On December 22, just a few weeks following the passage of the Senate’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the conference version of the bill was signed into law, marking the largest change to U.S. tax policy in decades.

With most of the provisions set to go into effect in the new year, it’s important that the manufacturing industry review the changes that occurred during the conference process to understand the impact to their companies and understand what steps to take.

Here are five steps manufacturing companies should take now to tackle tax reform:

1. Assess impact. Tax professionals will likely need to review the bill text manually, measure their organization’s specific circumstances against it to assess the impact of each provision, as well as the holistic effect on their bottom line.
2. Assemble a team. While the heaviest burden may fall on accountants, companies and their finance teams will have an important role to play to gather all the necessary data.
3. Dig into the data. Assessing the impact of tax reform requires a substantial amount of data. Organizations need to move from modeling the impact of tax reform to focus on data collection and computations as soon as possible. If you have an international presence, bear in mind that some of the information needed could date back to 1987.
4. Establish priorities. When considering what to undertake in the limited time before year’s end, focus on the areas that could have the greatest impact on your organization.
5. Initiate tax reform conversations with your tax advisor. Tax reform of this magnitude is the biggest change we’ve seen in a generation, and will require intense focus to understand not only how the changes apply at a federal level, but also the navigate the ripple effect this is likely to have on state taxation as well.

If you have any questions regarding the tax reform and impact on manufacturing, contact your accountant or trusted advisor for more information at (402) 423-4343.

This article originally appeared as a BDO USA, LLP Manufacturing Industry Insights publication (December 2017). Copyright © BDO USA, LLP. All rights reserved. www.bdo.com