Should I be complaining about this accountant/situation?

[Qualified Lead]

Hi all,

Just looking for general feedback.

I've been signed up with an accountant paying around £500 per month for the last couple of years.
We do our own books & file VAT.
They do payroll only. The retainer was so I could speak to him when needed and get general tax advice etc.
In that time I spoke to him only a handful of times.

I mentioned that perhaps this wasn't the best value. And that maybe we should stop, or pause since there wasn't much for him to do- except PAYE and file corporations tax.

He said that this wouldn't work as they don't do 'pay as you go' anymore- retainer only. This did make some sense.

I have now, however, paused the contract successfully as I couldn't go on paying for pretty-much nothing. Plus I saw I was over-paying.

Now I have recently discovered that our C/Tax and Annual Return for Co/House was not made. This in spite of emails about this very subject a number of months back.

We have a virtual office, and happened to check the post to find demand letters from HMRC and C/House.

Needless to say we've now been fined, £375, and £100 for HMRC.

I had no access to C/house- the accountant set this up, likewise C/Tax.

I've been chasing for 4-6 weeks to have them file these things. In the end I filed the annual statement with C/house.

I'm still waiting to get C/Tax filed and we're also waiting on an access code.

As of today- I have finally had a reply from the accountant saying that, on this occasion, they would do the return for me free of charge (since we've paused the contract).

I was pretty livid when I read this.

Before anyone points this out- yes, I know it was my responsibility to check it was filed, etc. But, likewise, when I'm paying £500 per month, equating to £6000 just to file a C/tax return and annual return, I think I should be able to sleep soundly at night knowing it was taken care of. Especially when they had emailed about it and logged in, etc. I mean they only had to do this ONE thing.

Should I be forgetting about this and moving on, or are there grounds here to "do something"?

I also provide services, and I were in this position, I would not be hesitating in offering to pay towards this fine. I cannot fathom having the attitude of 'we'll file it on this occasion as a favour to you.' !

Very open to your comments/feedback!

 

[Newchodge]

Did you 'pause' the contract before or after the CT was due to be filed?

 

[Mark T Jones]

Timings and contract terms matter here!

Were they mandated to file returns? What were the timings?

 

[MyAccountantOnline]

The starting point for a formal complaint is the letter of engagement - what does that say? I suspect it says services cease when your payments cease. Hence why nothing was done when payments stopped. That said in the circumstances you've described I think it's harsh that some agreement wasn't made with you to complete the outstanding work, or at the very least that your accountants didn't explain exactly what was outstanding and make it clear they wouldn't be dealing with it.

 

[UK Contractor Accountant]

Should I be forgetting about this and moving on, or are there grounds here to "do something"?

I don't think you will get anywhere with this - change Accountants is my best advice.

For our clients we get email alerts from Companies House at least 1 month before the filing deadline date. so it's just a matter of forwarding these on to clients to jog them into action.

At the least your Accountant could have sent you a reminder that accounts and c/tax return needed to be filed before certain date.

 

[WaveJumper]

Hi all,

Just looking for general feedback.

I've been signed up with an accountant paying around £500 per month for the last couple of years.
We do our own books & file VAT.
They do payroll only. The retainer was so I could speak to him when needed and get general tax advice etc.
In that time I spoke to him only a handful of times.

I mentioned that perhaps this wasn't the best value. And that maybe we should stop, or pause since there wasn't much for him to do- except PAYE and file corporations tax.

He said that this wouldn't work as they don't do 'pay as you go' anymore- retainer only. This did make some sense.

I have now, however, paused the contract successfully as I couldn't go on paying for pretty-much nothing. Plus I saw I was over-paying.

Now I have recently discovered that our C/Tax and Annual Return for Co/House was not made. This in spite of emails about this very subject a number of months back.

We have a virtual office, and happened to check the post to find demand letters from HMRC and C/House.

Needless to say we've now been fined, £375, and £100 for HMRC.

I had no access to C/house- the accountant set this up, likewise C/Tax.

I've been chasing for 4-6 weeks to have them file these things. In the end I filed the annual statement with C/house.

I'm still waiting to get C/Tax filed and we're also waiting on an access code.

As of today- I have finally had a reply from the accountant saying that, on this occasion, they would do the return for me free of charge (since we've paused the contract).

I was pretty livid when I read this.

