By Mary Jo Coulehan | Pagosa Springs Area Chamber of Commerce
The Chamber of Commerce, in partnership with the Small Business Development Center (SBDC) and Chamber member engagement, is pleased to announce some upcoming educational classes that we think will be of great use to our business community.
First on the list is the popular one-on-one QuickBooks consultation sessions to be held on Aug. 17 from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the Chamber conference room.
These sessions are meant for intermediate users of QuickBooks, not novice or beginner users. If you have some experience with QuickBooks yet are experiencing a particular problem or problems with your setup, inventory, invoices, reporting or the like, this 45-minute free session is for you.
There will be four slots available on an appointment basis. These slots will be open to Chamber members first and a waiting list will be created for all non-Chamber members. Should the slots not be filled, then those on the waiting list will be contacted.
With only four slots available at this time, you won’t want to miss this opportunity. The sessions will be conducted with Nelly Burns, who is an accounting business owner, SBDC consultant and QuickBooks pro advisor and trainer.
Since this opportunity is limited and free educational classes such as this are part of your Chamber membership benefits, this class will open up first to our members. If you are interested in scheduling a free session with Burns, go to www.sbdcfortlewis.org/consulting. Scroll down and select “Request an Initial Appointment” or “request Follow on Appointment” if you have worked with the SBDC before and then follow the prompts from there. If you go straight to the SBDC website, www.sbdcfortlewis.org, scroll down to the “no-cost, confidential one-on-one consulting” and follow the steps for new or existing clients. Click on the class and register for any of the open slots.
Burns can help you set up a better invoice or invoicing system, a better report to garner the information you need, a better inventory system or even set up job codes so that you can run and understand your financials better and you can streamline your accounting.
Should we get more than four sign-ups, we are looking to host another QuickBooks one-on-one consulting class on Aug. 24. In addition, later in the year we are looking at two more possible QuickBooks classes. One class will be for novice QuickBooks users and another class identifying some of the pitfalls to avoid when converting from QuickBooks desktop to QuickBooks online. Stay tuned for when these classes will be held.
The other class that will be held in August will be Business Tax Designation and Tips with attorney Alex Buscher and accountant Troy Reeder. You have set up or are setting up your business. What kind of tax designation do you assign to your business: LLC, C Corp, S Corp, etc.? If you set up your business one way, is it correct? Are you following the guidelines of that designation? Are you protecting your assets (personal and business) if you have an LLC? Are you getting the best tax deductions under your current designation?
Buscher and Reeder will be on hand on Aug. 30 to help set forth some guidelines for you and answer some questions on business tax designation. This is a topic business owners often skim by, think they know the best system — which may be the easiest, but not the best. If you are self-employed, this is an important class to attend. It will be held from 4 to 5 p.m. This class is free and open to the public. There will not be a Zoom link at this time. The location will be determined soon. To register for the class, go to the Chamber website, www.pagosachamber.com and go to the Events Calendar. Click on the date and the class and register.
These classes aren’t until August; however, we are just a few days away from that month starting, and you should reserve time now should you want to take these classes. For more information, please contact the Chamber at (970) 264-2360.
