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Conferences rock!
I thought as a conference I am organising is just around the corner it would be a good time to revisit the theme of professional conferences.
I have been to the CIMA Members in Practise conference for years and have always got key benefits from going:
- The conference is excellent for CPD, which as a professional management accountant, is vital. Although I don’t do tax or compliance myself I do need enough knowledge to help point clients in the right direction and conference is a good place to top up my knowledge.
- As well as specific CPD on accountancy issues we also have great key note speakers who motivate me to have the best business I can.
- Finally on the CPD front, sales and marketing is always a challenge for me and we have great workshops on how to get our messages across.
- For me, though, conference is about much more than just getting CPD. Because conference is full of like-minded individuals it is a great place to build relationships, which can carry me through the year. Working on our own can be a lonely place and these relationships help me to keep a balanced view of my world.
- And let’s not forget the gala dinner, disco, and the ‘craic’ at the bar! We have such a good time and, as I don’t get out very often, it is one of the few evenings in the year when I feel like a grown up!
I am really excited about what I will learn from this year’s conference but there is a sting in the tail.
Again I am chair of the conference (no pressure!!).
Last year the conference nightmares included not bringing the speaker slides and having to wing a presentation because one of the speakers didn’t turn up (could happen for real!). My nightmare of choice this year has been that a random eastern European pipe band crashes the event and plunges us all into chaos.
Nightmares aside I know it will all be OK because we have put many hours of preparation into it and we know we have a great programme.
So, if you are cogitating about whether to go to your professional conference (especially if you have not gone before) my advice is ‘give it a go’. You will probably get much more out of it than you ever imagined!
Fiona 🙂
Connecting is key!
I have long believed that effective networking is key to business success. This is particularly so for business to business services. However, it is always difficult to decide which of the numerous networking groups are best for your particular business. It is very easy to waste time and money doing lots of ineffective networking – by ineffective I mean networking which does not result in building ‘real’ business relationships.
I believe that successful networking is less about the format and the networking organisation and more about the individuals in the group. Are they the type of people who are moving in the same markets as you? Are they talking to the people you want to talk to? Can you see yourself building great referral relationships with them? If the answer is yes to any or all of these questions the chances are you have found a netwoking group which may well work for you.
So how do you get the best out of networking meetings?
Having a plan is an excellent start. Some groups provide a list of people who have booked for the meeting so look at who is going and decide who you want to talk to. Groups with a sit down meal often give you the opportunity for you to request to sit next to a particular person – or at least on the same table as that person. So use this facility.
If you have been invited to a group by a member discuss with them in advance who in the group would be good contacts for you. If they can introduce you to each other through LinkedIn or by email in advance you will be happier approaching them at the meeting.
After the meeting FOLLOW UP! However, well you got along with the people you meet they will soon forget you if you don’t follow up with further ‘get to know you properly meetings’ (or 121s). Remember everyone in the room will be meeting lots of people all the time – you need to find a way to make sure they keep you in mind if you want them to work with you.
So, I would like to sign off by saying that it does not matter how many people you meet during your networking – what matters is how many of them you follow up and build a mutually productive relationship with.
Fiona 🙂
Free access to accounts filed at Companies House
60% of the 3.5 million companies in the UK now file accounts electronically and you can access those accounts free of charge via http://companies.corefiling.com/search
Paul Driscoll is a Chartered Management Accountant, a director of Central Accounting Limited, Cura Business Consulting Limited, Hudman Limited, and AJ Tensile Fabrications Limited, and is a board level adviser to a variety of other businesses.
Are you your worst enemy?
I have been spending time mentoring fellow accountants in practise who have moved from the world of industry to working for themselves as accountants to SMEs.
As with many business owners one of their key problems is a lack of confidence, not in their abilities as accountants, but in determining the value they bring to their clients. This leads to them taking on work which is below their qualifications and experience, because it is easier to ‘sell’ lower level work if you don’t understand the value to clients of more challenging projects.
It is then very easy to get onto the tread mill of having to take on lots of low value clients/projects just to pay the bills. Because all their time is taken up servicing clients, rather than developing their business, they don’t have time to go after higher value work. This then means they find it very difficult to break out of the rut they have dug for themselves.
Another problem is that, even if they are trying to go after higher level projects, they are not clear enough on what their ‘perfect’ client looks like. To the ‘perfect’ client the work professionals can do for them is of real value. They want the service and are prepared to pay an appropriate fee for it.
Other clients may have been told they need the service but it has less value to them because they do not get why it is important to them. These clients will view a professional’s fees as a cost and are much more likely to want the service at a cut down fee. In this situation the management accountant (in this scenario) may still be in the position of doing a large number of hours for a relatively low rate and have the same problem as detailed above.
They have become their own worst enemy!
The key to understanding the value you can bring to customers is to talk to them! I know this sounds obvious but we are often put off from talking to our clients because we are afraid they will tell us something we don’t want to hear. However, it is more likely they will tell us something we DO want to hear!
If you don’t have any ‘perfect’ clients you will still have introducers and other business professionals with whom you can talk to chrystalise your value proposition.
