This is not an advertising directory!  Care and consideration should be taken when choosing an Accountant.  Your choice of accountant significantly influences your financial success.

Our ”dating agency approach” introduces you to the right kind of Accountants for you.  We are not affiliated with firms of accountants or accounting bodies and our introductions are independent and unbiased. We have been matching people with accountants for years and use human search facilities to find ideal accountants for you based on a range of criteria such as location, fees, software preferences, industry specialisms, service levels, and proven track records.

It’s free, will save you time and hassle from inappropriate meetings, chasing up quotes, and being pestered with sales calls!

Maxxy’s find-me-an-accountant.com service was a great service for us as a new startup facing a frankly bewildering array of accountants. Her industry knowledge and personal handling of our enquiry meant that we were quickly put in touch with knowledgeable, professional and approachable accountants. It’s saved us hours of searching and helped us avoid a potentially costly mistake in choosing the wrong accountant. Can’t thank Maxxy enough!
-Rob Spencer, York

So cut through the jargon, the sales spiel, and asking people for recommendations.  Remember that an accountant recommended by a colleague or someone with a biased view, may be the worst choice if that accountant does not have the specialist skills or qualification to suit your industry, the stage of growth of your business, or your particular circumstances.

Take the survey or complete the Quick Reply Form below and answer basic questions about your business and we will manually select suitably matched accountants for your individual needs! Oh, and by the way we never share any data with third parties!

Link is here … http://thebusinesshub.fm/the-business-hub-show-podcast-06-february-2011/

Ann Hawkins from The Inspired Group is currently presenting The A-Z of Business Success and invited me as a guest for letter A (How to find your ideal accountant!)

Thank you Ann for the invite and looking forward to hearing your other guests on there soon

Maxine Welford is owner of Maxxy Telemarketing and Find-me-an-accountant.com providing specialist lead generation for accountants and finding ideal accountants for business owners nationwide.

Maxine has spoken with thousands of business owners since 2005 and understands why people select and why they change accountant.

She is group leader for the marketing discussion forum at AccountingWEB, the UK’s largest forum for Accountants and Maxxy can be found at the top of google organic rankings for telemarketing for accountants.

Her finance background enables her to have knowledgeable discussions with both accountants and business owners on what makes the relationship between accountants and business owner successful.

Deciding to expand on her telemarketing business she launched find-me-an-accountant.com a year ago specifically with the aim of matching and introducing accountants and clients to each other. Both parties complete a vigorous survey and telephone interview to capture as much information as possible about what they both want from the working relationship.

She chose the domain name with dashes as otherwise it could have spelt “find mean accountant” and nobody wants one of them!

Accountants are running a business too and it can be more profitable for them to build their customer base in line with their strengths whether that is industry experience, qualifications in key areas, software products, services, or client care.

Business owners often don’t know what too look for when choosing an accountant and so find-me-an-accountant.com points them in the right direction for them.

The “dating agency” approach works as both parties carefully think about what they want from the other party. With valentines day around the corner, find-me-an-accountant.com will be playing cupid to accountants and business owners!

The service is free to business owners as accountants pay for introductions made to suit their practice’s requirements.

She is a prolific tweeter too @maxinemaxxy and also supports clients with social media for lead generation.

Must have exceptional management accounting expertise including track record of profit improvement programmes.  The client requires a good commercial outlook and a practical understanding of working with cashflows, variance analysis etc, as you would expect from a part time Financial Controller/FD.

If you feel you could help this client please contact me.

Have you received a demand for underpaid tax from HMRC?  If you need assistance to respond to this then don’t despair! Free help is at hand.

A group of qualified volunteer accountants has been established to help those on low incomes affected by the 2010 PAYE underpayments fiasco.

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I have a client looking for an remote working accountant who can help them with their part time Sole Trader business.

They have allocated a budget of approx £200 for sole trader accounts to be prepared from a small number of transactions.

This client would particularly like to work with an Accountant who is familiar and appreciative of Network Marketing.

Please contact me for further information.

One of the most popular ways of spending Start Up vouchers issued by Business Link is for Accountancy advice and accountancy fees either at pre-start or in the early stages of development of new businesses.

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We have a good base of accountants across the UK but regularly seek more especially where a client has a need for a particular industry strength or software preference in a particular geographical location.

Our service has been more popular than we originally thought and it helps to save time with introducing clients to accountants who we think are suitable for them.

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We have a survey running at the moment and one of the question asks if people know what qualifications their accountant has.

25% Admit they haven’t got the first clue!

A further 50% approx are not sure but think they have some sort of recognised qualification but don’t know what.

We are asking this question not because we advocate that qualifications are the be all and end all of supplying accountancy services, but because we are evaluating where the perceived benefits are from particular qualifications.

It goes without saying that experience and recommendation are usually important when selecting an accounting, but to not have any idea whatsoever of qualifications can make certain people in certain industries more vulnerable and exposed than others to areas such as large tax bills, financial surprises, weaker financial performance etc. To build on this having someone with the appropriate qualifications (plus experience, personality etc) can make a huge positive impact to financial performance.

Personally I am surprised that the levels of ignorance around qualifications was as high as this.  I expected there to be a large number of people who were not so sure but 25% without the first clue is a bit worrying don’t you think?

Tax changes quickly and it’s often difficult for accountants to write about tax planning without knowing people’s individual circumstances.

Here, our author Frank gives some general and advice for more meaningful and productive discussions with your accountant…

·      Be cautious of tales from the pub!  People can be notoriously inexact about their earnings, keen to boast and don’t usually understand the detail of their tax bill. Their circumstances may be very different to yours.

·      Tax planning should happen during the year, not after, and certainly not just before the tax payment date.

·      Good bookkeeping will give facts to help reasonable discussions about tax to take place. Waiting for draft accounts to be prepared may result in it being too late for tax planning.

·      Well organised records will help keep track and claim all business expenses.  You are much less likely ot have unexplained expenditure that cannot be claimed because you cannot remember what it was for! It’s not vital that every expense is supported with a receipt provided you can demonstrate it was a reasonable business expense but this should be an exception and you should have receipts for the majority of expenses.

… and finally… tax planning does not mean failing to put all your takings through the books because “that is what everyone does”.  That’s isn’t tax planning, it’s fraud.

You can leave a comment for Frank below or you can contact the author via our contact section.

I don’t know if they are good looking! But they are certainly attractive in terms of their specialisms, customer service, fees, and experience!

Do you operate a small business either as a Sole Trader, Partnership, Charity / Non for Profit, or Limited Company?

Have you been with the same accountant for years and not sure if you can get better value elsewhere? Business Link suggest on their site that businesses review their relationship with their accountant every 3 years.

Are you or a family member struggling to do your accounts yourself or do you think your time may be better spent doing more profitable things in your business? Are you finding it difficult to keep up with accounting changes? Or need support to help cover sickness and holidays?

Are you looking for someone to act as a Part Time Finance Director say on one day per month on site?

Are you looking to slim down the amount of accounting work that your accountant does for you and bring your bookkeeping inhouse and use an accountant for year end and tax advice?

Are you looking for an accountant who provides excellent customer service and who is proactive in their approach to improving your business? Perhaps you need someone with specific industry experience and qualifications?

We have some lovely accountants in Cardiff who are looking to take on more of the right type of clients for them so if you feel that this is a good opportunity to review your accounting set-up, please get in touch!