My husband started a handyman business about a year ago. For personal reasons, he's been keeping it pretty small.
Before he started the business I used to do all the budgeting/book-keeping for both of us. We kept it simple by mostly purchasing everything on credit card, which I could check online (don't worry we always paid in full before it was due) and he'd let me know if he bought anything with cash. We'd informally discuss spending and allocation and this system worked really well until he started his business. Then it got complicated. He'd buy a bunch of things at Home Depot and other hardware stores, but I didn't know if they were business purchases or home improvement purchases, (he likes to tinker and fix things up around the house). Additionally complicating things is that some business purchases he expects the customer to reimburse him for and some he doesn't. To address this I asked him if he would mind joining me for a weekly scheduled discussion of what was what. He agreed, but practically it doesn't happen every week (more like every other week or twice a month).
Even with the meetings, the fact that everything is on the same recepit and all mixed togather makes the accounting difficult, especially since when all the items are on the same receipt the sales tax gets lumped together on all of them. To get precise numbers we have to do a lot of dicussing and fair amount of math. It's not completely untenable, but I figure there's got to be a better way!
The reason I want to keep track of all of it seperately is that I don't mind if his business isn't making a lot of money, but I think we should have an accurate picture of how much it is making.
Anyway, a possible partial solution I came up with for this is that he should get a second credit card to put on things for the business for which he will not be reimbursed. Then, anytime he's purchasing stuff a customer will reimburse him for or something for home he should just group them on the conveyor belt so that customer stuff comes first and his stuff comes second. That way he can just draw a line on the receipt (he always carries a pen) and the math will be a little less complicated. It's only a partial solution because I'd still have to do the math for the sales tax, but I can't think of anything better.
Any thoughts?
If you think my partial solution is okay any suggestions of which credit card to apply for as his "business" credit card? (We currently use chase freedom unlimited for our personal spending and both have excellent credit.)