion can be
subject to trust fund penalties. What are trust fund penalties?
Penalties that are assessed because you made the choice not
(24:23):
to pay them into the IRS and use the money
that was you pulled out in trust and use it
to not pay the IRS but to pay other bills.
IRS can come in and assess trust fund penalties against
the owners of the business in any signers on the
(24:43):
checking account. That there alone can hit you hard as
an individual. So you want to make every attempt possible
to pay at the very minimum all the trust fund
taxes you withheld from people's checks. Sometimes that's not possible,
and you're going to get hit with the trust fund
(25:04):
penalties again. They gets hit against any owners in the
business and any signers on checking accounts, they're considered to
be decision makers. Hey, we've got a quick question from Joe.
I was a manager of a bar and they hit
me with trust fund penalties? Can I get those removed? Joe,
(25:28):
I've seen this before you as a manager, you've had
signature authority over at a checking account. We would have
to look at what authority you actually had there. We
might be able to get trust fund penalties removed from you,
depending on a what account you were signing on. If
you were just signing on a petty cash account that
(25:50):
only had a small amount, you didn't have anything to
do with payroll or beating other bills. Besides, what was
products that were dropped off that you either didn't order
or didn't have a say in those kind of things.
We might be able to get you off of those
trust fund penalties, especially not being an owner but being
(26:12):
a signer on the account. Yes, you can be held responsible.
We have seen where managers and businesses that had signature
authority on account have been held one hundred percent liable
for trust fund penalties. Unfortunately, sometimes you cannot avoid those
because you had the authority to do it. And it
came to the IRS's attention that you helped make the
(26:36):
decision not to pay the payroll taxes, and you did
nothing to get them to pay those payroll taxes either.
But if you had absolutely zero knowledge of it, we
might be able to become that portion of it. So
kind of keep those things in mind as well. The
(26:57):
other tax problems that happened usually only happened because you
were a C corp and didn't pay the federal taxes
on your corporation. You didn't find a timely file your
s corp or partnership returns and didn't get k ones
out to the owners of the business. They hit you
(27:20):
with penalties on the non filing of the tax return
or late filing of the tax return. Those penalties, yes,
some of them we can get waved and sometimes with
good cause we can get those things waved as well.
So you know, we've got to look at all the
different ways of going about getting a solution that is
(27:41):
in place. And if you are getting a K one,
then everything flows to your personal return and the taxes
are paid there. Now most people ask why am I
getting taxed this full amount when I only took so
much in distribute. Distributions amongst themselves are not taxable unless
(28:04):
it's as distribution an excess of basis. Long story on basis,
and we can't cover that here today. But it's the
net income from the business that is taxable on your
personal tax return. And you'll see many different mines on
that K one depending on your income source, depending on distributions,
(28:29):
depending on you know, how your profits are coming in,
and interest dividends, et cetera. Different items can show up
on those K ones and all of those need to
be listed on personal tax return and the taxes are
paid there. If you need money to pay your taxes,
you take a distribution from your business and pay the
(28:49):
taxes from the personal account. Don't enter mingle business and
personal out there. So that's you know, when we're looking
at businesses, that's what I look at is the biggest
thing that comes out of a business is when it
comes to pay tax problems. Is strictly coming back to
(29:10):
mostly time, it's payroll taxes, and it's something you need
to really jump in front of as quick as possible.
They will assign a revenue officer on that on payroll taxes,
because the first thing they're going to start looking at
is to assess the trust fund penalties and then expect
to get one hundred percent collections. Even though they will
(29:32):
set up a payment plan on it, their job is
to get it collected one hundred percent. It was wasn't
your money. It's you know, government's money, and you should
have paid it when you withheld it. So what I
tell you is, if you're in business, don't raid the
kitty from the payroll. Tax side penalties are too high,
(29:54):
too stiff, too much can be the nail that's in
your coffin of your of your business. Find other routes
to go borrow money, get a lot of credit, do
something different. You may have to terminate some people. Do
the things that you need to do to make sure
that you're in control of the finances for the business. So,
(30:21):
if you've got questions, man sending your questions. I got
a question here is kind of off topic. Is because
we mentioned something about an escort here. It is Ralph.
Question is as an es court, I'm an owner. Am
I required to take payroll if you are working in
(30:43):
the business. Ralph, Yes, you, as an owner, are required
to take what is considered to be a reasonable salary.
For the position that you hold and the work you
are doing. So you can actually break your work down
from everything from secretarial work, janitorial work, CEO works, CFO work,
(31:06):
controller work, retail salesperson work, whatever it may be. You
can break your position down into those roles and say, hey,
this is what a reasonable salary is. This is how
much time I spend doing each one of these things,
and you can get that down to a reasonable level.
(31:29):
But yes, if you are working in the business. Now,
if you are let's say just chairman of the board
and you're just kind of overseeing things from a high level,
you're not necessarily working in there. You can take maybe
a salary as a chairman for a small number and
maybe you're working at other jobs and this is only
(31:52):
a small piece that you kind of give guidance to.
Then we can manipulate, you know, from there, how much
time you're spending in the business, what you're doing in
the business. So those are the kind of things that
you would want to look at going from there. Hey,
I've got a couple questions about becoming an owner operator
and how we can truck to success, and we're going
(32:15):
to address those questions right after this quick.
Speaker 3 (32:19):
We have only scratched the surface of today's show. Please
stand by as Barry G. Fowler will be right back
with tax talk for you. As an owner operator. You
already spend too much time away from your family. Stop
spending time doing paperwork. Go to Trucker tax tools dot com,
(32:40):
a solution built specifically for truckers. Trucker tax tools dot
Com makes your life run smoothly. Let's get back to
tax talk for you with more tax talk once again.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
Here's your host, Barry G. Fowler. Hey, welcome back, and
we want to get you off on the right foot
truck and to success. You know, becoming a truck driver
and you know going through and running your own trucking
business sounds exciting and some people, you know it is.
