big contractor accountant vs local

[quackhandle]

SJD and Nixon Williams are both owned by the same people now, both sold over 2 years ago. I am surprised no one from either company has been on to see if they can help, perhaps they're not too keen on customer service anymore?

Not surprised and no they aren't (as long you keep paying they don't really GAS.

qh

[Fred Bloggs]

It does look like your first sentence is slowly but surely going that way. FreeAgent are slowly but surely persuading most of the mid size contractor firms (ie those with high hundreds/low thousands of contractor clients) to shift over to them. Don't think they've had any luck on the biggest players (ie SJD & co) yet.

However, I can't envisage there being a "Oh, you're not on FreeAgent? Then we charge an extra one off £X". Main reason from my perspective being that just because a client may have been on FreeAgent before in no way means their data is sound. FreeAgent's a great tool, but as with any tool, it can be used badly with pants results. Tidying that up can be just as painful as doing the equivalent when someone wasn't on FreeAgent before...indeed sometimes worse (as rather than drawing a line under historic stuff, there can be an expectation you'll go back and fix any historic errors).

Thanks for the interesting perspective. All part of wondering whether to put a few quid into their shares on AIM in my SIPP or not!

I believe Danbro are now FA accountants, I guess they count as a "big" player?

[psychocandy]

Nixon Williams = Brilliant.

In 5 years never met my accountant, never even spoken to him. All done by email.

Had some bad experiences with local accountants. One presented me a bill for £500 for "Research into IR35" (this was when it first came out years ago - told him to stuff it up his backside! The other local one was clueless, lasted two months, did bugger all and did not have a clue about IT contracting.

[northernladuk]

Nixon Williams = Brilliant.

In 5 years never met my accountant, never even spoken to him. All done by email.

Had some bad experiences with local accountants. One presented me a bill for £500 for "Research into IR35" (this was when it first came out years ago - told him to stuff it up his backside! The other local one was clueless, lasted two months, did bugger all and did not have a clue about IT contracting.

You are talking about your ex accountant here aren't you?