Accountant

philiporchard · Jun 11, 2011

Need an accountant for sorting out paperwork for Ltd company.

What are likely costs, and can anyone recommend anyone?

Thanks

Retired_member41 · Jun 11, 2011

Are there any employees who are on the payroll?

Vat registered?

Do you have any additional share holders?

Do you carry much that you write down?

There are lots of other accountable variables, but if it's a case of maybe just vat registered and few employees with little or nothing to write down. Then all you need is a good book keeper and maybe pay a "Real" lol accountant just once a year.

A good book keeper who pretty much does everything only charges between £50- £100 a month.

If its all online with no retail receipts or bills then just pay a book keeper twice a year.

Probably not the answer you are looking for but why waste money.

monaghan · Jun 11, 2011

Unless you have a complex configuration, you can do most of the required accounts returns yourself with very little assistance. Obviously if there are questions, you will need an accountant, best bet is either a specialist in your field (probably expensive) or someone local who you can visit or get to visit you to discuss issues.

I put all my data into KashFlow, use MyPAYE to handle the payroll and then just pull a few reports from KashFlow to do the HMRC year end stuff. KashFlow can be configured with your VAT reg details and do the on-line submissions for you as well.

Either way of doing it, you really need to ensure that you keep the basics up to date yourself otherwise you're looking at a huge effort and cost to drop a box of papers on an accountant's desk and get a completed tax return in response.

FagEnd · Jun 11, 2011

Any local CA or ACCA practice will sort you out for a few hundred quid. Accountants are not as expensive as you are led to believe. I am one believe it or not

I only worked in practice for 4 hours, I fucked off at lunchtime on my first day in practice and never went back, joined the corporate finance world instead, practice wasn't for me

philiporchard · Jun 11, 2011

Thanks for the replies and PMs. Plenty to look into now!

theaffiliate · Jun 11, 2011

To give you an idea of price, I have been paying £90/month (incl. VAT) for an all inclusive package for both ltd company and personal accounts which covers everything needed for me e.g. Kashflow subscription for bookkeeping, payroll, accounts, annual return, personal and company tax planning etc along with advice over the phone or email whenever needed.

Paid a little extra to also cover insurance for company/personal tax investigations by HMRC (having done some research, if you are ever chosen for one it can apparently take many hours and rack up huge accountancy fees if you want them to deal with it for you - which I would).

When I originally did some comparing the price seemed to be reasonable, perhaps at the upper end of the scale though.