How to Enter Startup Costs or Expenses Paid for With Owner’s Personal Monies

How to Enter Startup Business Costs

The way in which these startup expenses are entered will depend on how the owner wants to treat them – loan or investment, the way the business is structured – Sole Proprietor or Single Member LLC, Partnership or Multi Member LLC, or Corporation, as well as when these expenses were incurred.

What are Startup Expenses or Costs?

Before we get into the above, let’s start off with the main question: What are startup expenses or costs? Not everything is a startup cost and to determine what is and isn’t a startup cost we have to look at whether the costs were incurred prior to the start date of the business (costs to be amortized) or subsequent to the start date of the business (costs to be expensed). Startup costs are those expenses that were incurred prior to the start date of the business, and are amortized over a number of years so they are not a total expense in the first year. Initial costs – market research, advertising the future opening of your business, salaries for training employees before the business opened, incorporation costs, trademarks and the likes are startup costs.

As for amortization, that’s just a fancy accounting term accountants like to use when they refer to the process of spreading costs out to more than one year. They are usually intangible costs like legal fees, government filing fees and the likes. Fortunately, amortization is generally a straight-line process; you take the costs and divide them by the number of years and expense by that portion. It is always important to consult a CPA prior to booking startup costs.

If there are technology equipment such as computers or furniture in the initial purchases, you will need to separate them if they are used in the business, since they will need to be depreciated. Depreciation is generally for tangible items such as buildings, equipment, computers, furniture, vehicles, etc. Again, speak with your CPA about what was purchased in order to have all the startups entered accurately, as well as to get the help in setting up a depreciation schedule. For tax purposes, the IRS has specified fixed asset lifespan depending on what kind of fixed assets they are.

Journal entries are the best method to use when entering startup costs, regardless of the type of startup, the type of business structure, or whether the startup is a loan or an investment to the business. You will create an “Other Asset” account under which you can make sub accounts where you will be debiting the transactions, and an equity or loan account where you will be crediting them – depending on if the owner is investing or lending the monies to the company – respectively.

If some of these startup expenses are fixed assets, you will need to create individual Fixed Asset accounts for each, with the corresponding entry going to the Equity or Loan account. If there are multiple small transactions to be entered, you can enter them via the asset account register or the Equity or Loan account register you created. This way you will be able to enter as much information as possible including the dates of each transaction.

Whatever you do, just make sure that you get the correct equity balance to start off with; that is, how much did the owner(s) put in the business to start the business? In taxes, the equity accounts will be used to track the owner’s basis, which is adjusted up for income, owner’s contributions and other items, and down for losses, draws, and other items. Depending on the type of structure – sole proprietorship, LLC, partnership, C-corporation, S-Corporation, business losses may or may not be deductible for tax purposes if the owner does not have enough basis to deduct them against.

You should also speak with your CPA about whether it is better to consider these startup costs a contribution by the owner to the business, or a loan to the business to be paid back at some point in the future, as it relates to taxes.

Another way to enter these initial expenses on QuickBooks for a Sole Proprietor or Single Member LLC, is by using a Credit Card Account called something like “Owed to owner” and entering the expenses from there. This will increase the liability balance while allocating the expenses to their relevant business expense account. If the business pays it back, use the credit card account on the check which will zero out the credit card account. If it does not pay the monies back, use a journal entry to transfer it to the owner’s contribution account. Of course, this is based on what the initial startup costs are.

This is an option used by many QuickBooks users, and although it will make the accounts “accurate”, I do not recommend it from an accounting standpoint. Bookkeeping should be seamless and trackable! Just imagine that someone takes over the bookkeeping and trying to figure out the books, they will no doubt be looking for a business credit card since one would have been entered. For this reason I do not recommend using this method. Why add a credit card to the business in QuickBooks when there isn’t actually one for the business?

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As a business owner myself, I know that it is unavoidable at times – mixing business with personal funds, but this is not good business practice and should be avoided as much as possible. Why? Because, it is very easy to overlook business expenses that are paid with personal funds, and it is the best way to have IRS auditors going through all your personal affairs even though an issue is a business one. Since those monies do not directly affect the business bank or credit card accounts, you will need to make a concerted effort to track those expenses and record them appropriately on the business books.

