The self-employed and gig workers have a lot more work to do when it’s time to file taxes. Having a good record-keeping system and using the right bookkeeping software are all important for many freelancers to keep on top of their taxes.
Filing your taxes is a task that few people enjoy doing. And if you are juggling being a freelance writer, Uber driver, and other 1099 jobs, tax season can be especially monotonous.
Luckily, Keeper Tax was built with tax preparation for freelancers and self-employed workers in mind. It also serves as a digital bookkeeping tool so that you can track work-related expenses throughout the year to maximize your tax deductions.
Is Keeper Tax the right tool for you versus other tax software? It certainly has worked for many other independent contractors, but let’s see how it stacks up in this complete Keeper Tax review.
What is Keeper Tax?
Keeper Tax is a tax software service that’s designed for independent contractors to help with their expense tracking and may also help them qualify for tax deductions. The company is headquartered in San Francisco and was co-founded in 2018 by Paul Koullick and David Kang.
According to their website, Keep Tax has saved self-employed workers more than $40 million dollars. Their average customer saves $6,067 per year.
The mobile app is available for IOS and Android.
How does Keeper Tax work?
To pay for state and federal taxes, small business owners, freelancers, and independent contractors must set their money aside since taxes aren’t withheld on paychecks. There is also a self-employment tax that self-employed workers must pay which adds to their expenses.
Keeper Tax aims to make the process of tracking expenses, tax filing, and finding ways to save money easier.
The primary service that Keeper Tax provides is allowing you to scan all your previous purchases to look for tax-deductible purchases. Using Plaid, Keeper Tax securely connects to your bank accounts with the apps or websites that you use.
You can opt to receive a text message to confirm your transactions as business-related expenses if you’d prefer over going into the app.
Who should use Keeper Tax?
Keeper Tax was designed for freelancers, contractors, and small business owners. Some of those who would benefit from their tax filing service include:
- Freelance consultants
- Meal delivery and ride-sharing drivers
- Real estate agents
- Copywriters
- Artists, designers, and photographers
Is Keeper Tax Legit?
Yes, Keeper Tax is a legitimate, California tech startup. According to their website, Keeper Tax has been featured in Forbes, Vice, TechCrunch, and Entrepreneur. Its tax filing software has been available since 2018.
Keeper Tax Products and Features
A better way to track tax write-offs for your business is here with Keeper Tax. Below are the key financial products and features that Keeper Tax offers.
Business-Expenses Tracking and Exporting
Expense tracking with Keeper Tax enables a powerful and hands-off approach to your bookkeeping. The Keeper Tax app allows you to automatically record and categorize possible tax write off as they happen. This will save time so you can focus on other areas of your work.
You’ll need to link up your bank accounts and business credit cards with your account to get started. After you’ve linked up to your accounts, Keeper Tax will review your financial accounts to categorize your business expenses.
Come around time to file taxes, you can then write off each business expense.
If you paid for a business expense in cash or with a bank account that’s not linked with Keeper Tax, simply take a picture of your receipts. Expenses that Keeper Tax is unsure of whether it’s eligible for tax write-offs will initiate a text message asking for additional information.
Keeper Tax will find business expenses such as:
- Vehicle depreciation
- Property insurance
- Meals for work
- Gas, tolls, and parking
- Car maintenance, insurance, and registration
- Internet, power, water, and phone expenses
- Home office furniture and equipment
You can even use your bank statements or transactions for the Keeper Tax app to accomplish your expense tracking. There is no need to have a paper receipt for expenses related to your business purposes.
Be sure that your transaction record includes the date, time, purchase amount, merchant’s name, and purpose.
You can also export expenses outside of Keeper Tax. This is something you may wish to do if you want to have a tax preparer help with your tax filing. There’s a one-time fee of $39 to do this (recurring fee each year).
Tax Write-Offs
The primary purpose of Keeper Tax is to look for potential tax write-offs that could save you more money. It helps keep your records organized so that when it’s tax time, you’re not in a frenzy looking for your past purchases. The service is a money and time saver for gig workers and freelancers.
Tax Preparation and Filing
An optional service that Keeper Tax offers is their tax filing service. Even those with complex tax situations can use Keeper Tax to help with the filing process.
It’s not necessary to have a Keeper Tax subscription for the entire tax year to use their prep and tax service. Once tax time rolls around, you just need to have saved your receipts, digitized expenses, and bank statements.
These can then be uploaded to their software. Keeper Tax will look for tax-deductible expenses and write-offs and file your taxes.
Keeper Tax’s tax filing software helps people who pay the self-employment tax. However, it can handle a wide range of situations when it comes to your tax bill.
