Accountant Fees

[sjbeale]

Are accountants fees for preparing and submitting accounts included in tax allowances?

[wood1e2]

Depends on hourly rate, how many hours spent on work required.

Bit of a 'how long is a piece of string question'

Around these parts £450 for end of year accounts, but have heard of £650

That is for a basic set of accounts...not one full of no bookkeeping! :)

[elainec100@cheapaccounting]

when you say tax allowances - do you mean are they allowable against the profits of the business?

[JohnGreer]

Hi Sandra,

I may be mis-understanding your question, but if you mean can you offset accountants fees against your business profit, then generally yes.

Needless to say it's not entirely straightforward though!

For example if you trade via a Limited company and your accountant charges a fee for completing the company's accounts and the directors personal tax return, both will be offset against your company's profit but strictly speaking the part of the fee that relates to the directors personal return would be treated as a benefit in kind and you as an individual would have pay tax on the value of the service. For that reason some company directors may opt to pay their personal tax fee personally, which means that the company won't be able to claim the cost of that service against its profit.

There may be other scenarios relating to personal returns where a fee charged for a particular service may not be deductible against general income, but specifically against a type of income. By this I mean if you have a rental property for example, the fee for preparing the rental accounts for the year ought to be offset against the rental profit of the property, not against other income that you may have.

Hope this helps/make sense!

Best wishes

John