Entering business expenses paid for with personal credit card or cash on the business books will depend on the structure of the business:

  • For a Sole Proprietor or Single-Member LLC, the expenses should be entered to the relevant expense categories via Owner’s Draw/Equity. You will use this account for monies going in and out of the business by the owner. The Owner’s Draw/Equity accounts may have negative balances from time to time which will look odd on the balance sheet. So, it’s important to prepare a journal entry zero-ing out or offsetting these balances at the end of each month, quarter, or year.
  • For a Partnershp or Multi-Member LLC, the expenses should be entered via Member Contribution if the owner is investing it, or loan based on the partnership’s operating agreement.
  • For a Corporation, the expenses should be entered as loan if the owner will need to recoup the funds, or Equity Contribution if the owner wants to invest it in the business. If they are to be entered as loan, you will need to make the loan official, with repayment terms, interest, etc. Also, bear in mind that the IRS sometimes re-characterizes loan repayments as dividends – with serious tax implications. In this regard, a CPA should be consulted before deciding how to book these monies in QuickBooks.

In addition to the above mentioned effects of mixing business and personal funds, the mixing of business and personal funds can also pierce the corporate veil, and expose corporate business owners to personal liability which defeats the purpose of having a corporation to begin with. Sole proprietors already have personal liability, but not a corporation as it is an individual entity in itself. Separate business and personal financials at all cost, but if you do not, remember to enter them in their appropriate places and keep a record of receipts in the business files.

How to Record Personal Credit Card Expenses Incurred on Behalf of the Company in QuickBooks

How to Record Credit Card Expenses Incurred on Behalf on Your Company in QuickBooks

The correct way to enter business expenses that you have paid for with your personal credit card, debit card, or cash in your company’s QuickBooks, will be based on whether you want to invest this money in your company or reimburse yourself for it, as well as the type of business structure your company is setup as – Sole proprietor, Single member LLC, Multi member LLC, or Corporation. With QuickBooks, there are usually more than one ways to deal with various scenarios. Here are a few to deal with this one:

Option 1 – Reimburse Yourself

  • Setup yourself in QuickBooks as a vendor and create a bill for your expenses, allocating them to the relevant business expenses the funds were used for. Then, pay yourself with a check using the “Pay Bill” feature when you are ready to take your reimbursement. This option can be used regardless of your business structure.
  • Create a Current Liability account and call it something like “Owed to Owner”, then enter the transactions in this account where the credit card and other expenses will be easy to track in the event of an audit, with the exact amounts and vendor details listed. You will then write a check to yourself using this current liability account in order to clear the balance and reimburse yourself. This option is not suitable for a Corporation.
  • Fill out an expense report just as you would expect any other employee to do, in order to be reimbursed. All receipts that are company related that the funds were used for, should be attached to this expense report so that all vendor details are part of the company records. In addition, keep a copy of the personal credit card statement in the business files to serve as backup for the expenses. Then, write a check for the expense report total, allocating each expense to its relevant company expense. This option is most suitable for a Corporation. (NOTE: Use the “Write Check” feature only if you are paying the full reimbursement. If you will be taking the reimbursement in portions, you should create a bill with all the expenses listed, then use the “Pay Bill” feature to pay the portion of the bill you want to receive. When you are ready to reimburse yourself for the balance, you will again use the “Pay Bill” feature to complete the payment. Also, be sure to keep receipts as backup for the cash purchases you make with your personal funds on behalf of your business.)

Option 2 – Invest the Funds in Your Business

  • Create a Current Liability account and call it something like “Owed to Owner”, then enter the transactions in this account where the credit card expenses will be easy to track in the event of an audit, with the exact amounts and vendor details listed. Next, create an Equity account and call it something like “Owner Contributions”, and transfer the total of all the transactions in the current liability account to this Equity account to invest it in your business. This option is not suitable for a Corporation.

  • Create a Liability account and call it something like “Loan from Shareholder”, then enter the individual transactions in this account, so that you will be able to allocate each to its relevant expense. Next, create an Equity account and call it something like “Shareholder Investment”. When you are through entering the transactions in the “Loan from Shareholder” account, transfer the total balance to the “Shareholder Investments” account. This option is most suitable for a Corporation.

Mixing personal funds with business funds is never a good idea! Avoid co-mingling funds at all cost – especially for a Corporation. You could expose yourself to the kind of liability you formed the Corporation to avoid, in the first place.

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