Before anyone points this out- yes, I know it was my responsibility to check it was filed, etc. But, likewise, when I'm paying £500 per month, equating to £6000 just to file a C/tax return and annual return, I think I should be able to sleep soundly at night knowing it was taken care of. Especially when they had emailed about it and logged in, etc. I mean they only had to do this ONE thing.

I thought you said they did your payroll. As already mentioned devil will be in the detail of when you paused their services. and for anyone reading this I would always make sure you have your own access to HMRC, CH etc, and set up email alerts for anything you might get fined for. Defiantly worth shopping around though.

Should I be forgetting about this and moving on, or are there grounds here to "do something"?

I also provide services, and I were in this position, I would not be hesitating in offering to pay towards this fine. I cannot fathom having the attitude of 'we'll file it on this occasion as a favour to you.' !

Very open to your comments/feedback!

 

[bodgitt&scarperLTD]

You need a new accountant, yours sounds like a chancer.

 

[JEREMY HAWKE]

Do you know what ? !

I would go and have a meeting with him/he Her/she ( who else deals the beeb here )

Before you start talking about the agreement that you signed talk at the table and then if you dont get your own way get another accountant !

 

[Qualified Lead]

Hi all- thanks for the replies.

Yes, just to clarify- we only paused the contract a few weeks ago. The returns should have been done in Sept '21!

 

[Qualified Lead]

I don't think you will get anywhere with this - change Accountants is my best advice.

For our clients we get email alerts from Companies House at least 1 month before the filing deadline date. so it's just a matter of forwarding these on to clients to jog them into action.

At the least your Accountant could have sent you a reminder that accounts and c/tax return needed to be filed before certain date.

Nothing like that, ever. It always seemed to be me chasing and keeping tabs on things. As I mentioned they did get in touch in Sept 21, and so it appeared all had been taken care of.

 

[Qualified Lead]

Did you 'pause' the contract before or after the CT was due to be filed?

No, we only paused recently. The CT should have been done months ago.

 

[MyAccountantOnline]

Hi all- thanks for the replies.

Yes, just to clarify- we only paused the contract a few weeks ago. The returns should have been done in Sept '21!

So did you sign and approve the tax return and your accountants failed to submit it?

 

[Newchodge]

I would go and have a meeting with them.

Fixed it for you!

 

[Newchodge]

Hi all- thanks for the replies.

Yes, just to clarify- we only paused the contract a few weeks ago. The returns should have been done in Sept '21!

I would wait until you are sure the accounts have been sent, make a formal complaint and, if that is not satisfactory, report them to their professional body. If they haven't been submitted within a month. start the process anyway.

Their comment about making an exception and doing it for free may relate to the current year, which must be due shortly, are you sure Sep 21 has not been submitted

In the meantime, find another accountant. You may want to split payroll and CT returns, or at least get a split quote.

 

[scstock]

The other thing I would add is it's really not that hard to do your own Payroll. I use Payroo which costs £2.50/month per employee.

 

[Newchodge]

The other thing I would add is it's really not that hard to do your own Payroll. I use Payroo which costs £2.50/month per employee.

That's interesting, my business provides payroll for small employers and charges less than that, with all the work doen for you!

 

[Lisa Thomas]

Were they employed to deal with Corporation Tax work, as you say they were employed to deal with payroll?

 

[BookMarkLee]

Good advice above. Not sure if you're aware but ANYONE can call themselves an accountant in the UK. Do you know if yours has a professional qualification? This would also make them obliged to follow the best practices required of their professional body. There are many different accounting bodies in the UK. And each one will only hear complaints about their own members.

 

[Robert NW]

You have a service expectation gap (Parasuraman). There;s an option which doesn't involve making a formal complaint, which is to define in detail exactly what they do, what the standards are, and when they do it. In practice, you also need to define what they don't do.
So, example, in the hope you find it useful:-
1. Their duties
- PAYE monthly and annual)
- Accounts preparation
- CT 600
2. Your duties
- books delivered in good order by..... and in the format ....
- signed within one day
3. Standards
- must give 4 week and 1 week emailed notice of deadlines
- if they are late, no payment that month
- must immediately take care of any errors or alterations
4. What is not included
- tax planning Corp Tax (who does this)
- income tax planning including remuneration, benefits, pensions
- R & D
- tax management (what to pat and when and correcting HMRC errors)
- software support
5. 'Concern' process
6. Termination

 

[nicebloke]

You don’t mention how many staff you have but £500 a month sounds like a crazy amount of money to me.

