Online accountant with good software portal

[chriscomp]

I'm starting contracting soon with my own Ltd company and need to identify an accountant to use. Narrowed it down to SJD, intouch and Nixon Williams.

They all seem to offer generally the same services so looking to differentiate between them on their online software provided, and so my ease of use with them. SJD only seem to offer some Excel spreadsheets. inotuch have a portal but I can't find any information on it. Nixon Williams appear to have the most comprehensive portal where you can raise invoices and track payments etc.

Does anyone have first hand experience please?

SJD, Intouch, Nixon Williams.

[JB3000]

I'm starting contracting soon with my own Ltd company and need to identify an accountant to use. Narrowed it down to SJD, intouch and Nixon Williams.

They all seem to offer generally the same services so looking to differentiate between them on their online software provided, and so my ease of use with them. SJD only seem to offer some Excel spreadsheets. inotuch have a portal but I can't find any information on it. Nixon Williams appear to have the most comprehensive portal where you can raise invoices and track payments etc.

Does anyone have first hand experience please?

No first hand experience of the above but bear in mind that if the above companies use in-house software what would you do should you want to leave them?

You may be better off using an accountant that uses free agent:

Accounting software, simplified - FreeAgent

Free Agent can be transported from accountant to accountant and you can do all your vat, self assessment and payroll filing via the software. Corp tax should be coming soon.

The best thing to do would be to request demonstrations from all 4.

If you are happy with in-house software in touch seem excellent VFM at only £92+vat. They are fully qualified and regulated chartered accountants (unlike nw and sjd) and do ir35 reviews within the package (unlike nw). However I believe they charge a small exit cost of £350+vat. I believe SJD tie you in for a year at a very expensive £120+vat and their manchester office hasn't had many good reviews on here recently. NW always seem to get great reviews and are OK VFM at £95+VAT without IR35 reviews.

[Alan @ BroomeAffinity]

I'm a FreeAgent accountant so I am obviously biased but I would largely agree with what JB3000 said. I'm told that the in-house software is easy to data dump from if you need to move - I don't know because I haven't tried. I'd also venture that the FA software will be better than the in-house offerings but again I don't know because I haven't used them.

Bear in mind NW and SJD have the same owners and will very probably be the same company soon - regardless of what we they say.

But all 3 you mentioned are very good from what I hear. I'd expect In-Touch being smaller would get you a more personal service than the other two but I don't know.

[Louisa@InTouch]

We have an online portal, competitive monthly fee and provide personal service.

You can export all of your accounting transactions anytime from our portal into excel.

Plus there are no tie in periods or exit fees.

[RasputinDude]

I use accountsnet - Contractor Accountants & SME Accountancy Services | accountsnet - excellent service and value for money. Their online system is good and easy to use. I have never had to wait longer than a few hours for a reply to an email and the response time is usually much less than that.

[northernladuk]

I was with SJD and quite liked their spreadsheet. I went with one of their ex-employees when she left to Gorilla who use Freeagent which is pretty darn good to be honest. I got the expertise from SJD, a great portal and it's cheaper to boot.
So far so good.

[Dylan]

I Use Xero and it is excellent, run 2 companies on it and utterly painless.

https://www.xero.com/

Then just pick an accountant to suit your needs.

[Fandango]

I moved to FreeAgent at the beginning of the year and also moved accountants to Martin@Contratax who regularly posts help and advice on here.

Highly recommended and price wise was a lot more competitive than some of the others I spoke with

HTH

[Dan@OrangeGenie]

I'm starting contracting soon with my own Ltd company and need to identify an accountant to use. Narrowed it down to SJD, intouch and Nixon Williams.

They all seem to offer generally the same services so looking to differentiate between them on their online software provided, and so my ease of use with them. SJD only seem to offer some Excel spreadsheets. inotuch have a portal but I can't find any information on it. Nixon Williams appear to have the most comprehensive portal where you can raise invoices and track payments etc.

Does anyone have first hand experience please?

Why not ask for a demo of their online software? - that way you can decide which best fits your needs. FreeAgent is also a great piece of software, designed for contractors by contractors....

[d000hg]

We have an online portal, competitive monthly fee and provide personal service.

You can export all of your accounting transactions anytime from our portal into excel.

Plus there are no tie in periods or exit fees.

I quite like the Intouch portal, it's now just a few minutes' work a month since the ability to upload bank statements is automated pretty well these days.

PM me if you've any questions you don't want to ask on the forum. I'd happily take your referral bonus if you choose to go with IT, but equally I'd recommend them even if you don't refer me