6 Signs You May Be Ready To Change Accountants
1. Seeing your accountant as just another service provider
The right accountant should be your Trusted Business Advisor. It’s really not just another service provider- akin to telecoms or stationery!
A good accountant is there to support your business – now and in the future – and should be providing proactive advice helping your business grow and keeping down your tax bills.
2. Not having the right information at your finger tips
If your accounting systems are weak or perhaps outdated the risk is you could be relying on inaccurate or at the very least incomplete information.
Can you see your key numbers 24-7 without relying on your bookkeeper to update reports?
Can you issue invoices, check your cash position wherever you are and at any time of day?
Are you making key decision without the full facts?
This could be disastrous if you make major commitments or perhaps issue management accounts to your bank – which turns out to be incomplete or even misleading
3. Looking at the past not to the future
Many businesses see their accountant as just providing the annual accounts.
Whilst they may be reviewed at a meeting they are a snapshot of your financial position based on past results.
They tell you nothing about your finances today nor do they forecast the future.
They are also based around historic profits – so they give you no information about cashflow or your key performance indicators.
Growing businesses need more than just a ‘history lesson’ – they need help with planning and reports that track actual performance against targets.
You cannot change the past – but can plan to change the future!
A good accountant will be ideally placed to help you meet this challenge ….
4. Buying just compliance services when you need advice and support
It’s all too easy to miss out on real value added services for fear of them costing too much!
If you are ambitious you will be working hard to build a business that can really go places and should be worth a significant capital sum when you come to sell.
You will need advice perhaps on incentivising key members of your team, the best way to extract profits, building the right pension plans and having the right financial structure for growth.
These advisory services should form a cornerstone of the services your accountant provides each year. You should also be meeting regularly – to keep on track – and to benefit from seeing your trusted advisor as a ‘sounding board ‘for confidential discussions.
5. Using a firm that’s too big for you
A large accounting firm may have a national presence and can appear to be a smart choice.
But will they be remote and advise from a distance?
Will they give you the real personal service that may be offered in the glossy brochure?
Will you be paying a significant premium for city centre overheads?
6. Using a ‘traditional’ accounting firm
The problem with a traditional firm is that they may well be slow to react to changes such as the growth in cloud accounting.
They may also be ‘behind the curve’ in terms of using technology to speed up business processing and pass on the benefits in terms of efficiencies.
Are they well placed to provide corporate advice – such as Exit Planning? Will they be the right partner for your business journey – or are you in danger of outgrowing them as you expand?
How can we help?
We believe that business owners deserve more than just a set of annual accounts !
Harnessing the latest based technology we’ve build a suite of services aimed at providing truly proactive advice.
We’d love to learn more about your business, your challenges and perhaps your frustrations!
We can discuss options for the future and review your existing accounting system to see if you are getting the right business information whenever you need it 24-7
We can review your tax affairs, see if there are savings to be made from an annual tax planning review and above all understand your goals and plans for the future.
We may well be able to save costs on compliance services such as the annual accounts and instead help you invest in robust business planning and dynamic cloud accounting solutions.