As above, I would either do payroll yourself which is really quite simple through Payroo or Xero / Quickbooks or use a payroll agent. The key thing is to separate out your ct / annual returns from your payroll.

 

[MrGerbil]

How many employees have you got, and how big is your turnover? £500 pm/£6000 pa is a huge fee. I am a sole practitioner chartered accountant, and I would only charge that for this level of work if it involved 100+ employees or a large amount of year-end work due to poor book-keeping. Do either of those things apply?

 

[Truemanbrown]

When you visited the accountant did you check that he had professional liability insurance?

Most accountants would show a copy of the insurance on their office wall somewhere. You will find that a lot of unqualified accountants will not obtain the insurance.

 

[WaveJumper]

Be nice to know what the outcome was

 

[Karimbo]

Know many accountants like this, they are just negligent and have to chase them to do their job.

Professional does not mean anything any more, got fleeced by architect on something that we know took an evening to do that cost £3000. They did some work for us and asked us for some pre-requsite information the day before the deadline. So we know the work was done between the time when the pre-requisite information was provided and the work was delivered.

They were so lazy they couldnt even pretend it took so long - should have delivered 2 days late, made some excuse that there's all these mitigating stuff that came up and they have to do loads of extra work. Fake "buying time", apoligaise for the delay so at least the client feels they got 3 solid days of work.

Filing accounts is a one evening job. I was paying £500 to do it, and now have an chartered accounting on PPH who does it for me for £150. They even showed me some issues with the accounts from the past. I give them the ligin at 5pm and they send the drafts for approval by 7pm.

Sadly, accountants and other professionals are the same as builders, you cant just pay the money and expect work to be done, you have to be on their case. Ask for statement of work done so they justify their fees to you.

Dealt with solicitrs to get grant of probabte done for my late brother. Helped the widow because she was distraight and couldn;t deal with "business stuff". Lawyers basically just filled out some form - got the date of birth of the children all wrong, even misspelled one childs name. If lawyer is this shitty with the proof reading, how much faith do you have theyve done all their due diligence correctly?

Once you're in a certain position in this fields, it's just a button pushing exercise and they just neglect their clients - they're so used to overcharging and making so much money from people.

My approach to accountants is change providers often and regularly, dont put yourself in a retainer - pay for the work on a per job basis. You will get good service for the first year or two and then you will hear from them less and less, then they'll miss your deadlines because you dont mean anything to them any more.

As soon as you feel like you dont mean anything to them any more - change to another.

 

[Qualified Lead]

Know many accountants like this, they are just negligent and have to chase them to do their job.

Professional does not mean anything any more, got fleeced by architect on something that we know took an evening to do that cost £3000. They did some work for us and asked us for some pre-requsite information the day before the deadline. So we know the work was done between the time when the pre-requisite information was provided and the work was delivered.

They were so lazy they couldnt even pretend it took so long - should have delivered 2 days late, made some excuse that there's all these mitigating stuff that came up and they have to do loads of extra work. Fake "buying time", apoligaise for the delay so at least the client feels they got 3 solid days of work.

Filing accounts is a one evening job. I was paying £500 to do it, and now have an chartered accounting on PPH who does it for me for £150. They even showed me some issues with the accounts from the past. I give them the ligin at 5pm and they send the drafts for approval by 7pm.

Sadly, accountants and other professionals are the same as builders, you cant just pay the money and expect work to be done, you have to be on their case. Ask for statement of work done so they justify their fees to you.

Dealt with solicitrs to get grant of probabte done for my late brother. Helped the widow because she was distraight and couldn;t deal with "business stuff". Lawyers basically just filled out some form - got the date of birth of the children all wrong, even misspelled one childs name. If lawyer is this shitty with the proof reading, how much faith do you have theyve done all their due diligence correctly?

Once you're in a certain position in this fields, it's just a button pushing exercise and they just neglect their clients - they're so used to overcharging and making so much money from people.

My approach to accountants is change providers often and regularly, dont put yourself in a retainer - pay for the work on a per job basis. You will get good service for the first year or two and then you will hear from them less and less, then they'll miss your deadlines because you dont mean anything to them any more.

As soon as you feel like you dont mean anything to them any more - change to another.

Good advice- thank you!

