Year end payroll tasks

Once again, the year has flown by and it's already December! Below are some year end payroll tasks to review before the year is up. Let us know if/how we can help with any of these:

Do you provide health insurance, HSAs, retirement accounts and/or other pre-tax benefits to employees or yourself as owner? If so, you should go to the "Reports" Tab in the Intuit Online Payroll System and review the "Deductions and Contributions" Reports to make sure you have correct totals for deductions and benefits. You need to make adjustments by the end of December.

It is also a good time to review and update deduction and contribution amounts for 2020. Most insurance plans adjust pricing on an annual basis now, so it's a good time to adjust not only the YTD amounts for 2019, but also update the amount per paycheck for 2020. You'll want to make those adjustments under the "Employee" Tab AFTER you create the final paychecks of 2019.

Please contact your accountant if you need help making any updates/adjustments. It is much easier to make those adjustments BEFORE the end of December!

Every November/December, you should receive a letter telling you what your new MN Unemployment rate will be for the upcoming year. When you get that letter, you can log into your payroll, click on "Setup" Tab, then click on "State Taxes" and then "Edit the Rate" under the MN UI section. Make sure to pick Jan. 1, 2020 as the new Effective Date.

Let us know if you need help with this! Scan and send us a copy of that MN UI letter and we can also update that rate for you.

If you'd like to do some year end planning, contact your accountant with estimates of company income/expenses. We can help you decide if it makes sense to adjust withholdings on your final paychecks, create a bonus paycheck to increase retirement contributions and/or tax payments. These items need to be done before we make your W2s in January, so start planning now!*

The IRS is creating a new W4 Form that is to be used for 2020. It is currently NOT complete and available in final form, but here is the page with a FAQ about it; the link should be posted for the new form soon. Once that new form is in place, you will need to provide it to all new employees OR any employee requesting to adjust their withholdings. With the new federal form, new employees will also need to fill out a MN W4 to separately calculate number of exemptions on the state level. Please be sure to download and have a MN W4 on file to give to new employees as well.


It'll be January before you know it, so please let us know if/how we can help as we quickly roll into Holiday season! 

Thanks!
Mark, Alyssa and Fox Tax Team