What does your accountant do for you?

sillysausage237

Just wondering as our new accountant is basically getting me to do everything and I am not sure this is right, since we are paying him although I am the Company Secretary.

I have to enter all the payments and expenses into a database and I also have to submit things like VAT returns myself. Is this normal? It seems like all they are going to do is the payslips etc.

We pay them about £100 per month.

Kez100

You can ask them to do as much as you want (assuming they provide the service) but they will charge. No one can tell for the information you can provide on here whether the cost you are incurring is fair for the service or not.

The service they are providing for the agreed fee will be in your letter of engagement - take a look at that to see what they will be doing during the year.

If you want them to do more ask for a quote for the extra work.

If they say they cannot provide those services, others will, so look for an alternative firm (perhaps using recommendations from friends or family) and ask them for a price.

cmac1107

I am an accountant, and the level of work we do for each client varies. Some clients just want us to do the year end accounts, tax computations and tax returns. They deal with all their paperwork, VAT returns etc. Whereas other clients expect us to do everything.

The more your accountant does for you the higher the charge. Its up to you to decide how much your accountant does for you. If you understand what you are doing then you may as well do it yourself - it will save you money.

Cook_County

sillysausage237 wrote: »

Just wondering as our new accountant is basically getting me to do everything and I am not sure this is right, since we are paying him although I am the Company Secretary.

I have to enter all the payments and expenses into a database and I also have to submit things like VAT returns myself. Is this normal? It seems like all they are going to do is the payslips etc.

We pay them about £100 per month.

Why don't you go back to your old accountant if the new service is no good?

shabbychicfan

Our accountant does everything for us (which is why i know nothing about tax!) - although we provide him with the basic accounting details obviously! He does, VAT returns, Corp Tax, Accounts, Payroll and just about anything else that crops up.

As a Company Secretary I don't actually do anything!

We pay about £350 a quarter for this.

Hope this helps

Pennywise

sillysausage237 wrote: »

Just wondering as our new accountant is basically getting me to do everything and I am not sure this is right, since we are paying him although I am the Company Secretary.

I have to enter all the payments and expenses into a database and I also have to submit things like VAT returns myself. Is this normal? It seems like all they are going to do is the payslips etc.

We pay them about £100 per month.

Putting payments and expenses into a database and doing the VAT return is book-keeping and most businesses make their own arrangements for book-keeping, either by proprietors doing it themselves, employing a book-keeper or engaging a firm of book-keepers.

Accountants generally prepare the year end accounts and tax returns - a completely different task to the book-keeping and VAT returns.

You really don't want to be paying an accountant's hourly rate for doing such basics as the basic book-keeping - if you don't want to do it yourself, find a book-keeper at a fraction of the cost.

Your accountant will be doing a lot more than payroll - annual accounts preparation, tax computations and tax returns at the minimum, and maybe more such as planning advice etc.

As others have said, look at the letter of engagement where the terms and scope of service should be outlined.