2023 New Year’s Resolution: Prepping Your 2022 Taxes Early

Experts caution taxpayers to prepare for another year of delays and hassles as the tax-filing season has already begun, highlighting the significance of filing early and carefully organizing your information.

The COVID-19 outbreak has left the economy in shambles. Financial stability is the most critical challenge for 12% of small business owners, followed by losing business and acquiring new consumers. No wonder taxes—a bill that arrives at the end of each fiscal year—are the second-most pressing issue for small businesses in the United States.

The Importance of Preparing to File for the 2022 Tax Year Now

In a typical tax year, the IRS estimates that 30 million people put off filing their taxes until the final two weeks before Tax Day. The reason we say "usual" is because the pandemic-related deadline juggling by the IRS over the past couple of years reduced the last-minute rush.

Even though the deadline to submit your 2022 taxes is April 18, 2023, typically, the IRS begins receiving returns as early as January.

• Faster refunds: Receiving a quicker tax refund is among the most popular justifications for filing taxes early. The quickest way to receive your refund is by filing your return electronically and choosing direct deposit into your bank account.

If the government does owe you money this year, making an early file can ensure that you receive every dollar that is due to you. According to IRS data, taxpayers who submit before the end of February receive average refunds of $400, much more than those who file later. Naturally, you're more likely to file earlier if you know you're getting a return, which may contribute to the fact that early filers receive more significant refunds.

Another argument, though, is that the earlier you begin filing your taxes, the more time you have to ensure you're taking advantage of all the tax breaks and credits you're entitled to, which require more effort and paperwork than using the standard deduction.

• Avoid processing delays: The IRS was dealing with a garbage fire earlier this year. The agency still had 21.3 million unprocessed paper tax returns at the end of May 2022, up from 1.3 million at the same time last year. For months, millions of people waited for their tax refunds. 

• Minimize stress: Most taxpayers who responded to a TaxSlayer survey said that tax season is stressful. 16% of surveyed said they would prefer receiving a root canal than filing their taxes. When a significant assignment is staring you in the face, it is advisable to complete it as quickly as possible. Income taxes are the same: just grit your teeth and complete the forms.

To do your taxes earlier, try setting a fictitious deadline for yourself. Give yourself a little reward for being practical and accountable after filing your return. After that, unwind.

• Less last-minute scrambling for documents: When you put off a vital task, you strain yourself more. You know you need to submit your taxes at some point, and no amount of procrastination will change that. Complete the process as soon as possible so that you can relax while everyone else is concerned about paying their taxes on time. Tax returns can be complicated. You increase your chances of not having essential papers or information in time by putting them off. Again, by getting a head start, you may avoid this problem.

• Less chance of forgetting important documents: We've all heard that hurrying things increases the likelihood of an error. Suppose you wait until the tax deadline approaches. In that case, you may feel rushed to gather your tax records, and you may need to pay attention to vital information such as charitable contributions and other deductions.

Suppose you work with TaxTaker early in the tax season. In that case, you can take extra time to ensure you've gathered all of the correct information, and we can assure you get every possible deduction to give you the best return possible. More importantly, you can avoid an unpleasant IRS audit, which is more likely if you mistakenly leave out critical information on your return.

• Switching to TaxTaker has never been easier: Our seasoned tax and financing experts ensure that you receive the most significant amount of money due each year while requiring no changes to your existing financial partners or software stack. That means you maintain your accountant/CFO/QuickBooks and receive more money on top of what they currently find you!

Unlike traditional accounting firms or banks, we make qualification and underwriting decisions in minutes rather than days. We'll inform you immediately if you're a good fit for our services because time is money, and you should save both.

How Can TaxTaker Help?

If you’re planning on taking the R&D credit this year, you already know you need to complete it prior to filing your taxes. We never want to be the delay if you’re making the responsible decision to file early. 

For the past few years, we've been building, honing, and refining our platform to make it ridiculously simple, and fast for startups to get cash back so they can focus on what they do best—building awesome companies and changing the world. 

We've spent decades in the field listening to the pain points of businesses and their accountants. Through an intuitive tech-enabled solution, TaxTaker streamlines the process of obtaining these tax credits so that consumers can finish it in one hour or less.

It happens in three easy steps after you join up:

• Sync up your finances.
• Describe your projects to us.
• Get the credits you are due.

Our software also offers several additional advantages to your R&D credit filing process, such as less time spent exchanging emails, which speeds up the process by 90% for a busy founder.

• Direct document uploading to the app puts all the necessary information in one location.
• Takes you step-by-step through each process, making it incredibly simple to understand and ensuring nothing is missed.
• Allows you to call actual people at the other end of the line to plan meetings with our staff simply by clicking a button. 

Why wouldn't you want your money quickly returned directly to your startup's profit margin? 

Using our app, you can recoup up to 10% of the annual cost of producing products and technology.

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