NZ Financial Year End 2025 – what to prepare

(NZ Financial Year End)

The end of the financial year is upon us! When 31 March 2025 rolls around, we’re going to end the financial year and usher in the new financial year of FY2026 on 1 April 2025! Hooray!

Or not, if you don’t have your tax affairs in order!

As the financial year draws to an end, small business owners in NZ will start worrying about their taxes. So here are some tips and tricks to have a less panicky financial year end:

Get an Accountant

Seriously, why are you trying to cheap out on getting an accountant? Get one already and you won’t even have to read the rest of this article. Then you can spend time working on your business, or spending time with your family.

If you have an accountant – you should have nothing to worry about. If you’re still worrying about the financial year end, then talk to your accountant. If your accountant charges you every time you breathe in their general direction, then you need a new accountant who won’t do that.

If you can’t get in touch with your accountant, or they take forever to respond to your emails then its time to fire them and GET A NEW ACCOUNTANT.

But I don’t want/can’t afford/am to small to get an accountant

SIGH.

OK.

In which case the rest of this article is for you. But seriously though, unless you’ve got a background in tax and accounting, consider getting an accountant.

NZ Financial Year End tip #1 – Use a spreadsheet or accounting software

If you have an accounting software like Xero or MYOB setup, this is pretty easy. If you don’t have one, then consider using a spreadsheet to keep track of your business spending.

Most business spending these days are done electronically. If you can export a CSV or Excel copy of your business’s transaction for the financial year, you can work with the spreadsheet to identify your income and expenses. Note this this is a LOT easier if you use a separate bank account for your business (separate from your personal spending account).

NZ Financial Year End tip #2 – Gather source documents for purchases above $1,000

Generally speaking, your bank statements are your primary source document. This means that this is the main source document that the IRD will investigate if they ever want to check your books. In most cases, they won’t want to look at all the individual receipts you have spent on expense claims.

That being said, its good to hang on to purchase invoices or receipts for items above $1,000. Make scans/copies of them and keep them in your folder. If the IRD will ever ask you for proof of transactions, they will target the transactions that are worth more than $1,000. Everything else can be verified through your bank statements.

NZ Financial Year End tip #3 – Calculate your net income

Net income is your Sales minus your tax deductible expenses. Calculating sales is easy. Sales is whatever income you received from providing services/selling products to your customers. Expenses are trickier.

Generally speaking, anything spent towards the operation of your business is an expense. Easy expenses to claim are:

• Purchase of retail goods for sale
• Raw material/Ingredients purchases
• Office/shop rent
• Stationery
• Telephone bills
• Staff wages/contractor wages

And the list goes on. If you’re ever confused about what you can and cannot claim, you can check out this guide that we’ve prepared to help you determine it.

Home office and mileage expenses

If you use part of your home to operate your business, you will be able to put through a home office expense claim. You can read about that more in this article.

If you use your personal vehicle for business use, you can also put through a mileage claim for your car. You can read more about that here!

Once you’ve gotten your Sales and your income sorted out, you just take your sales and minus your expenses. If it is a negative, then you’ve made a loss. If it is positive, then you’ve made a profit! (and have to pay taxes)

The end?

Once you’ve got your net income, you then need to file the net income with the IRD. You can do this via your MyIR. Once you’ve done than you may have tax to pay, or have a tax refund coming your way.

Then you can relax for another 12 months until the next financial year shows up.

Happy accounting!