(33:17):
I deal with all kinds of people and talking them through,
you know, trucking and different things that are needed when
you are in the trucking business. And you know, becoming
a owner operator is a great idea if you're disciplined
and disciplined entrepreneur who can handle the high initial costs,
(33:39):
the responsibilities risks associated with being your own boss, those
things that we discussed, you know, in the first segment.
The two segments of the show. And you know you
enjoy your independence, you enjoy potential for higher income. Can
(34:00):
you handle the flexibility that you need to be out
there operating the truck? You know? Can you be self
aware of self driven to run your business and have
the ownership you know? You do have higher costs, you
have business risks, you have increased responsibility and less stability. Now,
(34:24):
being an owner operator, you got to be looking at costs.
A lot of times we're looking at things like duel costs,
repair costs. Uh. You know, what kind of truck should
you buy? Should you get a new one, should you
get a used one? You know, what's your risk tolerance
as well? What's your stability tolerance? You know you need
(34:48):
to be one hundred percent stable in your life. The
second side of it is is are you finding every
deduction to keep your taxes? Where this goes for every
business out there is, well not just trucking, But we
get these kind of questions. Cindy asks, my husband's jumping
out to become an owner operator. What's doing is this
(35:10):
information I hear about per diems? Well, perdams is a
tax deduction, and you know per diems basically reimburse people
for travel, for food, miscellaneous incidentals. The IRS for truckers
(35:30):
has a standard perdem amount of eighty dollars per night
away from home except for the first and last, which
then it's forty dollars each of those nights, and then
it's eighty percent deductible, not the fifty percent for meals
and entertainment. So if you aren't over the road trucker. Now,
(35:53):
if you're just trucking locally and return home every night,
you're not getting meals, not getting travel. The per diems
these are for over the road away from home truckers.
You got to have an actual home you're supporting, whether
it's an apartment in a house, whatever it is. You've
got to have someplace that you're supporting that you come
back to and can lay your head down. If you
(36:15):
just live in your truck and you don't have any
of those expenses, you're considered a tax turtle and that
your home is your truck, and therefore you don't get
meals on the road. As simple as that, there's certain
rules out there. We work with you as an owner
operator to help you and guide you what is qualifying
(36:37):
for per diems. We tell you to keep a calendar,
even pull your ELD log so that you have proof
for the nights that you're away from home if you
should be audited. So things like that become deductions and
per diems is a fantastic deduction. And think of it
(36:58):
this way is you know, we get a lot of
truck drivers who are on the road eighty percent of
the time, and that means they're on the road two
hundred and eighty eight days out of the year at
times eighty. Now we didn't take first and last days
out of here, so you know this is a rough number,
(37:19):
but right around twenty three thousand dollars tax deduction before
the eighty percent, So that gives you an eighteen four
hundred and thirty two dollars of expense that you're riding
off against your income valuable deduction for an owner operator
right there. Now, if you're a W two driver, you
(37:39):
don't get this. You don't get pre dms. This is
only for owner operators out there. So they took away
the twenty one oh sixth form, which was the underreimbursed
employee business expenses to the Sugarne and many many truck drivers,
and it really affected people's taxes when they went to
(38:03):
the higher standard deduction and took away the unreimbursed business
expenses out there for individuals. So that's the one of
the good deductions for a business owner and especially owner
operators out there. Now, if you're in business, you know,
(38:23):
you got to start thinking about ordinary necessary expenses. And
we do this routine with everybody that's in trucking. We
have a form and we're looking for everything. You know,
when we go through and look at our bookkeeping for
a trucker, you know, we are looking specifically for every deduction.
(38:43):
So when we sit down we look at it. We're
looking at possibly telephone expense. Oh, speaking of telephone, we
haven't really given out this number to get a hold
trucker tax tools so that they can work with you
on bookkeeping and taxes. Matter of fact, we're running a
great special out there right now. If you're driving on
twelve near Ham in Louisiana, you saw our billboard signs
(39:09):
up there. There should be flashing up more often right now.
This talks about low costs, discounted bookkeeping and taxes for truckers. So, hey,
we're out here trying to be a service to truckers
and we help you. We're members of IDA and supporters
of IDA Owner Operator Independent Drivers Association. Hey, whether you
(39:31):
like the association or not, there are a lot of
the great things they do for truckers and helping represent truckers.
So it's a great membership to get out there and
very low costs for you as well. So I do
speak at a truck to success seminars and everything. So
we're always working to find better ways to help truckers.
(39:54):
But even if you're in business, you've got to be
going through and looking. You know, hey, did you deduct
the poor to the cell phone you use for business?
That's your personal phone you're using it? Well, did you
deduct your bookkeeping and tax preparation? Uh? If you go
to truck or tax tools dot com again truck or
tax tools dot com, you can get a free guide
(40:16):
and it gives you the tools to never worry about
your taxes again. Or you can just give us a
call at eight seven seven nine nine six two four
seven seven again eight seven seven nine nine six two
four seven seven Again. Just go to Trucker tax tools
dot com. We're here to provide the service that you
(40:37):
need to help your business that's out there. You know,
did you deduct things like fire extinguish you maybe the
cooking supplies you needed for the cab of the truck,
maybe the new mattress you bought. Those things are all
deductible for your business, and we want you to find
those things. You know, ice person, These may sound like
(41:01):
little things, but the little expenses add up and that's
the kind of things that we're looking for. You know,
do you have subscriptions that you use in the truck
that maybe you're running on your cell phone and that's
getting builds your personal account. We need to help you
find those. You can get the deduction for those kind
of things as well. What subscriptions are you running? Are
(41:22):
you deducting your eled it's by a road outlyss Do
you pay monthly for subscription to GPS? Things like that
that you need to be aware of. Are you looking
at your settlement statements you see from the company or
least on are they deducting the things the right way
(41:44):
for you? Are they hitting you with deductions that you
don't have. We've seen that as well, So we tell
everybody read your settlement statement, Look at your settlement statement,
know what's on it each and every week you get it.
