Finance Business Partners

We believe in working with our clients rather than for the clients. For that reason, we consider ourselves as your finance business partners helping you to make financial decisions right for your business.  We can assist you in key decisions about business growth and financial investment for the future. We begin by discussing your specific requirements with you and then we set up appropriate accounting procedures and controls and ensure your accounts are kept fully up-to-date and in compliance with statutory regulations.

But we don’t stop there. We can also provide you with industry leading financial management advice based on key financial analytics. Essential areas include:

• Cashflow and Profit & Loss Forecasting (Monthly/Quarterly)
• Budgeting (Creating a Yearly Financial Plan)
• Variance Analysis (Monthly/Quarterly)
• Key Performance Indicator’s (KPI’s) tailored to your business needs
• Monthly/Quarterly review meetings depending on requirements
• Customer Profitability Analysis

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Business Planning

Preparing a road map for your business

It is often said that, “Failing to plan is planning to fail.”

As a business owner you have no doubt been reminded on more than one occasion of the importance of business planning. And no doubt you agree that planning is important.

And yet probably you rarely seem to find the time to sit down and develop strategic plans but end up flying by the seat of your pants, trusting your intuitions and relying on snap judgments rather than adhering to a pre-arranged strategy.

Not that we would deprecate such intuitions. Experience has taught us that it is precisely this ‘sixth sense’ that many business owners and managers seem to possess that is the driving force behind entrepreneurship – and we have learned to take it seriously.

But the planning is important. Without sound analysis, clear projections, and well-thought out contingencies, businesses tend to become hostages to fortune.

Proactive management is replaced by reactive coping, and instead of following a well-thought-out plan, owners and managers are reduced to responding to unforeseen events or trying to catch up on missed opportunities.

Therefore, we encourage our clients to schedule regular planning sessions. We can help you:

• Formulate and implement long-term strategic goals
• Set concrete operational objectives
• Monitor performance and adjust plans accordingly

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Business Startup

Putting your new business venture on a strong footing

You want to start a business because you are an entrepreneur with a great idea and the vision to realize it.

And we’re here to help you do just that.

We want you to focus on what you do best – building your business – while we provide all the necessary background support.

Here are just a few of the ways we can help you get started:

• Preparing a comprehensive business plan
• Determining the best structure of your business: sole trader, partnership, limited liability partnership, or limited company
• Where appropriate, assisting with company formation and company secretarial duties
• Registering your new business with the HMRC
• Establishing relationships with banks, insurers, etc.
• Preparing cashflow projections and assessing finance needs
• Preparing and submitting finance applications
• General bookkeeping, VAT, and payroll duties
• Tax planning
• Management accounts
• Annual accounts and (where necessary) annual audit

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Company Secretarial

Assuring compliance with the Companies Act

The Companies Act requires companies to submit various documents within strict time limits. Not only is this a considerable administrative burden, failure to comply can result in potentially severe penalties for directors.

We can relieve you of both the burden and the worry by helping with your Company Secretarial duties. Our service includes:

• Preparing and filing accounts and confirmation statements

Maintaining statutory registers:

• Register of Allotments
• Register of Transfers
• Register of Members
• Register of Directors
• Register of Secretaries
• Register of Directors’ Interests
• Register of Mortgages and Charges
• Preparing and filing Companies House forms recording:
• Changes of officers
• Changes of registered office
• Increases in share capital
• Allotments of shares
• Changes of accounting reference date
• Preparing documentation for annual general meetings
• Acting as company secretary of your company (if required)
• Providing your company with a registered office address (if required)

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Company Finance

Finance is the lifeblood of any business. At every stage in its growth a business needs to maintain a balance between a positive cashflow and adequate working capital on the one hand and a reasonable return on investment on the other.

Directors’ drawings, shareholder dividends, and debt repayments need to be carefully orchestrated to ensure that the smooth running and continued growth of the business are not jeopardised.

Moreover, while proper provision needs to be made for possible external changes such as economic downturns or fluctuations in exchange rates or interest rates, and internal changes such as temporary or permanent loss of key employees, it is equally important that any finance raised by the business is made to work for the business.

All these matters require a keen, professional eye to develop and constantly adjust an appropriate and flexible finance structure for your company.

Then there are the special finance requirements for business expansion, mergers and acquisitions, MBOs, and MBIs. Preparing business plans and finance applications and identifying and approaching appropriate lending sources require expertise and professional insight if the best possible results are to be achieved.

Finally, there are the financial implications of ensuring a suitable exit route for the current business owners.

These are all matters on which our corporate finance experts are qualified to advise and guide your business.

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Company Recovery

Our approach to corporate recovery is summed up in the phrase, ‘Prevention is better than cure.’

The key to preventing business failure is to have the right controls in place to help identify areas of poor performance or early signs of distress in a business and to take appropriate remedial action if and when such signs appear.

