Bookkeeping Qualifications - is it worth it?

trixietoes

Personally as a small business owner I'd rather my bookkeeper had the neccesary qualifications.

I did a bookkeeping course so I could do my own, yes it is something you can pick up with many of the book out there but I think it is best to be qualified and become a member of a relevant organisation (me ICB) plus it looks more professional when pitching for business.

You don't have to enrol on a course like I did that cost hundred of pounds. Kaplan do lots of books (on amazon) you can go through to ensure you know the things they will put in the exam. Then you can enrol on the exams yourself - you need to have trainee membership to things like ICB though. They are 25.00 a shot. The 1st one is online then the next 2 or at local centres up and down the country and are run on a regular basis.

http://www.bookkeepers.org.uk/Examinations/Membership%20by%20Examination

Ballymackeonan

If you get qualifications as a book-keeper with one of the professional bodies, you will be able to get professional indemnity insurance through them, which will be a considerable saving long-term to set against the original training and exam fees. Also, they will be the "supervisory body" for money-laundering regulations, so you won't have to register yourself.

Incidentally, the registration for premises applies to your own business premises, not your clients'. I do some book-keeping and accountancy work, some in my office and some in clients' premises, and I'm registered for my office as that is where all the identitiy etc records are kept

theesel1994

Ballymackeonan wrote: »

Incidentally, the registration for premises applies to your own business premises, not your clients'.

I got the impression from HMRC that it was every location you carried out bookkeeping work at. So if a client wanted you to work on site it was £120 for their premises.

From the HMRC site -
Premises you need to register

You must list each address where you carry on business activities covered by the Money Laundering Regulations. But you can include the details of all your premises on just one registration form.
Premises means any place where you carry on business activities that HMRC supervises under the Money Laundering Regulations.

For registration purposes, some examples of premises include:

• offices
• shops and auction houses
• call centres
• cruise ships (in UK territorial waters)
• domestic premises

For details of the business activities supervised by HMRC, follow the link below.
Do you need to register with HMRC for Money Laundering Regulations?
What if there are no business premises?


You might have no business premises, perhaps because you work from home or make door-to-door sales. Instead you'll need to list and pay a fee for either:

• your home address
• your principal contact address - an address where HMRC can contact you and make arrangements to visit you

Premises you don't need to register


There are some premises that you don't need to include on your application form. These are premises where you don't carry on any of the business activities that HMRC supervises. For example, you don't have to register premises that you only use for things like:

• storing your business records
• training employees
• generally managing your employees

Note that you must list premises where you carry out any part of a transaction. For example, if a transaction takes place at your customer's premises, but you complete the paperwork at a central office, you'll need to list and pay a fee for that central office.
You don't need to register any premises that are outside the UK.

theesel1994

Ballymackeonan wrote: »

I'm registered for my office as that is where all the identitiy etc records are kept

Are you talking about being registered (covered) via a supervisory body or with HMRC? If it is via a supervisory body it doesn't matter then it doesn't matter how many locations you carry out the work but if it is via HMRC then I think it might. Or, at least, that's the way I interpreted it and spent all my money on courses and doing exams. I probably would have gone the ICB route anyway.

Incidentally, the exam centres mentioned above are the same ones that do the driving theory tests (Pearson VUE) so there is always on prettyu close by and exams can be taken at any time of the year not just on specific dates.

Ballymackeonan

According to the detailed guidance (page 38) premises mean any place from where you carry on business as a TCSP - see

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/mlr/mlr9.pdf

It's "from where" not "at".

And on page 39, the list of excluded premises includes any:

Which do not belong to you but which you may attend in order to carry out some of your relevant activity, for example, clients addresses.