Make sure the company's not hitting you for something that
you shouldn't be hit with. You're looking for every ordinary
and necessary business expense that you have as a business owner. Now,
(42:10):
don't get carried away trying to put personal stuff over
on the business. You don't want to intermingle business and personal.
You want to keep it separate. You want to reduce
the taxes to the lowest amount you can, and that's
what we work with you to do. Now, what's the
bad part about finding every deduction? Well, again, the good
(42:31):
part is it lowers your income, which lowers your taxes,
which lowers your self employment tax, which lowers your federal
income tax. Bad part is it lowers Social Security. How
much you would be contributing to Social Security, good or
bad depends on your philosophy behind social Security. If your
income is way down you're trying to get loans from
(42:52):
the bank, then the bank doesn't know trucking. They may
not provide you with the loans that you need. Maybe
if you're trying to buy a house, your income would
show way too far down because you know, a think
of it, you just lowered your income by you know
eighteen thousand dollars taxable income by that twenty three thousand
on a financial statement, and you're trying to go to
(43:14):
a bank and your income was really really low, so
that makes things a little bit difficult there for you
as well. Hey, I'm gonna surprised you, man. I'm running
long and they just told me I had one minute left. Hey,
I'm glad you joined us on tax Talk for You.
Follow us over at tax Talk for You dot com. Hey,
next week we're going to be off for Thanksgiving, So
(43:35):
have a wonderful and blessed Thanksgiving and then be back
here every Monday, ten am Eastern time for Tax Talk
for You again. To go to tax Talk for You
dot com. Follow us over there so you don't miss
an episode. And if you do, go check out our
podcast at tax talkfor You dot com or on iHeart, Spotify,
you name it. But above all, have a guide, blessed,
(43:57):
glorious week and a god blessed thanks Thanksgiving, a lot
to be thankful for. We'll see you the weekend after Thanksgiving.
Have a wonderful two weeks.
Speaker 3 (44:08):
Are you an individual or business that wants to understand
taxes and how they affect you? Are you looking for
specific tax advice for self employed business owners and truckers.
Are you behind on taxes and your bookkeeping? Are you
dealing with the irs and ready to have some relief,
(44:29):
Then you need Tax Talk for You, hosted by tax
and trucker expert Barry G. Fouler EA. Tune in ten
am Eastern Time every Monday right here on W four
CY Radio and Talk for TV. Don't forget to check
this and past episodes at tax TALKFORU dot com. See
(44:50):
you next week at W fourcy dot com.
The topics and opinions express in the following show are
solely those of the hosts and their guests and not
those of W FOURCY Radio. It's employees are affiliates. We
make no recommendations or endorsements for radio show programs, services,
or products mentioned on air or on our web. No
liability explicitor implied shall be extended to W FOURCY Radio
or it's employees are affiliates. Any questions or comments should
be directed to those show hosts. Thank you for choosing
(00:21):
W FOURCY Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Barry G.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Fowler EA brings you tax talk for you right here
on W four CY Radio and talk for TV. As
an enrolled agent and a national leader in tax resolution
as well as Trucker bookkeeping and tax planning. With over
thirty years of experience, Barry will break down taxes, bookkeeping,
(00:49):
tax planning, and tax relief for individuals and businesses just
like you. So let's have some tax talk for you
with your hosts.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Barry G. Ho Hey, good morning and welcome. Hopefully you
just finished watching or listening to asked the experts that
preceded us here, and I was just doing a show
with Steve O and asked the Experts talking about IRS
problems and problem resolutions. You can find those podcasts. Ask
(01:21):
the Experts has them on all the I Heart, Spotify,
you name it, it's there. We have some great shows.
We've been doing some shows with him for many many years.
Asked the Experts, has this come on and talk about
tax relief? Hey, this show tax talk for you. You know,
I enjoyed doing this because we get to bring out
(01:43):
new information or go back through and talk about different
things that can help you. The today's show came about
because we got a number of questions people asking, Hey,
should I go into business? You know, what do I
need to do? If I'm going into business or thinking
(02:04):
about getting out into business? Is this a good idea? Well,
first off, I can't tell you point blank for you personally,
if you going into business is the right move for you?
You know, if maybe you've been a W two employee
all your life, you're just not sure by going into business.
(02:28):
That is the first decision you've got to really make,
you know, So is this the right thing to do
for me to go out in the business? One? The
first question do you have what it takes? The drive?
Can you be success driven? Can you be self driven,
(02:52):
and are you self motivated? See those are the three selves.
Because if you you're elf, can't accomplish those three things
and be those three things, and business is probably not
right for you. You need somebody that's getting you and
(03:12):
driving you to be a success as opposed to you
being a success on your own. Now that could be
you know, your husband or your wife helps drive you,
and then maybe you can do a business together and
be driven to success. When you're a W two employee,
(03:33):
you're responsible to somebody else. You have that one person
or multiple people above you that are your bosses that
are pushing you to get your work done, or you're
going to be terminated, buyered, you're out of here. It
doesn't work that way when you're going to go out
in business. So you have got to be self motivated
(03:55):
and self driven. It's for that success for yourself and
for your family. Because going into business one, it takes
a lot of work. And I've been dealing with entrepreneurs
and owner operators and truck drivers for you know, more
than thirty plus years, and I've never seen anybody that
actually is going to work less in a startup business
(04:18):
while they're building their business. Then when you were an employee,
and when you're an employee, you clock in, you clock out.