Even where a business is in a relatively advanced state of distress, we still regard insolvency as a last resort and prefer to explore all possibilities of restructuring the business and setting it on a path to full recovery. Often this will involve refocusing on core business activities, introducing stringent cost controls, and setting clear profitability goals.

This approach, we believe, is in the best interests of all the stakeholders – shareholders, directors, managers, employees, customers, and suppliers.

If all else fails and the business must go into administration, receivership, or insolvency, we can advise and assist with this process and guide you through the financial, legal and regulatory implications of such a course of action.

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Corporate Tax Planning

We can conduct a full tax review of your business and determine the most efficient tax structure for you. Very often such reviews result in considerable tax savings, which show up as real improvements in your bottom line.

As with any other area of taxation, it is essential to be proactive and plan when dealing with corporation tax.

In this way you can:

• Minimise your corporation tax liabilities
• Make the most of any available reliefs, tax losses and deferment opportunities
• Ensure you meet all your CTSA deadlines and file your returns correctly, thereby avoiding any potential penalties

In addition to helping you with your corporate tax planning we can also represent you in any communication with the tax authorities.

Why take up valuable time and resources dealing with corporation tax when we can do it for you?

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Mergers & Acquisitions

If you are considering expanding your business through a merger or acquisition, we strongly recommend you seek appropriate professional advice and assistance to ensure your interests are best represented in any subsequent transaction.

Why not contact our M&A team? They can advise on and help with:

• Strategic planning to determine suitable acquisition criteria
• Identifying suitable candidates’ companies
• Conducting feasibility studies
• Developing a negotiating strategy
• Performing financial and operational due diligence
• Preparing the necessary financial projections
• Identifying potential finance sources
• Preparing and presenting finance applications
• Assisting with negotiations
• Assisting with post-acquisition integration

It is equally important to seek professional help and advice when disposing of a business.

We can help with valuing the assets, preparing the business for sale, finding suitable purchasers and negotiating the sale.

Above all, we can help you time the disposal to minimize your tax exposure.

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Payroll

Administering payroll is becoming increasingly burdensome for many businesses, taking more and more time and resources away from core business functions.

Fortunately, payroll can easily be separated from your other accounting activities and outsourced to a specialist agency such as our team of payroll professionals.

We can also set up an Employers’ Scheme with HMRC for you and we can advise you of whether employees should be added to the payroll or not and deal with the relevant forms/ submissions for you.

We can file all of your in-year and year-end returns for you with HMRC and provide you with P60s to distribute to your employees at the year end.

We offer a completely confidential and cost-effective service that includes:

• Starters and leavers
• Code number changes
• Customized and generic payslips
• Taxable benefits and P11Ds
• Company, personal, and stakeholder pension schemes
• Student loan recovery
• WFTC and DPTC
• SMP, SPP, SSP, and SAP
• Child maintenance orders
• Give as you earn
• Pay in lieu of notice redundancy
• Advice on tax and NIC payable
• Processing payments through BACS
• Dealing with employee enquiries
• Standard payroll reports
• Production of year-end P60s
• Preparation and electronic filing of forms

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

VAT

Value added tax is one of the most complex and onerous tax regimes imposed on business – so complex that many businesses inadvertently overpay or underpay VAT.

From April 2019, HMRC is introducing Making Tax Digital (MTD) as a part of its ongoing digitization program. This means it will become compulsory for all businesses with a turnover of over the current VAT threshold of £85,000 to maintain their VAT records digitally and submit VAT returns through MTD compatible software. 

There is no impact on the frequency of returns nor the payment dates; this will remain unchanged. By April 2019 the software used must be MTD compatible and by April 2020 the software must be capable of exchanging data digitally with HMRC. Filing via the existing HMRC portal will no longer be permissible.

The ever widening scope of VAT, the constant stream of detailed changes to the regulations, and the ever growing demands of HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) call for a trained professional eye to ensure that you do not fall foul of the regulations and do not pay the Exchequer more than you need to!

We provide an efficient cost-effective VAT service, which includes:

• Assistance with VAT registration
• Advice on VAT planning and administration
• Use of the most appropriate scheme
• VAT control and reconciliation
• Help with completing VAT returns
• Planning to minimize future problems with HMRC
• Negotiating with HMRC in disputes and representing you at VAT tribunals

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Making Tax Digital

Making Tax Digital for VAT requires VAT registered businesses with taxable turnover above the VAT registration threshold (£85,000) to keep records in digital form and file their VAT Returns using software.

It is increasingly common for business records and accounts to be kept digitally, in a software program on a computer or tablet, or in a smartphone application, or maintained through such a device and stored using a cloud-based application.

For more information view our Making Tax Digital page

Management Consultancy Services

The unprecedented internal and external challenges in the current business climate have revealed the Finance function capability needs to evolve to meet the modern-day organizational demands.

CFO’s and their teams need to move from ‘react mode’ to finding improvement opportunities and adding real value to the enterprise. The future agenda for finance is transforming to focus on how the finance organization enables enterprise value creation.

