Has anyone experience with 1st Contractor Accountants (1CA)?

[minstrel]

They offer £69+VAT

Sounds dodgy to me!

Any professional firm that charges £69 for services sounds dodgy to me!

[minstrel]

Being serious though, I used Churchill Knight years ago and had no problems with them. Only reason I left is that I wanted to try other accountants.

I remember a guy called Luke being the 1st line support/admin guy.

Maybe he's got qualified/experienced and is branching out, making 1CA a joint venture with Churchill Knight.

[Waldorf]

They do actually have the ICAEW logo at the very bottom of their web page

I cannot see that on either website - as far as I can see they are not qualified, certainly no mention on the websites or their Linkedin pages.

Simon is probably right on that they are looking at the cheap end of the market by charging £69 - having said that churchill knight charge £135 a month and I hear the service is quite poor, perhaps they realise the ck brand is tainted and want to spread the risk.

[Mothersea]

Awful experience with new team at 1ca - July 2014

Here is my feedback, unluckily based on my own experience: I ‘ve been using 1ca until recently (June 2014) where I realised they had not filed the payroll, VAT. I phoned them several times without anybody answering the phone, eventually a lady answered my call to say that a new team was going to be formed and they would call me the following day, however I did not receive any phone call from them.

A few days later I received an email from Hardeep Mangat, who is now the new accountant (Zena was the accountant after Luke) saying that they had a new team and the service would improve.

I tried to contact him to sort out things that had been done wrongly, he comes back to me to say ‘We are doing it’ which is not true (he is being saying this for more than two weeks). I had to book a call to speak with him, and hey! After having a day and time to call him, he was not available !!! therefore I couldn’t speak to him!

To speak to the accountant, you first have to call the office (I was put on hold for several minutes) after that the office will pass the message to Hardepp (which he will not reply). You leave the message to be called back, but ... nobody calls you back !!!

I have now changed accountant, so my review is not about how good he is as an accountant as I don’t know, but the CUSTOMER SERVICE IS AWFUL !! It’s even worse than used to be with the former team, they do not really care about your emails/questions.
My advice if you don’t want to get in trouble with HMRC (as all this can be very stressful) is that you get a reliable accountant that you can meet face to face in their office. This team at 1ca are very incompetent and unprofessional and is really stressful to not be able to speak to someone.

[Jessica@WhiteFieldTax]

I won't comment on this particular practice, I don't know this firm, and anyway its my rule not to knock competitors.

What I will say is if things aren't working, vote with your feet.

(a) It keeps firms like mine on our toes

(b) Don't let inertia get in the way - there isn't much a competent accountant can't reconstruct, repair, or re-file if you've been left in a horlicks elsewhere. May not be able to wash away HMRC and Companies House fines, but at least you are now uptodate and in a position to review why things went wrong and seek recompense.

[moggy]

looks like the firm was in administration and is now being dissolved according to duedil.

[Hardeep Mangat]

Reply from Hardeep Mangat.

Firstly I would like to apolgise to Mothersea for his/her experience. It was simply not good enough.

We took over the company in June, the company is solvent and trades under 1st Freelancer.

1CA was put on the market for sale a number of months ago and I was shortlisted out of many other potential suitors to purchase 1CA given my success at Nimble Jack Accounting.

However, having run Nimble Jack Accounting and studying the market for contractor accountants I have realised that successful firms like SJD, Nixon William, Churchill Knight and Brooksons were not the cheapest and hence have been around for the number of years. Pricing is key!

I have kept the price the same for all existing clients which includes FreeAgent ( £25 per month, but well worth it!) but have increased the price for new clients and referrals, so 1CA’s business model can work in the long term and have a budget for a qualified accountant.

I have implemented the following straight away

1) Qualified or part qualifed accountants.
2) Landline number for all clients to speak to us directly.
3) FreeAgent reviews, we saved one client £7,989 in one meeting!

Once again I do apologise, as the transition period has been hectic.I have been working my way through telephone meetings with all clients and will investigate what went wrong. But from my most unhappiest clients (which accounts for 3% of my current clients), I take away the most learning on how I can improve our future client experience.

Kind Regards,

Hardeep Mangat ACCA

[LisaContractorUmbrella]

You've got to admire his honesty

[GlenW]

You've got to admire his honesty

Yes, although not his grammar.