It's your forty hours and maybe some overtime here and
there that you're going to go work. When you're running
your own business, that could be eighty hours a week.
It could be seven days a week working. It could
(04:39):
be not nine to five. Your business could be from
eight in the morning till eight or ten o'clock at nine,
depending on what you're going to be doing in your business.
So these are the things that you've got to think
about as you step out to go into business for yourself.
It's going to t take a lot of work. Stepping
(05:01):
out into business is going to cause a lot of worry,
and that's hard to avoid. You're going to be worried
about making payroll, what your future holds, what the uncertainty
is about income and paying your bills, if you're growing,
how you're going to grow, how you're going to hire,
the risks that you're going to have to take for
credit lines, paying back lines of credit money that you
(05:24):
owe to other people, or maybe you've brought in investors,
paying back investors money that you spend based on future
projections and profits. So It's a lot of stress that's
involved failure. It's always a possibility. Failure can cost you
big time. Businesses do fail. Trust me, Not everybody going
(05:48):
out into business is one hundred percent successful. That's why
not everybody goes out into business. Some people have to
be employees and have a W two paycheck. Know, otherwise
everybody be in business, you know, for themselves, and it's
not always your fault that they fail, or the fault
(06:08):
of the owner. You know. Even great decisions and good
decisions can have bad outcomes, could have a negative impact.
There's a lot of other factors that you can't control
in business, you know, and that failure out there can
cost you relationships and as possibility is something you can't
(06:30):
deal with personally, so you don't really want to go there.
I always like people telling me, man, you know, Verry,
this is the greatest thing because you are your own boss.
I laugh. I don't ever think of myself as my
own boss. You know. Maybe when I first started out
and doing taxes and stuff, I felt empowered to be
(06:54):
my own boss. But as you continue to grow and
you continue to take on clients, your client it's become
your bosses. So I don't report to just one boss.
I report to hundreds to thousands of people that are
now my bosses demanding, Hey, we need tax planning this
time of the year, we need taxes done. You know,
(07:17):
it's now in their hands to help control and impact
what we've got to do and what we've got to
accomplish here. So, you know, even sometimes you feel like
the employees you hire are your boss with their demands
of what they want or can't do or can do,
and you've got to work around it because sometimes hiring
(07:38):
is hard to do, especially finding good quality people. So
you're not going to be your own boss, but you
might feel empowered. So, you know, do I really want
to be in business? Hey? These are the negative things
so far that we're talking about. And I'm going to
guarantee you one thing. You will make the stack yep.
(08:01):
As a business owner, you will make mistakes. And if
you can't live with making mistakes, don't start your own business.
If it's going to affect you and your attitude, You're doomed.
It's done, it's over. The writing's on the wall. Before
you ever get started. You're going to make wrong turns,
you know, sometimes heading into businesses like walking through a
(08:24):
forest without a trail, you're setting your own trail. You
need to find your own paths. Sometimes you're going to
make it right and you should have made a left.
Sometimes you're going to make a left and you should
have made it right. Sometimes you just needed to keep
going down the path you were on and stay straight. Hey,
the good news is is if you can get around
those things and you can overcome the little mistakes that
(08:45):
you make in business, you can survive, and you survive them,
you come out stronger. Your business comes out stronger. So
sometimes make those little mistakes makes businesses stronger on their
good point and realize, hey, we need to go from
here to there. So maybe you made that left and
(09:07):
you need to turn back around, and you turn and
get back to where you were on that straight path
and fix the things and make it stronger going forward.
So maybe that's the fun part about being in business
is knowing that you can make a mistake and straighten
it out and continue to move forward stronger and better
(09:31):
as an organization and better as a person. Now we're
going to talk about some of the good things that
you can do and things and reasons you might want
to be in business for yourself, and we're going to
do that right after this.
Speaker 3 (09:50):
We have only scratched the surface of today's show. Please
stand by as Barry Chief Fowler will be right back
with tax talk for you. If you owe the IRS
or are going through an IRS audit, don't go at
it alone. Call Taxation Solutions Tax Relief at eight eight
(10:10):
eight nine three zero one zero one six. We are
your solution for IRS debts, audits, back taxes, garnishments, leans
and levees. Whether you're an individual or business, you need
a solution and a strong, aggressive tax resolution. Don't let
(10:31):
the IRS walk all over you. Stop the IRS now
call eight eight eight nine three zero one zero one
six or go to Taxationsolutions dot net now for a
free no obligation consultation. Let's get back to tax stock
(10:51):
for you with more tax stock once again, here's your host,
Barry G.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Feller. You know, welcome back. Looking at where I started
many many years ago to decide I'm going to go
into business and everything. I came out of college and
did what everybody else did, and as a CPA way
back in the eighties was get out to the you
(11:17):
know Big eight public accounting and you know, work in
that industry and then move from there to uh, you know,
out in the corporate world and rise to the corporate ladder.
I didn't like playing politics with bosses and everything else.
I had to make a decision earlier what did I
really wanted to do. And I decided I wanted to
(11:40):
help people. I wanted to do taxes. I've always been
doing taxes. Helped my dad when I was a kid
doing taxes. He worked at one of those you know,
box firms, uh part time, you know, on the weekends
and everything for a little more money. Since there were
five kids that he was feeding, you know, so there
were seven of us in the household, bus a dog,
(12:02):
and so you know, he was at that time the
only one working. So he was doing everything he could
to make ends meet. And we would go with him
and we could I could help to taxes, pen and paper,
pencil and paper, a lot of fun. But I really
reached back and decided this is something I wanted to do.
