You might wonder if this is even possible. But regardless, one has to express a certain amount of appreciation to the IRS for any attempt to explain these complicated regulations.
I’m sure you all know what I am referring to when I mention the “repair regs.” However, just in case, let me clarify what is being clarified: Near the end of 2013 (although generally effective for tax years beginning in 2014), the IRS issued…
The Elective Partial Disposition under the TPRs
By Bob McElroy, Certified Trainer, Sage University
Suppose your company bought a new building in 2000 for a cool $2 million. You created the asset record in your Sage Fixed Asset—Depreciation software (called “FAS” back in those days). And you depreciated it over a 39-year recovery period in your tax books. The record might look like this:
You…
Since bonus depreciation was first introduced by the Job Creation and Worker Assistance Act of 2002, it has been extended multiple times. Except for once (in 2008), whenever the deduction for bonus depreciation has been extended, it has been made retroactive so no lapse was allowed to occur. Considering its latest extension through 2014 (although long-production-period property and certain aircraft may use bonus depreciation…
We all know Sage Fixed Assets is an industry-leading suite of products that allows you to simplify your fixed assets accounting processes, but are you using the products the right way and to their full potential? It’s a common misperception to believe that just because you’re using the products means you’re using them correctly. In fact, many customers who attend our training classes discover they’ve been using the products…
The IRS has just released the new depreciation limitations and the annual lessee inclusion amounts for luxury vehicles placed in service or leased during 2015. In addition, there is a change for 2014 due to the extension of the provision for bonus depreciation. These new limits can be found in the IRS Revenue Procedure 2015-19.
First, let’s talk about the new limits for luxury vehicles placed in service in 2015:…
Help! My monthly depreciation is wrong!
Here are some variations of that issue:
Let's start off with…
You may be surprised to learn the standard mileage rate used to calculate the deductible costs of operating a business vehicle has been increased for 2015 to 57.5 cents per mile (it was 56 cents per mile in 2014). What makes this so surprising is the fact that gas prices at the pump have plummeted over the past several months. And, at 57.5 cents per mile, this is actually the second highest rate in the tax service’s…
How to ensure the IRS is happy with your Form 4562 - Depreciation & Amortization
Year-end Tax time is here and when the time comes in the Sage Fixed Assets version 2015.1 Tax Update the Form 4562 will need to be reconciled to your assets.
The Tax update will not be release until the first week in February.
When it is time to run your Form 4562, the thing you will want to do is run depreciation on the <All…
The concept of impairments is only used for financial reporting purposes and never for tax. For tax purposes, an asset is either depreciable or not. It is a different story under GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Prnciples), however.
Under both GAAP and IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards), an asset is written down for impairment when it is probable a loss has occurred. However, the process for assessing…
The Sage Fixed Assets 2014 Year-End Center is now live! Get all the latest knowledge articles, videos, and online resources you need for your year end activities.
There is information for Installation, Depreciation concepts, Reports, and Tax forms.
You can bookmark this page and feel free to review as often as you start with your year-end activities, and set up for the new year.
Note: Some features may require an active…
As we look at the task of year-end tax planning, it is time to be sure we know which federal tax provisions are expiring at the end of 2014. However, while that is important, this year we also have to consider that should Congress finally act to pass legislation, some of the provisions that expired at the end of 2013, may well be extended and be available in 2014. Although I am only going to discuss those provisions…
Use of the Custom Import and Export Helper
By Dennis Mabon, Implementation Consultant
Whether your need is to convert your existing fixed assets from another system to Sage Fixed Assets (SFA) Depreciation or to make changes to existing Depreciation assets, SFA Depreciation provides tools to help make the job simpler.
The Custom Import Helper will assist you in adding assets to a new or existing company in SFA, or…
When acquiring new property, for tax reporting purposes, one has to (or at the very least, one should) consider the different available options that exist today for expensing part or all of an asset’s cost in the year in which it is placed in service. So, how many ways are there????
I can think of three:
"Badges? We don't need no stinkin' badges!" is a well-known and widely quoted line from cinematic history. With Sage Fixed Assets user security you can limit who has access to the data and which functions a user has access to.
Sage Fixed Assets offers users a variety of ways to input and manipulate asset data, however there are times when access to that data will need to be restricted. In Sage Fixed…
Managing the Challenges of Performing an Inventory
By Lawrence Kimes
Planning to do an inventory of your fixed assets? Let’s review the challenges you will likely face.
But first, even before you begin the physical inventory, consider the advantage of having a policy of standard operating procedures in place. This policy should set forth the procedures to follow when an asset initially arrives on site as…
You’ve heard of a “do-over,” right? We now have a do-over officially sanctioned by the IRS. With the issuance of Revenue Procedure 2014-54, taxpayers may make a late partial disposition that will allow taxpayers to go back to prior years and treat the retirement of a structural building component as a disposition. Revenue Procedure 2014-54 provides guidance on making an automatic accounting method change in order to…
When I was thinking about what to write for this month’s blog, I realized that quite a lot has been in the news lately about fixed assets.
Running reports for past or future periods
by Amanda Wolf, Sage Fixed Asset Customer Support Analyst.
Reporting for a past or future period is possible within the Sage Fixed Assets program. By calculating depreciation to a needed period, you can then run any report for that period.
When depreciation is run in Sage Fixed Assets the program is not creating a cumulative total of prior runs, but rather is calculating…
Which of the following is a true statement? Or, are they both true?
1> All personal property is Section 1245 property.
2> All Section 1245 property is personal property.
Only the first statement is correct! The second statement should be revised to read “Most Section 1245 property is personal property” and then, it also would be correct.
Since I always like to give a little background, I found…
Organizing your Sage Fixed Asset database(s)
By Sam Cimmarusti, Certified Trainer
After initially setting up the SFA—Depreciation software, a common question from students is how to setup the database(s) for efficiency and the separation of data. My general suggestion for setup is as follows: create separate databases as individual work areas to store the various companies that hold asset information based on the…
No, this blog has definitely not been posted to the wrong site! After all, both blueberry bushes and cows are fixed assets and the connection to each other is that they have both recently been mentioned in Congress during the talks on renewing and possibly expanding the deduction for bonus depreciation.
Here’s how this month’s topic came about: In last month’s blog, I discussed bonus depreciation expiring at the end…
How to Replicate an Asset Already Depreciated
By Bob McElroy, Certified Trainer, Sage University
“The best thing about being me... There are so many ‘me’s.’”
-- Agent Smith, from the movie The Matrix Reloaded
Agent Smith was programmed with the ability to create an almost endless number of clones of himself. Using the Sage Fixed Assets--Depreciation program, we too have the ability…
There has been much talk in the last several months about the 50 plus tax provisions that expired at the end of 2013. (Be sure and follow my General Accounting blog on this site for more news on the extenders!) Of all these recently expired provisions, the one that probably affects the most businesses is the deduction for bonus depreciation.
There is no doubt bonus depreciation is a valuable deduction…
Changing Assets and How It Affects Depreciation
By Dianne Yusi, Customer Support Analyst
Once asset data has been entered in Sage Fixed Assets, this information can be changed at any time. It is easy to edit General Information (top half of the Asset Detail screen, or the fields included in the Asset List view) fields. Simply type in the new value for the field that needs to be changed and click the Save button to save…
Sometimes you just have to step back a bit, look at some of the more complex areas of tax law, and wonder how we got here. It certainly didn’t happen overnight. It seems whenever a new regulation is passed, something gets overlooked and ten more rules have to be created just to make certain the first rule is clear or a loophole is closed. Exceptions in the tax code have become a way of life.
Let’s take a moment…
