Accountant Recommendations

[MisterGoof]

Re: Accountant recommendations

If you keep looking i'm sure you'll manage to pay well over £100pm.

I cant see any reason to spend over £65 (inc vat)pm.

MG

[Moose]

Re: Accountant recommendations

So...can you reply to this with your recomendation, once we've got a few names we can create a voting form then see who comes out on top.

And if we add options like.
Company xxx positive.
Company xxx negitive.

we'll be able to track all you miserable b*stards as well!

That way newbies (like what I is) will stop having to keep asking...which Accountant would you recommend.

[4Contractors]

Re: Accountant recommendations

Moose

This is an active forum with outspoken members. If any of the advertising accountants were to upset clients on this forum I'm sure we will all hear about it.

If you look at previous posts, you will see that many of the larger more expensive accountants get bad press and are best avoided from a financial and efficiency point of view.

I think £50 a month + VAT is the cheapest contractor accountancy you will find, for a comprehensive service. It's a shame that not all newbies take good advice and choose an accountant/umbrella recommended by contractors. Luckily for us a few do and hopefully they are happy with their choice.

HTH

Rob

[Moose]

Accountants and all that Jazz

Ta Rob,
to be honest, I was heading for the ************ site to fill out the application (apparently the guy they recommend is quite good).
Just thought it would have been useful to see who got the most votes (plus and minus).

:\

[king contractor]

Accountants and all that Jazz

"I was heading for the ************ site to fill out the application (apparently the guy they recommend is quite good)..."

Rob is ************... Doh... and they probably get a kickback from the guy they recommend...

KC

[4Contractors]

Re: Accountants and all that Jazz

KC - I'm sure Moose made the connection but was giving us a bit of free publicity

We do get a small commission for referring clients to our Accountant but it is very small.

The difference between us and most other advertisers is that Mark and I are both contractors and the accountant is our chosen accountant. We are both very pleased with them after unpleasant experiences in the past and have no qualms in promoting them to other contractors.

I think a contractor is far better placed to promote an accountancy service to other contractors than an accountant selling his own product.

What is it you promote by the way ?

[Moose]

Re: Accountants and all that Jazz

Already knew of the connection and the fact there was a small finders fee. I figured that as everyone else on the forum also knows this and nobody takes the piss, then the service must be OK.

[xoggoth]

Re: Accountants and all that Jazz

************ is right. The big boys get almost universally bad press. Best avoided. I was with one of them for two years and it was a nightmare. On one set of accounts I could only recognise one figure. I think the office junior started out by modifying some other company's accounts and got bored after 5 minutes. If I asked a detailed question I got a meaningless generality in reply.

[king contractor]

Not always true

I was recommended an accountant by a fellow contractor when I first started contracting, not a good experience... and a costly one at that...

Just wanted to point out that what one contractor may find great another may find terrible...

I agree that seeking advice/recommendations from fellow contractors is the first step, but I would suggest that you should also meet them for a face to face and agree in writing the service they are to provide and what the fees will be come billing time.

KC

[fiddleabout]

Re: Not always true

I would suggest that you should also meet them for a face to face and agree in writing the service they are to provide and what the fees will be come billing time.

Yes I did that - picked a local accountant and agreed an annual fee up front. Shook hands etc. etc.

Unfortunately they did sod all apart from the final return and charged me 50% more than I'm paying now for the whole works (PAYE VAT company returns etc. etc.)

Contractor accounting is a very simple process and specialists can cut costs to the bone yet still provide good email/phone support. There is little to no need for face-to-face contact. Some of the big guys make even bigger savings by outsourcing the work abroad - that imo is a saving too far and they don't even pass it on to their customers.

Fiddle - the less respectable half of ************