Be out in business for myself. But I had to
(12:23):
figure out what did people want or need and how
can I provide that niche to be a success in business.
So if you're thinking about going out in a business,
and that's maybe one of the first things you got
to look at, especially when you're starting to put together
maybe a business plan, which is really key to get
(12:44):
in your business started as well. How are you filling
avoid Is it something people want or neat? Do people
really want what you're going to be selling or the
service you're going to be providing. So if you're providing
a service that makes people feel better, maybe sleep better,
maybe learn better, live better, product everybody once, hey, go
(13:09):
out there and go after it. You know, you can
look at some successful startups and how they were built
around things that made life better. You know, computers. I mean,
who would have thought way back in the day computers
would be so portable That first compact portable computer that
was there that weighed fifty pounds and had the little
green screen. And I'm dating myself, but I'm gonna know
(13:32):
I already know them old that we would lug from
one place to another became these laptops that we carry
around that are no more than you know, two to
five pounds, really kind of cool, or you know, iPads,
whatever it may be. You know, the progress of transportation,
(13:52):
web applications, tutoring, tax preparation, i RS, problem resolution, all
these things that you know, we've jumped into and people
have jumped into over the years that have become hugely
successful because it fit a need, built a need, or
they establish a need for those products. Now, another reason
(14:17):
for starting a business is maybe you're going to be
better off. So hey, this this spands full range of
situations from making more money to being home more to
be with your children. Maybe you can do a part
time business, be successful and have more time for your kids.
Maybe you'd be able to live in a better place.
(14:39):
Maybe at some point you'd have more time. So there's
fundamentally some good reasons that can spill over to family
life that can help you. If it's a business that
you can run part time and spend more time with family,
great if it substitutes the income that you were making
for your w two wages. Again, you got to be
(15:04):
self driven though during times to make ends meet, make
it work, and continue to grow that business. Maybe you
can involve other family members or loved ones that can
work in the business and help the business grow. And
now you've got a family business and everybody you know,
(15:24):
you're raising the ship for everybody out there you know,
looking back for me, one of my main drivers wanting
to do business for myself was wanting to be able
to do things my own way, being that I was
self driven in to get the business going, and I
could spend the time that I needed focused on business
(15:49):
for my clients. That my days didn't have to be
technically from eight to five. I could be at work
and doing things early in the morning, take a little
break in the afternoon, and come back. Can do things
at home at night for taxes, bookkeeping, whatever it was
that we were promoting and pushing to grow our business,
tax resolution, We can do things that didn't require set
(16:13):
office hours, and it made our life happier because we
could focus on things that the kids can do to
make their life better such as sports, you know, baseball
and swimming, things like that, and so we could do
those kind of things, you know, so it made our
(16:33):
lives happier. Another thing that you can consider is you're
going to be able to control your own destiny. You know,
I built a business, You could build a business. So
maybe you want to be an owner operator truck driver
out there, but you're a W two driver right now,
Do I really want to jump out and become an
owner operator. Well, you've got to consider your control, self awareness,
(16:57):
what can you do, self motivation, all the things that
we talked about, and negatives on the self side can
be turned around as positives. Out here. You can control
your own destiny and you're how much you're driven to
be a success. You know, you've got to realize that
being a success means you're going to be putting your
credit online, You're going to be buying a new truck.
(17:17):
If you're going to be an owner operator or leasing
a truck for you know, three years, five years, whatever
it may be, you're going to be possibly get going
out and getting your own authority and then you're going
to be having to collect on invoices. Maybe you'll be
a LEAs tign driver and they're just going to give
you settlement statements. That might be the easiest route to
ease into being an owner operator out there, but again,
(17:42):
accepting loads, going after it, getting driven for a success
is going to be up to you, and you're going
to control your destiny, your financial future by how much
are you going to go out there and work? Now,
you also got to consider in this if you're going
(18:05):
to be like an owner operator is fluctuating freight prices
and fluctuating costs that just cost of fuel, repairs, things
like that. So you've got to take a little bit
of everything into consideration. So it may seem like maybe
you're making a dollar or two more a mile being
an owner operator, but then you've got more expenses over here,
(18:28):
such as owning the truck, repairs and maintenance and things
like that, lease of trailers, whatever you may be. You've
got to factor all that in to what your income
level is. So maybe you're making ten dollars more you
know out there, now you've got maybe eight dollars more
of cost, so maybe there is two dollars of flexibility
(18:50):
and more income for you. But then you've got self
employment taxes and other things out there, and you've got
other administrative costs that you've got to account for. So
those are the kind of things that you're going to
have to be looking at as all your expenses. And
then what you're going to want to do is say, hey, yes,
I am self motivated, I'm self driven, I'm self aware,
(19:12):
and I have that drive to go after this. Now stop,
take a step back, put a business plan together, and
in that business plan. Make a decision what do I
How much money do I need to be a success
to pay for the things in my life. That is
what you need to do when you're going out into business.
(19:35):
You may not be going out there to change the
world or better. You may not. You may only be
trying to change your little family world and make it better.
But maybe you have the idea of a product or
service that will make the world, the United States a
(19:56):
better place. Go for it. Hire people, pay them a
good salary. Build the business that you've dreamed of in
the business of your dreams. Be that go getter, go
after it. Maybe you want to be the next huge
trucking company, Go for it. Be self driven. So, if
your business has a purpose and you have the drive,
(20:18):
being in business maybe the right thing for you. Hey,
we're going to take a short break. When we come back,
we're going to talk about some business tax problems that
people have who have been in business and now are
looking for solutions to tax problems, and we're going to
discuss those right after this break.
