To see your total income and taxes for the year so far, you first need to categorise all your business income transactions since the beginning of the financial year (April 1st).
Tip: For personal transactions (such as transfers or a payment from a friend), use the 'Archive' category or simply leave them as uncategorised and Solo will exclude them from your tax calculations.
How to categorise a transaction
Click the Select a category drop down box for the transaction you want to categorise.
Select the appropriate category from the drop down menu.
Click the round tick ✅ button to save the transaction.
That's it! Your income transaction has now been categorised, added to your total income and included in Solo's tax calculations. You can view your categorised transactions at any time by clicking on the Income tab at the top of the page.
To undo a categorised transaction, click on the ✖️ icon next to the category name to remove the category. Then save the transaction by clicking on the tick button. The transaction will then be moved back to the Uncategorised tab and excluded from Solo's calculations.
Tip: Categorise new income transactions as soon as possible to keep your tax calculations current.
Which income category do I choose?
There are only three types of income that you need to categorise in Solo; Self-employed Income, Zero-rated Supplies and Rental Income. Other income types, such as Salary & Wages or Schedular Payments, have already had the tax portion paid to IRD on your behalf by your employer.
Self-employed Income is general untaxed income that has been paid directly to you by a customer or client and has not yet had any tax taken out if it.
Zero-rated Supplies is income you get paid from an overseas client or customer. This type of income is similar to Self-employed Income but the key difference is that it has no GST. Overseas clients are not required to pay GST to the New Zealand government so you do not need to add GST when invoicing them.
Rental Income is income from your rental property or a flatmate in your home.
For more information about income types in Solo, view our understanding income types article.
Tip: For personal transactions, use the 'Archive' category. This will hide/remove the transaction and exclude it from Solo's calculations.
How is GST calculated?
Solo automatically calculates GST based on your settings and the income type you select.
If you've selected that you're GST registered in your settings, Solo will automatically calculate the GST and income amounts of each transaction, based on the category you choose. E.g if you select Self-employed Income Solo will work out the GST amount, but if you select Zero-rated Supplies Solo will ignore GST on the transaction.
You can see how much GST is being calculated on a transaction by clicking on the down arrow ∨ at the right hand end of the transaction.
Tip: You can also check how Solo is calculating your income by exporting your data. Go to 'Export Data' in the main menu of Solo to get started. You can also view totals for each income type.
Batch categorising similar income
To categorise lots of similar transactions quickly try this trick:
Click on the transaction description or search for the transaction to group similar transactions. You can also click on an amount to group transactions with the same amount.
Select the checkboxes at the left-hand end of the transaction to select multiple transactions.
Use the Categorise all drop down menu to apply a category to all the selected transactions.
Save each transaction by clicking the tick ✅ button.
