06.14.16

Federal Funds and Your Audit Requirements
Harry Fox

Your organization has just received its first federal grant award and everyone is thrilled. As the celebration is going strong and everyone is in high spirits, the executive director mentions that she heard from a colleague that these federal awards come with extra strings attached. In such a case, your organization may be subject to a specialized audit called a Single Audit. In our latest Not-For-Profit Group blog, we break down what a Single Audit entails and the reporting requirements attached to this specialized audit.

06.09.16

Whipping Up a Social Media Strategy for Your Restaurant
Christopher Georgiou

Social media is a great way to connect with current and potential customers. The active user base certainly shows a world of opportunity. According to its 2015 Annual Reports (Form 10-K) filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Facebook and Twitter boast an impressive 1.04 billion daily active users in December 2015, and 302 million monthly active users in the three months ending December 2015, respectively. In our latest Restaurant Group blog, discover ways you can take advantage of various social media tools to help promote your restaurant.

06.01.16

Are You Growing Yourself Broke? Don’t Forget This Important Metric

We figured we’re due to go back to analyzing some good old fashioned financial metrics for fast growing companies. This is a topic that is integral to our services and one our founder, Chris Arndt, is especially fond of. Chris presented a workshop on these three metrics and why many scaling businesses fail because they don’t put enough emphasis on the Payback Period.

05.31.16

Be Careful What You Toss: Plan Record Retention Requirements
Stephanie Zaleski-Braatz

As far as the IRS is concerned, you cannot be overly cautious with saving too many retirement plan documents. Plan sponsors, on the other hand, might reasonably feel the need to free up file storage space every now and again by purging documents that are no longer needed. This article examines where to draw the line and also looks at IRS rules for documentation of hardship withdrawals and participant loans.

05.24.16

Giving Your Revenue Cycle an Annual Checkup
Greg Koelling

If a practice does not know whether its revenue cycle management system is functioning, it might be headed for trouble. In such cases, the practice may want to perform a checkup of its system. This article notes that a systems review can help keep performance in high gear and maximize revenue. A Sidebar warns of the necessity of ensuring that providers abide by their contracts.

05.17.16

Six Awesome Tips for Productivity

Output, yield, productivity. We’re always looking for ways to be more efficient and er, productive? So we’ve compiled our favorite, but perhaps, unexpected tips. Remember that this is not a ‘one size fits all’ list, but hopefully a few of these will be a good reminder of some ways to get more done in what seems to be those ever shorter days!

05.13.16

Making Meaningful IRA Contributions is Easier Than Ever

This article encourages people who may have dismissed traditional IRAs in the past to take a fresh look at them. It explains that income limits for deductibility and maximum annual contributions are more generous. The article also talks about the benefits of investing in Roth IRAs. A Sidebar notes that, effective for IRA withdrawals taken in 2016, individuals can execute only one traditional IRA rollover in a 365-day period.

05.10.16

The Ins and Outs of Using Accountable Plans to Save Taxes

When an employer pays an expense reimbursement or advance to an employee, the IRS generally considers the arrangement to be disguised taxable compensation. Accountable plans are an exception to this rule, allowing payments to qualify as tax-favored expense reimbursements. This article explains how to set up accountable plans to save taxes for both employees and employers.

05.05.16

Menu Costing Affords Restaurateurs Proper Pricing and Inventory Management

How often do you cost your menu items? Menu costing allows for proper pricing and inventory management. In our latest Restaurant Group blog, we give you tips on how you can determine the various costs of the items in your menu, how frequently you should examine these figures, and the benefits you will reap from following this practice on a regular basis.

05.03.16

Give Employees More Bang for Their Buck: How to More Effectively Use Default Deferral Rates and Auto-Escalation Clauses
James Quaid

According to a Plan Sponsor Council of America survey, only 46% of defined contribution plans automatically enroll participants. The most common default deferral rate for those that do is 3%. Are plan sponsors telling employees that they can afford to retire by saving just 3% of their salary each year? Some participants may think so. This article discusses how to use default deferral rates and auto-escalation clauses to boost participants’ retirement savings.