Tax pooling is part of the strategy Shore Accounting Solutions employs to assist businesses with managing cashflow and provisional tax payments.

Tsarina Dellow is a chartered accountant at the two-person firm in Amberley, 45 minutes north of Christchurch.

She says paying provisional tax on dates Inland Revenue (IR) prescribes can be hard on small- and medium-sized businesses’ cashflow. That’s particularly the case during the January to May period, when the department awaits payment of two provisional tax instalments (not to mention GST).

Xero’s Small Business Insights reveal January and May are two of the most difficult months in terms of cashflow. August is another. (See a pattern here?)

Tsarina says business owners can come unstuck in this period – particularly if they’re guilty of not squirreling cash away throughout the year.

“Kiwis are often quite bad at saving. They’re not very good at putting money away in the good times, so when they have a bit of a bump – maybe a customer pays late or a supplier puts their costs up – they don’t often have that buffer there. When you don’t have that buffer, things start to go downhill and it gets really stressful for people really, really fast.”

Enter TMNZ

As an IR-approved tax pooling provider, TMNZ allows businesses to make their provisional tax payments when it suits them.

There is no need to worry about late payment penalties. And the interest it charges is fairer than what IR charges when they miss a payment.

Tsarina mentions this service to clients when discussing tax planning and cashflow management if she notices they’re going to encounter any difficulty at certain times of the year.

“If [TMNZ] can help them out with that, we can set a programme in place to even things out during the year,” she says.

“It delivers excellent benefits for people’s cashflow. They’re able to pay their tax as and when it suits them and their business – and they don’t have to worry about the IR always chasing them up. If they can’t meet a provisional tax payment, they can hand it over to TMNZ and pay it when they can.”

About Shore Accounting Solutions

Tsarina has been working at Shore Accounting Solutions for four years. Her colleague Ben Shore founded the firm in 2012.

The duo is big on providing great, technical tax advice and helping North Canterbury businesses and the community grow.