Speaker 3 (20:38):
We have only scratched the surface of today's show. Please
stand by as Barry Chief Dowler will be right back with.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
Tax talk for you.
Speaker 3 (20:49):
As an owner operator, you already spend too much time
away from your family. Trucker Tax Tools handles all your
bookkeeping in taxes. No matter what level trucker you are,
life on the road can be taxing, but that doesn't
mean that your wallet or time with your family should suffer.
Trucker Tax Tools makes your life run smoothly. Go to
(21:11):
Trucker tax Tools dot com for a free guide that
will give you the tools to never worry about your
taxes again. Call Trucker Tax Tools eight seven seven nine
sixty six two four seven seven or go to Trucker
tax Tools dot com now and let the experts keep
you trucking. Let's get back to tax stock for you
(21:36):
with more tax stock once again. Here's your host, Barry G.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
Faller. Hey, welcome back. You know we're talking about going
into business and it is the right thing to do.
You know, sometimes in business you struggle. Sometimes it's money struggles.
Sometimes it's sales are struggling sales or damn, sometimes costs
are gone way up due to inflation, things like that,
(22:06):
and so you find got to find cash flow solutions, right,
and sometimes that's the consequences of taxes. We were dealing
with the client who had major cash flow problems, but
he was trying to find everything he could do to
take care of his employees had been with him a
long time, and instead of closing the business and telling everybody, hey,
(22:32):
we just can't afford to do this anymore, he just
kept making payroll. But what he was doing was in
pain in the payroll taxes. Now he's in way over
his head. And you know, if you're avoiding paying payable
taxes for cash flow, you're going to have bigger problems.
If you can't afford to pay the payroll taxes, you
(22:54):
can't afford to be in business, to be honest with you,
or you can't afford to have as many employees. Sometimes
you've got to do that reduction just to make it
make sense to keep the business afloat for those that
you can afford to keep on in business, just supported
(23:17):
by the revenues that are coming in. What happens when
you don't pay your payroll taxes, Well, the IRS comes
after you. IRS is going to be all over you,
and the IRS is going to be looking for that
money any way, shape or form. Now there are two
parts to payroll taxes. There is the part that the
(23:38):
company pays so Security and Medicare, So that's roughly seven
and a quarter percent of your payroll taxes of gross payroll.
And then there is the side that is pulled from
the employee's check, which is that matching seven and a
quarter SOI Security and Medicare and the federal withholdings. Now
(24:02):
that portion is considered pulled out in trust means you
were trusted to pull that money from your employees check
and send it to the IRS. That portion can be
subject to trust fund penalties. What are trust fund penalties?
Penalties that are assessed because you made the choice not
(24:23):
to pay them into the IRS and use the money
that was you pulled out in trust and use it
to not pay the IRS but to pay other bills.
IRS can come in and assess trust fund penalties against
the owners of the business in any signers on the
(24:43):
checking account. That there alone can hit you hard as
an individual. So you want to make every attempt possible
to pay at the very minimum all the trust fund
taxes you withheld from people's checks. Sometimes that's not possible,
and you're going to get hit with the trust fund
(25:04):
penalties again. They gets hit against any owners in the
business and any signers on checking accounts, they're considered to
be decision makers. Hey, we've got a quick question from Joe.
I was a manager of a bar and they hit
me with trust fund penalties? Can I get those removed? Joe,
(25:28):
I've seen this before you as a manager, you've had
signature authority over at a checking account. We would have
to look at what authority you actually had there. We
might be able to get trust fund penalties removed from you,
depending on a what account you were signing on. If
you were just signing on a petty cash account that
(25:50):
only had a small amount, you didn't have anything to
do with payroll or beating other bills. Besides, what was
products that were dropped off that you either didn't order
or didn't have a say in those kind of things.
We might be able to get you off of those
trust fund penalties, especially not being an owner but being
(26:12):
a signer on the account. Yes, you can be held responsible.
We have seen where managers and businesses that had signature
authority on account have been held one hundred percent liable
for trust fund penalties. Unfortunately, sometimes you cannot avoid those
because you had the authority to do it. And it
came to the IRS's attention that you helped make the
(26:36):
decision not to pay the payroll taxes, and you did
nothing to get them to pay those payroll taxes either.
But if you had absolutely zero knowledge of it, we
might be able to become that portion of it. So
kind of keep those things in mind as well. The
(26:57):
other tax problems that happened usually only happened because you
were a C corp and didn't pay the federal taxes
on your corporation. You didn't find a timely file your
s corp or partnership returns and didn't get k ones
out to the owners of the business. They hit you
(27:20):
with penalties on the non filing of the tax return
or late filing of the tax return. Those penalties, yes,
some of them we can get waved and sometimes with
good cause we can get those things waved as well.
So you know, we've got to look at all the
different ways of going about getting a solution that is
(27:41):
in place. And if you are getting a K one,
then everything flows to your personal return and the taxes
are paid there. Now most people ask why am I
getting taxed this full amount when I only took so
much in distribute. Distributions amongst themselves are not taxable unless
(28:04):
it's as distribution an excess of basis. Long story on basis,
and we can't cover that here today. But it's the
net income from the business that is taxable on your
personal tax return. And you'll see many different mines on
that K one depending on your income source, depending on distributions,
(28:29):
depending on you know, how your profits are coming in,
and interest dividends, et cetera. Different items can show up
on those K ones and all of those need to
be listed on personal tax return and the taxes are
paid there. If you need money to pay your taxes,
you take a distribution from your business and pay the
(28:49):
taxes from the personal account. Don't enter mingle business and
personal out there. So that's you know, when we're looking
at businesses, that's what I look at is the biggest
thing that comes out of a business is when it
comes to pay tax problems. Is strictly coming back to
(29:10):
mostly time, it's payroll taxes, and it's something you need
to really jump in front of as quick as possible.