Working with CFOs, our team are providing insights and recommendations on people (behavior and culture), processes (efficiency and effectiveness), risk and systems and working with clients to deliver improvements. 

We focus on assisting our clients with:

•    Business Process Re-engineering and implementing internal controls
•    Working with our partners to improve efficiency through implementing financial solutions 
•    Enhanced performance reporting and business steering capabilities 
•    Refocusing people to add value i.e. Business Partnering

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Personal Tax Planning

We offer a specialist personal tax planning service tailored to your individual needs that includes:

• Advice on minimising tax liability for all personal taxes, including:
• Income tax
• Capital gains tax (CGT)
• Inheritance tax (IHT)
• Non-domiciliary taxes
• Completion and filing of relevant returns
• Advice on what payments are due and when
• Advice on trusts and estates

Your personal Tax Adviser will also be available to advise on issues such as:

• How best to handle benefits such as company cars and accommodation
• Whether directors should be paid by salary or dividend
• How to minimize CGT liability on disposal of assets
• How to optimise your tax position when living or working abroad

With the complex nature of tax and finances today, we also encourage our clients to develop a comprehensive personal finance plan that, in addition to general tax planning, covers:

• Provision for education costs
• Mortgage planning
• Savings & investments
• Insurance planning
• Healthcare provision
• Retirement planning
• Estate planning

Decisions made in any of these areas are likely to affect one or more of the others, which is why we recommend working within an overall plan.

We can help you draw up a comprehensive personal financial plan.

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Estate Planning

When you have spent a whole lifetime building up your personal wealth, you want to think that upon your death your estate will pass into the hands of your chosen beneficiaries and not into the hands of the Taxman.

And yet, all too often we meet clients who are shocked at how much of their inheritance is taken from them before they even see it! At present rates, the Taxman can take up to 40% of your estate! Yes, almost half its value!

Inheritance tax (IHT) used to be referred to as a ‘voluntary tax’ for the very wealthy, but with the recent dramatic increases in property values without a corresponding increase in the IHT threshold, many more estates have come within of the Taxman’s reach.

This makes estate planning more necessary – and more urgent.

There are several ways to reduce the potential tax liability on your estate, but they all involve careful planning – often over a long period.

Lifetime gifts, the judicious use of trusts, and care with transfer of agricultural and business property can all help to reduce IHT liability.

It is also possible to mitigate potential inheritance tax liabilities by arranging adequate life assurance cover.

We can help you with your estate planning, including succession planning and business exit strategies.

We can also help with the drafting and updating of your will, and where appropriate, act as trustees or executors.

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Retirement Strategies

Are you confident you have made adequate preparations for your retirement?

These days, with increasing life expectancy and advances in healthcare it is not uncommon for people to live for twenty to thirty years after they retire. This can be more than half the time they spent working!

Ensuring adequate income for life in these circumstances requires careful planning across a wide area:

More and more people are supplementing their pension provision with other sources of retirement income, such as savings products, investments, and even property acquisition. The tax and financial implications of such decisions are complex and require timely and expert advice.

Then there are the questions of when you should plan to retire and how you will leave your business – whether you will pass it on to others in the family or sell it and cash out. It is wise to prepare your exit strategy well in advance and to be sure you optimise your tax position while you still have flexible options.

Finally, there are matters of life assurance provision, long-term care, and medical insurance to consider if you are concerned to maintain a good quality of life throughout your retirement.

The three keys to successful retirement planning are:

• Plan well ahead – It is never too early to start retirement planning. The earlier you start the greater your chances of achieving your objectives
• Maintain balance & flexibility – It is especially important to achieve an appropriate balance between high and low risk exposures, and to maintain flexible options regarding instruments such as pensions, savings, investments, and insurance.
• Seek professional advice – This a very complex and continuously changing area, and we strongly recommend you seek skilled, professional advice at every step.

Our professional team can help you draw up and implement a comprehensive retirement strategy – giving you peace of mind to enjoy life to the full now and into the future.

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.

Trusts & Executorships

Trusts are extremely useful instruments for tax planning purposes. They are particularly useful for holding shares in private companies as part of a family financial or tax plan – especially if you want to reduce inheritance tax liability on your estate.

They can also be useful for:

• Providing funds for your children’s education, maintenance, etc.
• Restricting access to property by future beneficiaries
• Providing for people who are mentally or otherwise incapacitated
• Gifting to charity

There are four main types of trust:

• Life interest trusts
• Discretionary trusts
• Accumulation and maintenance trusts
• Bare trusts

Each type of trust receives different tax treatment and can be adapted to many different purposes.

To take full advantage of trusts in your tax and estate planning you need to receive expert help and advice.

We can help you determine which types of trust are suited to your purposes, prepare the necessary documentation, and advise on appropriate trustees.

Contact us today and receive your free initial consultation.