 

[Qualified Lead]

How many employees have you got, and how big is your turnover? £500 pm/£6000 pa is a huge fee. I am a sole practitioner chartered accountant, and I would only charge that for this level of work if it involved 100+ employees or a large amount of year-end work due to poor book-keeping. Do either of those things apply?

Nope- just me and my wife! And we were doing almost all of the work anyway.

 

[Newchodge]

Nope- just me and my wife! And we were doing almost all of the work anyway.

Have you got an outcome?

 

[Qualified Lead]

Hi all,

Thanks for the thoughtful replies here.

It's now a month on from when he said they would get the accounts filed, finally. He cited a discrepancy as a reason not to file. And one on the corporations tax return. However, I couldn't see any issue with it (it was to do with called up share capital. There wasn't any, so I put '0'. He seemed to think it should say something. I explained I didn't think it would- and got no response. He gave the impression he didn't know what it was, tbh).

Despite me chasing weekly, nothing has happened. I got a "I'll get back to you first thing tomorrow." over 10 days ago now. Accounts that should have been filed last year, still not filed.

I've essentially said - "you didn't file the accounts, we've paid you something like £10k over the last couple of years and received nothing - and we've had over £600 in fines- so far. If you were in my shoes- what would you want?"

Is there some kind of ultimatum I can offer here?
I'm not sure if there's some professional body for all accountants, or numerous ones?
ICAW?

Thanks everyone.

 

[Newchodge]

Hi all,

Thanks for the thoughtful replies here.

It's now a month on from when he said they would get the accounts filed, finally. He cited a discrepancy as a reason not to file. And one on the corporations tax return. However, I couldn't see any issue with it (it was to do with called up share capital. There wasn't any, so I put '0'. He seemed to think it should say something. I explained I didn't think it would- and got no response. He gave the impression he didn't know what it was, tbh).

Despite me chasing weekly, nothing has happened. I got a "I'll get back to you first thing tomorrow." over 10 days ago now. Accounts that should have been filed last year, still not filed.

I've essentially said - "you didn't file the accounts, we've paid you something like £10k over the last couple of years and received nothing - and we've had over £600 in fines- so far. If you were in my shoes- what would you want?"

Is there some kind of ultimatum I can offer here?
I'm not sure if there's some professional body for all accountants, or numerous ones?
ICAW?

Thanks everyone.

There are numerous accounting bodies but, as someone mentioned, there is no need to be a member of any of them, or even have any qualifications!

Have a loook here

Third Country Auditors

Third Country Auditors who are auditing companies listed in the UK are required to register with the ‘Competent Authority’, which is the FRC.

www.frc.org.uk

 

[MyAccountantOnline]

Hi all,

Thanks for the thoughtful replies here.

It's now a month on from when he said they would get the accounts filed, finally. He cited a discrepancy as a reason not to file. And one on the corporations tax return. However, I couldn't see any issue with it (it was to do with called up share capital. There wasn't any, so I put '0'. He seemed to think it should say something. I explained I didn't think it would- and got no response. He gave the impression he didn't know what it was, tbh).

Despite me chasing weekly, nothing has happened. I got a "I'll get back to you first thing tomorrow." over 10 days ago now. Accounts that should have been filed last year, still not filed.

I've essentially said - "you didn't file the accounts, we've paid you something like £10k over the last couple of years and received nothing - and we've had over £600 in fines- so far. If you were in my shoes- what would you want?"

Is there some kind of ultimatum I can offer here?
I'm not sure if there's some professional body for all accountants, or numerous ones?
ICAW?

Thanks everyone.

There are several professional bodies for accountants which your accountants may be governed by if they are qualified.

Do you know what qualifications, if any, your accountant has?

Two common bodies for accountants in practice are ACCA (The Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) and ICAEW (Institute of Chartered Accountants In England and Wales).

The complaints procedure depends on the professional body, but generally you will be expected to have first of all used and exhausted the formal compaints procedure which should be set out in the letter of engagement, which you should have been given, and signed, when you initially appointed your accountant.

Do also bear in mind legal action can be an option - all qualified accountants have to hold professional indeminity insurance for that reason.

 

[Qualified Lead]

There are several professional bodies for accountants which your accountants may be governed by if they are qualified.

Do you know what qualifications, if any, your accountant has?

Two common bodies for accountants in practice are ACCA (The Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) and ICAEW (Institute of Chartered Accountants In England and Wales).