They will assign a revenue officer on that on payroll taxes,
because the first thing they're going to start looking at
is to assess the trust fund penalties and then expect
to get one hundred percent collections. Even though they will
(29:32):
set up a payment plan on it, their job is
to get it collected one hundred percent. It was wasn't
your money. It's you know, government's money, and you should
have paid it when you withheld it. So what I
tell you is, if you're in business, don't raid the
kitty from the payroll. Tax side penalties are too high,
(29:54):
too stiff, too much can be the nail that's in
your coffin of your of your business. Find other routes
to go borrow money, get a lot of credit, do
something different. You may have to terminate some people. Do
the things that you need to do to make sure
that you're in control of the finances for the business. So,
(30:21):
if you've got questions, man sending your questions. I got
a question here is kind of off topic. Is because
we mentioned something about an escort here. It is Ralph.
Question is as an es court, I'm an owner. Am
I required to take payroll if you are working in
(30:43):
the business. Ralph, Yes, you, as an owner, are required
to take what is considered to be a reasonable salary.
For the position that you hold and the work you
are doing. So you can actually break your work down
from everything from secretarial work, janitorial work, CEO works, CFO work,
(31:06):
controller work, retail salesperson work, whatever it may be. You
can break your position down into those roles and say, hey,
this is what a reasonable salary is. This is how
much time I spend doing each one of these things,
and you can get that down to a reasonable level.
(31:29):
But yes, if you are working in the business. Now,
if you are let's say just chairman of the board
and you're just kind of overseeing things from a high level,
you're not necessarily working in there. You can take maybe
a salary as a chairman for a small number and
maybe you're working at other jobs and this is only
(31:52):
a small piece that you kind of give guidance to.
Then we can manipulate, you know, from there, how much
time you're spending in the business, what you're doing in
the business. So those are the kind of things that
you would want to look at going from there. Hey,
I've got a couple questions about becoming an owner operator
and how we can truck to success, and we're going
(32:15):
to address those questions right after this quick.
Speaker 3 (32:19):
We have only scratched the surface of today's show. Please
stand by as Barry G. Fowler will be right back
with tax talk for you. As an owner operator. You
already spend too much time away from your family. Stop
spending time doing paperwork. Go to Trucker tax tools dot com,
(32:40):
a solution built specifically for truckers. Trucker tax tools dot
Com makes your life run smoothly. Let's get back to
tax talk for you with more tax talk once again.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
Here's your host, Barry G. Fowler. Hey, welcome back, and
we want to get you off on the right foot
truck and to success. You know, becoming a truck driver
and you know going through and running your own trucking
business sounds exciting and some people, you know it is.
(33:17):
I deal with all kinds of people and talking them through,
you know, trucking and different things that are needed when
you are in the trucking business. And you know, becoming
a owner operator is a great idea if you're disciplined
and disciplined entrepreneur who can handle the high initial costs,
(33:39):
the responsibilities risks associated with being your own boss, those
things that we discussed, you know, in the first segment.
The two segments of the show. And you know you
enjoy your independence, you enjoy potential for higher income. Can
(34:00):
you handle the flexibility that you need to be out
there operating the truck? You know? Can you be self
aware of self driven to run your business and have
the ownership you know? You do have higher costs, you
have business risks, you have increased responsibility and less stability. Now,
(34:24):
being an owner operator, you got to be looking at costs.
A lot of times we're looking at things like duel costs,
repair costs. Uh. You know, what kind of truck should
you buy? Should you get a new one, should you
get a used one? You know, what's your risk tolerance
as well? What's your stability tolerance? You know you need
(34:48):
to be one hundred percent stable in your life. The
second side of it is is are you finding every
deduction to keep your taxes? Where this goes for every
business out there is, well not just trucking, But we
get these kind of questions. Cindy asks, my husband's jumping
out to become an owner operator. What's doing is this
(35:10):
information I hear about per diems? Well, perdams is a
tax deduction, and you know per diems basically reimburse people
for travel, for food, miscellaneous incidentals. The IRS for truckers
(35:30):
has a standard perdem amount of eighty dollars per night
away from home except for the first and last, which
then it's forty dollars each of those nights, and then
it's eighty percent deductible, not the fifty percent for meals
and entertainment. So if you aren't over the road trucker. Now,
(35:53):
if you're just trucking locally and return home every night,
you're not getting meals, not getting travel. The per diems
these are for over the road away from home truckers.
You got to have an actual home you're supporting, whether
it's an apartment in a house, whatever it is. You've
got to have someplace that you're supporting that you come
back to and can lay your head down. If you
(36:15):
just live in your truck and you don't have any
of those expenses, you're considered a tax turtle and that
your home is your truck, and therefore you don't get
meals on the road. As simple as that, there's certain
rules out there. We work with you as an owner
operator to help you and guide you what is qualifying
(36:37):
for per diems. We tell you to keep a calendar,
even pull your ELD log so that you have proof
for the nights that you're away from home if you
should be audited. So things like that become deductions and
per diems is a fantastic deduction. And think of it
(36:58):
this way is you know, we get a lot of
truck drivers who are on the road eighty percent of
the time, and that means they're on the road two
hundred and eighty eight days out of the year at
times eighty. Now we didn't take first and last days
out of here, so you know this is a rough number,
(37:19):
but right around twenty three thousand dollars tax deduction before
the eighty percent, So that gives you an eighteen four
hundred and thirty two dollars of expense that you're riding
off against your income valuable deduction for an owner operator
right there. Now, if you're a W two driver, you
(37:39):
don't get this. You don't get pre dms. This is
only for owner operators out there. So they took away
the twenty one oh sixth form, which was the underreimbursed
employee business expenses to the Sugarne and many many truck drivers,
and it really affected people's taxes when they went to
(38:03):
the higher standard deduction and took away the unreimbursed business
expenses out there for individuals. So that's the one of
the good deductions for a business owner and especially owner
operators out there. Now, if you're in business, you know,
(38:23):
you got to start thinking about ordinary necessary expenses. And
we do this routine with everybody that's in trucking. We
have a form and we're looking for everything. You know,
when we go through and look at our bookkeeping for
a trucker, you know, we are looking specifically for every deduction.