Although this blog has focused largely on accountants the same problems can be found with other professional service providers and the solutions are the same:
– Have confidence in yourself and your abilities
– Understand the value your clients realise from what you do and charge accordingly
– Concentrate on projects in which you have particular expertise
– Identify your perfect clients and market to them
Become your best friend and give yourself the best chance of running the business you deserve
Fiona 🙂
Get HMRC to pay you
HMRC will pay you interest
It is not that well-known that HMRC will pay you interest on tax paid early. The interest rate is only 0.5% though, so it isn’t going to change your life.
In the case of Corporation Tax, any payment is due 9 months and a day after your year-end. If you have a business bank account that pays no interest and the cash to pay your tax early you can pay your tax as soon as you have filed your return. After the 9 months is up HMRC will send you the interest calculated.
What spare cash?
See my earlier post on paying your debts first. In the situation where you have cash in the bank that you aren’t putting to good use and no outstanding debts paying your tax liability early will yield a small benefit.
Get your tax return done early
It is difficult to plan your cash flow if you don’t know how much tax you are due to pay. Even if you don’t want to pay your tax early, it is helpful to know how much cash you will need to set aside. The later you leave it to file your tax return the more pressure you can end up putting on your cash flow. More importantly the later you leave it, the more pressure you put on your accountant. Most accountants increase their fees as tax deadlines approach – or to put it another way you are likely to get a discount for starting early!
Don’t be late!
It won’t surprise anyone that HMRC will charge interest on late payments. The interest rate isn’t the measly 0.5% mentioned above but is currently 3%. As Bank of England rate increases – expect this to increase too!
For support and advice on preparing your annual accounts and filing your tax returns contact Alterledger or visit the website alterledger.com.
Read all about it!
It is now 6 months since I started writing and distributing my newsletter Bright Business Bulletin and I have certainly learned a lot along the way.
I came up with the idea of producing a monthly printed newsletter at the Entrepreneur’s Convention back in September. Two clear messages of the Convention were that doing what every on else was doing was not a sensible way to stand out in business, and that if you have an idea you should act on it quickly. A perfect idea which is not put into action is worthless. However, an imperfect but relevant idea that comes to fruition will move you forward.
I have always liked the idea of producing a newsletter with genuinely useful information. I felt that sending out an e-newsletter would not be the best use of my time as most people receive many emailed newsletters but few actually get read.
So I decided that my newsletter had to be printed and sent out the old fashioned way by Royal Mail – in red envelopes of course! I would send it out to 80 people I thought would be interested and who I wanted to keep in touch with – clients, strategic introducers, business partners etc. (I have since made the newsletter available to download from my website).
For the October newsletter I had only 3 days to design my newsletter format, write the content, source envelopes, get it printed, stuffed in envelopes and posted (as well as doing the day job!), because I was due to go on holiday. It was tight but I did it!
Having just sent out my 6th newsletter I certainly feel a sense of achievement.
The feedback I have had has been really gratifying. People are clearly reading the newsletters and engaged enough to comment back to me about what they like, to thank me if I have featured their business, and take part in the competition I ran.
So what have I learned so far?
Firstly, and most importantly, have a format that is easy to follow each month, so you are not confronted by a blank sheet of paper. I have clear smallish sections that are easy to think about in isolation. For example, I have my Pooh quote of the month, Ask Jenny (my financial agony aunt column), featured business and partner, Michael’s minutes and dates for your diary, as standard columns.
Secondly, it may seem like a big commitment to do a newsletter monthly but, like blog writing, once you get into the habit it is relatively easy. It is difficult to get into a habit if you only do an activity irregularly or quarterly.
Finally, having sections about other people and their businesses is a great idea, because it is easier to write about others than ourselves, and readers love the fact that someone else is interested enough in them to write about them.
Now I am not worried about what I will write about each month but actually enjoy the challenge of creating something interesting.
So, if you are thinking about creating a newsletter don’t spend a lot of time worrying about it – just do it!
Fiona 🙂
Delegation is the key!
I was talking to a strategic introducer recently – she is successful in her field but is starting to get bogged down in the day to day running of her business. In particular, administration and bookkeeping are starting to grind and take the shine out of her enjoyment of her businesses.
This is a common story but one that has a simple solution – DELEGATION.
We may have many ‘good’ reasons why delegation is hard and why we should do all the ‘easy’ jobs in our businesses:
– it can be expensive to pay someone else
– perhaps they will do the job wrongly or prove unreliable
– it will take time for them to settle in and the process will be distracting
However, you cannot escape the truth that however much you try to ‘create’ time by managing it better, there will only ever be 24 hours in a day! There will come a point (or you may already be there) where there is simply not enough time to do all that is needed in your business.
So I would answer each of the objections above like this:
– You are much more valuable to your business than you may credit. Your time is likely to be worth much more to your business per hour than the £15-£25 per hour you might need to pay an administrator/bookkeeper.
Also there are jobs which only you can do in your business. These undelegatable jobs include creating business strategy, and leading and managing your business (even if you work alone your business needs to be managed!). If administration and bookkeeping are keeping you so occupied you do not have time for strategy, or management, then your business will suffer considerably.
