Opening a business

Hi AP82, 

Hope you're having a good day! If you are the only person operating the business, you are considered a sole proprietor and will be required to file Schedule C part of your 1040 tax return. To keep track of your expenses, QuickBooks online allows you to link your business bank account so it makes it easier to categorize your expenses. Once you start hiring employees, you can also use the payroll service in QuickBooks to help you with that as well. Please see additional resources below:

• QB's Online 
• Schedule C 
• Schedule C Instructions  
• Starting a Small Business  

Hi AP 82.  

Based upon your information, your business appears to be a sole proprietor/self-employed.  I would start by doing some research for how to operate self-employed business.  There are many resource(s) such as the Dept. of Revenue, SBA, local Chamber of Commerce, in addition to QuickBooks Online.   The most likely tax form will be Schedule C within the 1040 tax return.  You can keep track of expenses using many types of income/expenses tracking systems.  QuickBooks is a good way to track income/expenses; if you use third-party applications such as Venmo, Cash-App, and Square, these providers will also track income/expenses as well.  With these companies, you most likely will receive a 1099-K for all transactions in excess of $600.  As far as hiring employees, they will get W-2s at the end of the tax year.  I would definitely do more in-depth research about payroll taxes and quarterly payroll filings once you decide you want to hire employees for your business. Payroll is a very important task in a business, so you may want to outsource it to a well-known Payroll processing company such as QuickBooks Payroll, ADP, Paychex, etc.  I would suggest to do good research on this as well.   Additionally, you may need to look into worker compensation and unemployment liability insurance.

I hoped that I have answered your questions to get you started.  These were very good questions in starting up a new business.