(38:43):
So when we sit down we look at it. We're
looking at possibly telephone expense. Oh, speaking of telephone, we
haven't really given out this number to get a hold
trucker tax tools so that they can work with you
on bookkeeping and taxes. Matter of fact, we're running a
great special out there right now. If you're driving on
twelve near Ham in Louisiana, you saw our billboard signs
(39:09):
up there. There should be flashing up more often right now.
This talks about low costs, discounted bookkeeping and taxes for truckers. So, hey,
we're out here trying to be a service to truckers
and we help you. We're members of IDA and supporters
of IDA Owner Operator Independent Drivers Association. Hey, whether you
(39:31):
like the association or not, there are a lot of
the great things they do for truckers and helping represent truckers.
So it's a great membership to get out there and
very low costs for you as well. So I do
speak at a truck to success seminars and everything. So
we're always working to find better ways to help truckers.
(39:54):
But even if you're in business, you've got to be
going through and looking. You know, hey, did you deduct
the poor to the cell phone you use for business?
That's your personal phone you're using it? Well, did you
deduct your bookkeeping and tax preparation? Uh? If you go
to truck or tax tools dot com again truck or
tax tools dot com, you can get a free guide
(40:16):
and it gives you the tools to never worry about
your taxes again. Or you can just give us a
call at eight seven seven nine nine six two four
seven seven again eight seven seven nine nine six two
four seven seven Again. Just go to Trucker tax tools
dot com. We're here to provide the service that you
(40:37):
need to help your business that's out there. You know,
did you deduct things like fire extinguish you maybe the
cooking supplies you needed for the cab of the truck,
maybe the new mattress you bought. Those things are all
deductible for your business, and we want you to find
those things. You know, ice person, These may sound like
(41:01):
little things, but the little expenses add up and that's
the kind of things that we're looking for. You know,
do you have subscriptions that you use in the truck
that maybe you're running on your cell phone and that's
getting builds your personal account. We need to help you
find those. You can get the deduction for those kind
of things as well. What subscriptions are you running? Are
(41:22):
you deducting your eled it's by a road outlyss Do
you pay monthly for subscription to GPS? Things like that
that you need to be aware of. Are you looking
at your settlement statements you see from the company or
least on are they deducting the things the right way
(41:44):
for you? Are they hitting you with deductions that you
don't have. We've seen that as well, So we tell
everybody read your settlement statement, Look at your settlement statement,
know what's on it each and every week you get it.
Make sure the company's not hitting you for something that
you shouldn't be hit with. You're looking for every ordinary
and necessary business expense that you have as a business owner. Now,
(42:10):
don't get carried away trying to put personal stuff over
on the business. You don't want to intermingle business and personal.
You want to keep it separate. You want to reduce
the taxes to the lowest amount you can, and that's
what we work with you to do. Now, what's the
bad part about finding every deduction? Well, again, the good
(42:31):
part is it lowers your income, which lowers your taxes,
which lowers your self employment tax, which lowers your federal
income tax. Bad part is it lowers Social Security. How
much you would be contributing to Social Security, good or
bad depends on your philosophy behind social Security. If your
income is way down you're trying to get loans from
(42:52):
the bank, then the bank doesn't know trucking. They may
not provide you with the loans that you need. Maybe
if you're trying to buy a house, your income would
show way too far down because you know, a think
of it, you just lowered your income by you know
eighteen thousand dollars taxable income by that twenty three thousand
on a financial statement, and you're trying to go to
(43:14):
a bank and your income was really really low, so
that makes things a little bit difficult there for you
as well. Hey, I'm gonna surprised you, man. I'm running
long and they just told me I had one minute left. Hey,
I'm glad you joined us on tax Talk for You.
Follow us over at tax Talk for You dot com. Hey,
next week we're going to be off for Thanksgiving, So
(43:35):
have a wonderful and blessed Thanksgiving and then be back
here every Monday, ten am Eastern time for Tax Talk
for You again. To go to tax Talk for You
dot com. Follow us over there so you don't miss
an episode. And if you do, go check out our
podcast at tax talkfor You dot com or on iHeart, Spotify,
you name it. But above all, have a guide, blessed,
(43:57):
glorious week and a god blessed thanks Thanksgiving, a lot
to be thankful for. We'll see you the weekend after Thanksgiving.
Have a wonderful two weeks.
Speaker 3 (44:08):
Are you an individual or business that wants to understand
taxes and how they affect you? Are you looking for
specific tax advice for self employed business owners and truckers.
Are you behind on taxes and your bookkeeping? Are you
dealing with the irs and ready to have some relief,
(44:29):
Then you need Tax Talk for You, hosted by tax
and trucker expert Barry G. Fouler EA. Tune in ten
am Eastern Time every Monday right here on W four
CY Radio and Talk for TV. Don't forget to check
this and past episodes at tax TALKFORU dot com. See
(44:50):
you next week at W fourcy dot com.
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