– Are you really sure you are the best bookkeeper/administrator anyway! Surely you did not start your own business to play around with the books or to file!
– If you engage a trained bookkeeper they will settle in very quickly. Also, because they already know what to do as a bookkeeper you won’t have to spend time showing them what to do.
So do yourself a favour. If you have too little time to do the important things in your business – DELEGATE!
Fiona 🙂
Paint your picture!
When I ask business owners what their business will look like in a year, 5 years or even 10 years time I am often told they do not know – after all they are not a seer and don’t have a crystal ball.
This is a cop out in my opinion – and a dangerous one at that.
If you don’t have a plan of where your business is going, who will have? If you do not have a clear vision of what you want your business to look like, who does?
Clearly there are lots of things we, as business owners, have little control over: the general economy; the banks’ perception of business risk; how our competitors and our customers behave, to name but a few. But this does not mean that we have no control over our own business success.
In helping business owners to plan for the future I have found they become much more focused on what they want to achieve. They suddenly have a picture of what they need to do to get where they want to go and are motivated to get there. In some cases they are even reminded of the passion that drove them to start the business in the first place – something which is often lost in the day-to-day stresses of life.
They do not need to know for certain every detail of how their business will grow in the years ahead, but they do need a clear set of targets which, if achieved, will deliver a business which is successful in their terms. These targets will often revolve around sales achieved, new customers found , profits made, business owner earnings…
The picture they draw may become enhanced over time but will not change in essentials.
So, if you want to feel confident about the years ahead paint your own picture of your dreams for your business. Populate it with the subtle colours that will make your business shine. Then stand back and make sure you are happy to hang that picture on your wall for the long term.
Fiona 🙂
Ovivo – Dead as a dodo
I guess the moral of this story might be – if it looks too good to be true, it probably is…
Is it a dodo?
The ovivo logo looks like bird resisting the weight of a great rhinoceros. If you have recently signed up for a free subscription to the mobile phone company ovivo, you may be surprised to learn that the company has ceased trading. Their home page now contains a form to get your PAC code but who knows if they will be able to deal with all the requests?
Glimmer of hope
You may be able to get a refund from your debit or credit card if you signed up in the last few days under the Chargeback scheme. There is an article on the Money Saving Expert site including a template for a letter to send your bank. Giffgaff is offering £5 of credit to anyone transferring their number from ovivo, but the deadline for transferring your number is the end of April – and there is no guarantee that ovivo will release the PAC code in time.
For business support and advice contact Alterledger or visit the website alterledger.com.
Related articles
Limited Liability Partnerships
Limited Liability Partnerships came under closer scrutiny in the Budget 2013. The aim is to target LLPs which use the structure to hide the employment relationship of the partners and those with Corporate partners who divert business profits to the corporate partners in order to avoid tax.
Although the following measures come in to play from 6th April this year, the anti-avoidance measures make it effective from 5th December 2013. This is to prevent partnerships changing their arrangements in order to avoid the new rules.
The two main areas of focus are salaried or fixed profit share partners which is referred to as disguised employment, and profit and loss sharing arrangements within mixed partnerships.
LLP partners with fixed profit share
HMRC believe that many members of an LLP should be taxed as employees, because they don’t see them is true partners.
A new test has been brought in which has three conditions. Where the member tested meets all three conditions then he or she must be treated as an employed salaried member and be brought within the PAYE system with tax and class I NIC applied to any earnings, which had previously been Taxed as profit share.
This also means that if a vehicle is provided for the members use by the partnership this will be taxed as a benefit in kind. As such the member will have to pay tax and NIC and the LLP will have to pay Class 1a NIC on the benefit.
HMRC does actually accept that employment tax rules are imposed on the individual but that in fact the individual has no employment rights. This is because he is not actually an employee for employment law purposes.
The test is as follows. The provision is triggered when all conditions A to C are met:
Condition A: The Member is performing services for the LLP in his capacity as a member of the partnership and it’s reasonable to expect as a result of these arrangements that any amounts paid to him in respect of his services will be wholly or substantially wholly a disguised salary. In other words if his reward package is comparable to that received by an employee, either a fixed salary or a variable bonus based on performance rather than profit share.
Condition B: The Member doesn’t have significant influence over the affairs of the partnership.
Condition C: The Member’s capital contribution to the LLP is less than 25% of the total amount of his disguised salary which would be expected to be paid in the relevant tax year by the LLP in respect of the members performance of services as a member. Normally the relevant time would be the beginning of the new tax year.
These tests must be reviewed each tax year.
Corporate LLP Members
This applies to partnerships who have members which are not subject to UK income tax for example this might be a limited company. The problem here is that HMRC believes these structures are used to avoid tax on a very large scale. Where for example an individual member introduces his Ltd company as a corporate member, and which then receives a profit share that would otherwise have been paid to the individual member. If the Member then has the power to enjoy the fund which had been paid to his company then:
- The individual member will be treated as a salaried member.
- The amount paid to the company will be treated as employment income paid to the individual member.
There are anti-avoidance rules are in place to catch anyone trying to put measures in place to counteract these new rules.
fiona@grant-jonesaccountancy.com
Business Accountant 