The complaints procedure depends on the professional body, but generally you will be expected to have first of all used and exhausted the formal compaints procedure which should be set out in the letter of engagement, which you should have been given, and signed, when you initially appointed your accountant.

Do also bear in mind legal action can be an option - all qualified accountants have to hold professional indeminity insurance for that reason.

I have never received a letter of engagement, or even an invoice from them.
Feeling very foolish at the moment, but it's a lesson learned.

He has been going for over 26 years though and always very knowledgeable on the phone. Just totally let down by service delivery and proactive communications.

They don't have a website, but listed on various platforms. No sign of being part of any professional body though.

 

[MyAccountantOnline]

I have never received a letter of engagement, or even an invoice from them.
Feeling very foolish at the moment, but it's a lesson learned.

He has been going for over 26 years though and always very knowledgeable on the phone. Just totally let down by service delivery and proactive communications.

They don't have a website, but listed on various platforms. No sign of being part of any professional body though.

I suspect in that case your only option is legal action if you do want to pursue it.

 

[AndreasC]

Hey QL,

Sorry to hear about your situation. It sounds as though they weren't a regulated accountant so your only route is a legal claim which will take time, money and stress. You could therefore put it down to experience but that's for you to decide.

I'm a regulated accountant (ACCA) and I'd be happy to have a free no commitment meeting/call with you to see how I can help. £6,000 p.a. sounds a lot for the services being provided and am sure I can help.

Wish you well.

Andreas

[email protected]
www.chilledconsulting.com

 

[Reachinghigher]

Jumping on the back of this as we have the same issues with our accountant.

We have to chase him over and over to get everything up to date and is just simply not doing anything for us despite regular monthly payments. He also had the cheek to try and charge outstanding payments for an old company name we closed with him over a year ago and accounts settled up as far as we were aware.

So the question is, what do we need to do in order to change accountants?

We have tried with 3 other accountants but they all said we need to have the current accounts fully up to date before transferring.. This is the problem, its impossible to get him to do this which is why we are wanting to move on?

Thanks

 

[Gyumri]

We have tried with 3 other accountants but they all said we need to have the current accounts fully up to date before transferring.. This is the problem, its impossible to get him to do this which is why we are wanting to move on?

That's one problem with the accountancy profession but you don't need an accountant to prepare and file accounts. The certificate which an accountant prepares is meaningless anyway for many sets of unaudited accounts. Get a bookkeeper to assist if you can't prepare them yourself or look for an accountant who is more understanding.

 

[MyAccountantOnline]

....

So the question is, what do we need to do in order to change accountants?

....

You tell your current accountant you are changing accountants, give them authority to provide information to your new accountant and appoint a new accountant.

 

[MyAccountantOnline]

...

We have tried with 3 other accountants but they all said we need to have the current accounts fully up to date before transferring.. This is the problem, its impossible to get him to do this which is why we are wanting to move on?

Thanks

It's generally best to let the current accountant complete any outstanding work, especially if you've paid or part paid for the work, but it's not essential.

A new accountant can take over at any point if they want to.

It sounds very odd indeed to have had that response from 3 other accountants.

 

[UK Contractor Accountant]

We have tried with 3 other accountants but they all said we need to have the current accounts fully up to date before transferring.. This is the problem, its impossible to get him to do this which is why we are wanting to move on?

As you are on a standing order arrangement with old Accountants I can see that any new Accountants would want the company's affairs bought up to date as effectively you have already paid on account to have the work performed.

Can get a bit messy trying to get amounts paid on account refunded and sometimes you end up paying twice for the same service.

 

[DontAsk]

We have tried with 3 other accountants but they all said we need to have the current accounts fully up to date before transferring.. This is the problem, its impossible to get him to do this which is why we are wanting to move on?

If I were desperate to move and didn't mind losing a bit for duplicate work I would go to them with the final accounts from my last full accounting year, plus bookkeeping data for this year so far and say, "here you are, this is the up to date state of the company".

 

[AndreasC]

Sounds as though you need to get any money you paid on account back and move on to another accountant. As others have said it won't be easy but if they haven't done the work and are regulated accountant (with a professional body) they will refund the monies as otherwise you can report them.

It's strange that 3 new accountants have said you need the old records updated first.

Happy to have a look and let you know what I think. No charge.