W-2 income, investment income, retirement contributions, and income, and income that comes from formally incorporated businesses like a limited liability corporation can all be handled with Keeper Tax.
The company keeps an in-house tax professional to review every return to ensure that your tax bill is accurate, complete, and not a risk to be audited.
Free Resources for Freelancers
In addition to Keeper Tax’s paid services, they offer a library of resources on their website that is available for free. You don’t need to have an active account to access these resources. These resources include the items below.
Write-Offs Lists
Semi-custom lists of possible write-offs for 30 to 30 lines of work (real estate sales, graphic designs, side hustles like Uber) can be reviewed. Each list may include expenses for work supplies, mileage, vehicle maintenance, continuing education, labor, advertising, legal, and other professional services. The content varies by line of work.
Tax and Deduction Calculators
There are also interactive deduction and tax calculators available on Keeper Tax’s website. These can be used to estimate or total your quarterly tax payments, tax due at tax time, total income tax owed, and home office deduction expenses.
Simple Invoice Generator
This basic template has no send or storage functions so you must print and mail or download and email the final invoice. This resource is still useful for those who don’t want to spend money on invoicing software or type invoices by hand.
How much does Keeper Tax Cost?
Here is how much Keeper Tax costs for each of their offerings:
- Expenses Tracking – There is a 14-day free trial, then it’s a monthly cost of $16
- Annual tax filing file – $89
- Export data fee – $39
You get a free trial for 14 days to try out their expense tracking service before jumping into a monthly subscription fee of $16. That gives you some time to figure out if it works for your needs.
If you wish to file your taxes, Keeper Tax charges $89 for your state and federal taxes for the year. You can work with third parties like an accountant or another tax review service if you wish. There’s a one-time fee to export your expenses to a spreadsheet that you’ll need to pay to do so.
Keeper Tax Pros
Here are some of the advantages of using the Keeper Tax app for your tax review needs:
Possible Tax Bill Reductions
Keeper Tax can save you money by reviewing your accounts to find possible write-offs when you connect to your accounts.
14 day Free Trial
There’s a free trial of 14 days that you can use the service to try it risk-free.
Free Tools and Resources
Whether you use Keeper Tax or not, you can use their free tools to help with things like estimating your quarterly taxes.
Makes Record-Keeping Easy
Keeper Tax will look through all your purchases to find items that are tax-deductible and save you money.
Keeper Tax Cons
There are some drawbacks that you should be aware of when using their service such as:
Limited Accounting Features
Keeper Tax does not come with accounting features and reports that software like Quickbooks provides. It’s worth noting that Quickbooks doesn’t offer purchase categorization via text message.
Paywalls
If you want to file your federal and state taxes using Keeper Tax, you have to pay $89. There are alternatives that you might be able to use to do it for free, for example. But if you want to use those resources, you will have to pay their $39 export fee.
FAQ: Keeper Tax Review
Is Keeper Tax a good value?
Keeper Tax pricing is less expensive than competitors like QuickBooks. And the monthly fee can pay for itself with the savings you may otherwise miss. Full-time 1099 workers may find more value than part-timers or those who don’t have as many tax deductions.
Does Keeper Tax have the right features?
Tracking your work receipts is the primary benefit of using Keeper Tax. You can link it up with your financial institution or credit card issuer so those purchases are automatically uploaded and categorized for you.
Is the Keeper Tax app legit?
Available on the Google Play and Apple Store, Keeper App has a user-friendly interface. It’s an entirely an app-based filing system. The navigation is exceptionally simple, walking users step-by-step through the filing process.
Does Keeper Tax have good resources?
There is a host of free knowledge articles available on Keeper Tax’s website. You can also use the “Ask an Accountant” section to get help with questions. If you sign up for their bookkeeping service you can also interact with an assigned bookkeeper who is available for specific questions about write-offs.
Does Keeper Tax offer customer support?
The software is relatively simple, so setting up and using it on a day-to-day basis should be fairly seamless. There isn’t much in the way of customer support if you need help through it appears. The website has a link to their email support which is support@keepertax.com.
Is Keeper Tax worth using?
Keeper Tax offers expense write-off and tax filing to users who are independent contracts, self-employed, or gig workers. Many users have said that they were able to save money that they wouldn’t have otherwise.
One of the unique features that the service offers is to receive text messages to confirm and categorize purchases. If you are looking for a tracking system for your work-related purchases, Keeper Tax is a great solution.
Just keep in mind that you may have other options available that are less expensive when it comes to doing your taxes. The money savings might make that a mute case though.
