Should i fire the accountant?

nuttydede

Hi

For the past few years it has been playing on my mind as to whether to do my partners accounts myself (I do all the book keeping). Is there a site that I can enter all our incomings and outgoings to see if I get the same amount as him for the last tax year. If so not worth paying him £300! Just worried he might get better figures than me if you know what I mean!?

cheers
marie:think:

Elaine_Wilson

Did you not get a copy of the accounts he produced? Why not compare these to your records and see if you can understand the reasons behind any differences?

In view of the figure quoted I assume your partner is a sole trader. Do you have a copy of the last tax return? If so, you should be able to explore the tax adjustments made. Capital allowances can be a complex area but it may well be simple in your case.

Once you have the taxable profit there are some sites that will do the actual calculation for you. A lot of people register with HMRC for online filing and put the figures in there, even though they do not actually file the return that way. But your accountant will probably use a computer program to do the calculation so there is unlikely to be a difference.

scotsbob

Go to this forum, the third one down is "Accounts and Finance" you will get software, help and advice there.

http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/forums/index.php?

zaver

I wouldn't recommend not having an accountant. Though it might be worth looking for a better one as you don't seem to think very highly of your current one.

I have been in business for over 2 years and have often felt glad to have a professional accountant by my side offering valuable advice.

I started off with a small accounting firm which offered shoddy service. Been with beprofessional.com for over an year and I'd highly recommend them.

garfield44

Hey nuttydede,

I would always recommend having an accountant. The main reason for this is HMRC are planning clamping down on tax evasion and are going to be doing a lot more tax investigations this year. .
However it certainly seems that you arent confident in your accountant so its always worth while looking elsewhere. They will be looking for your custom so may be prepared to offer you a fixed fee to do the Return. It all depends on how much work they need to do so if you can get as much information as possible to them it means they will spend less time on it hence a cheaper fee. Another thing to do is always ask your accountant for a breakdown of where the time was spent on your job and ask them for ways you can improve your book keeping.

If you can get a copy of your accounts and tax return for last year you will be able to see the headings used for the income and expenses and could tailor your book keeping round them. Usually a tax computation is available aswell so you can see exactly where the figures have come from.

Sorry if I sound biased, I'm a qualified accountant myself and have seen the mess that people can get into by doing there own returns when they are not quite sure how it all works. If you have anything i.e tax questions you'd like to ask me please feel free to do so.

Garfield

nuttydede

cheers for everyones advise, I think i will stick with accountant. Not that I dont rate his work, was just trying to see if I can save money! But I supose its 100% write off against profit, so swings and round'a'bouts really!
Nuttydede