Accountant recommendation

[Darren@UptonAccountants]

I use Upton. They still use the old 1st accountancy tag on here as that is how Darren has been posting for some time.
Excellent service. Answers my mails regularly (even when I hadnt paid him for 3 months eh Darren).

Very true LG! We rely on the kind donations from our clients to keep us going!!

seems to be a bit tricky to change the user ID without loosing the history....looks like will have to bite the bullet and start with a fresh one.

[r0bly0ns]

I use Upton. They still use the old 1st accountancy tag on here as that is how Darren has been posting for some time.

Yep, just didn't want people to see "Upton Accounts" and not recognise it

[The Lone Gunman]

1st Accountancy has recently been renamed Upton Accountants, I can recomend them.

I use Upton. They still use the old 1st accountancy tag on here as that is how Darren has been posting for some time.
Excellent service. Answers my mails regularly (even when I hadnt paid him for 3 months eh Darren).

[sathyaram_s]

JSA's 250 pm does seem expensive ..

I use SJD and they are pretty good .. I have also heard good feedback about them from a few contractor friends .. But, the level of service does vary between various offices and of course the accountant allocated to your company ... On the whole they are a good bunch ...

The initial response from SJD is relatively slow ... I had to call them about half-a-dozen times before I could go beyond the operator ... But once I spoke with them, things moved at the speed of light and haven't had complaints since ... Your local office of SJD is likely to be relatively less busy than the head office - so get in touch with your local office for good intial response times ...

About PCG membership, you can go for the basic membership ... I would say that you are unlikely to need PCG+ in the first year or two, unless you are interested in VLRC ...

[r0bly0ns]

1st Accountancy has recently been renamed Upton Accountants, I can recomend them.

[mjshrimpton]

... seems to be allot of rave reviews for SJD - do you know whether they cover the insurances an IT Contractor needs?

No - you sort those out yourself. You are running the business......

[DaveB]

I realise they don't do Insurance ... I just wanted to see if annual payment would include the insurance that I'd need.

Just moved from an umbrella company to limited and going through that steep learning curve now. This site seems a great place to make a start!

Though you'd recommend PCG over SJD then??

No. SJD ( and Nixon William and 1st Accountancy ) are Accountants. They will manage your company accounts, do your annual returns, payroll, calculate VAT, PAYE, NI, advise on dividend payments etc etc. They charge a monthly fee for this.

The PCG is the Professional Contractors Group, an organisation whose purpose is to represent the interests of the contracting and freelance community. As part of this they offer memberships that grant the benefits I listed earlier as well as a lot of other support and information.

You need an accountant. I'll say that again. You need an accountant. At least untill you get your head round the business and tax side of things. Getting your tax returns wrong or not paying your VAT will see you getting a hefty fine and possibly even jail.

PCG membership is worth the cost because of the extra support and information they can provide as well as the Tax Insurance you get with it and the members discount on business insuances.

The first thing you should do is ring one of the accountants mentioned, any of them will be happy to talk to you about the process of setting up and running a contracting business.

[basshead]

Though you'd recommend PCG over SJD then??

Oh dear.

Both.

[JulesG]

I realise they don't do Insurance ... I just wanted to see if annual payment would include the insurance that I'd need.

Just moved from an umbrella company to limited and going through that steep learning curve now. This site seems a great place to make a start!

Though you'd recommend PCG over SJD then??

[DaveB]

Thanks for that ... sathyaram_s : £250 is a monthly bill, that does include the insurance. But splitting the upper value of £700 you mentioned that's just under £55 a month that I should be paying in insurance alone. I can't see how/ why their monthly services should be costing me the other £200 a month.

DaveB: shall check those out ... seems to be allot of rave reviews for SJD - do you know whether they cover the insurances an IT Contractor needs?

Thanks again

They are all accountants, they do Accounts not Insurance. If you have been with an MSC previously you need to sort out a lot more for yourself now.

Join the PCG as a start. With PCG+ membership for £220 pa you get insurance cover for all your tax risks plus discounted rates on business insurance such as PI, PL and EL. The general consensus is that you really can't do much better.

The days of being able to run your contracting business without knowing anything about the business side are gone. You'll have a steep learning curve to catch up, but it's not impossible.

[JulesG]

Thanks for that ... sathyaram_s : £250 is a monthly bill, that does include the insurance. But splitting the upper value of £700 you mentioned that's just under £55 a month that I should be paying in insurance alone. I can't see how/ why their monthly services should be costing me the other £200 a month.

DaveB: shall check those out ... seems to be allot of rave reviews for SJD - do you know whether they cover the insurances an IT Contractor needs?

Thanks again

[sathyaram_s]

What services does this 250 GBP cover?

When comparing, make sure you compare the services as well. From their website, it appears that your fee to JSA includes insurances as well. On their own, these insurance will cost about 350 per annum (assuming a PI limit of 0.5 million, but the 2m PI will cost as high as 700 pa)


If you used MSCs before, I'm afraid, you'll find a lot of stuff expensive in the real world.


HTH

Hi all,

Just had my first bill from JSA ... OMG ... it was over £250 ... correct me if I'm wrong but that seems extortionate!!!

Any chance I could get some recommendations of Accountants ... I've been told that 1stContact are good ... what do you think ... any others out there??

[DaveB]

Try the serach box on the menu bar. "recommended accountant" is a good place to start.

Failing that: SJD, Nixon Williams and 1st Accountancy all get good reviews.

[JulesG]

Hi all,

Just had my first bill from JSA ... OMG ... it was over £250 ... correct me if I'm wrong but that seems extortionate!!!

Any chance I could get some recommendations of Accountants ... I've been told that 1stContact are good ... what do you think ... any others out there??