Archive for the ‘Speaking’ Category

There are essentially just five basic approaches to making more profits as an accountant in practice:

1. Increase your charges – for doing the same work you have always done. This requires you to increase the perceived value of what you do
2. Speed up collection of your fees and so reduce your capital requirements and interest costs
3. Reduce the time you spend providing your services whilst keeping your fees the same as before. This allows you to take on more (profitable) work.
4. Provide more value and charge more than you did before NB: this is not the same as simply ‘doing more work’ for existing clients
5. Provide additional services and charge for these. Avoid preconceptions about what clients will pay.

There are also 2 supplementary things you can do:

• Get existing (good) clients to introduce new prospects just like them

• Sack the duff D-list clients who get in the way

You will appreciate that my focus here is on generating more profits rather than on increasing your top line, for example through adding new clients secured through advertising, marketing and networking.

In my talks on this subject I tend to focus on the first 5 points above although I also cover the 2 supplementary issues and some of the less costly methods of securing new clients and turnover. In so doing I share dozens of practical, commercial and easy to implement ideas that I know are being applied by other smaller practitioners.

“How to make more profits from your smaller clients – without fancy tax schemes” will next be presented in Birmingham on the morning of Friday 21 May 2010. Full details here.

I’m reminded of the old sex education message: Just say ‘no’!

As professional advisers we are all used to prospective clients seeking free advice. As I’m no longer in practice and as a frequent blogger I have very different perspective now. So here is some free advice from me.  When a stranger/prospect calls you need to set clear parameters. Why give any free advice?

I think the most common reason accountants give themselves is that it helps evidence their credibility, style, approach, knowledge and willingness to help clients.  In reality it is only the accountant themselves who doubts their ability and knowledge. The prospect generally takes all that for granted – after all our adverts or website makes clear we’re an accountant. All accountants know everything don’t they? We know this isn’t the case but prospects assume it is so.  Even more so if theye have been recommended or referred by a third party.

So accountants are generally proving nothing by giving free advice. They can evidence the other key qualities they want to exhibit without giving free technical advice.

I also tend to think that a side benefit of the Anti-Money Laundering (AML) legislation is that it gives accountants a statutory justification for any apparent reluctance to provide answers to technical questions before engaging a new client.  “I’m really sorry Mr Prospect but as a professional adviser I’m precluded by law from giving any advice before we’ve been through the anti-money laundering checks. I know it’s a pain but it’s the law.” The consequence of this will often be that you have engaged the client and secured their agreement to your preferred billing procedures before you give them any valuable advice. So the AML laws do have an upside after all!

Finally I would suggest you establish a process to qualify a prospect or to let them go elsewhere before you waste too much time on them. Initially you may want to qualify out time wasters on the phone. You will also want to determine what you need to cover in an initial meeting.

In many of my seminars I ask accountants if they offer a free initial meeting to prospective clients. Typically the answer is ‘yes’. “How long do you allow for such meetings?” Some put a cap on it. Others say ‘as long as it takes’. I ask the question – “As long as WHAT takes?” It’s not just about getting the prospect to want to appoint you. You need to find out quite early on if they can afford to pay the fees you would want to earn. You also need to determine if this is the sort of person you want to have a client.

Bottom line, I’d suggest you establish a process/checklist (that you will in time commit to memory) to use when you receive such calls in future and indeed when you have an initial meeting with a prospect.

A driver who drove his car to the edge of a 100ft drop after he “slavishly” followed its SatNav instructions has become one of the first motorists to be convicted for placing too much trust in his SatNav.

When I noted this news story today I was reminded of a comment I make during my talks about how to avoid professional negligence claims. It’s in the context of evidencing ‘good practice’. One way of doing this is to comply with your professional body’s Membership Handbook. In normal circumstances you might expect that if you can show that your actions were in accordance with the guidelines contained in the Handbook you would have a strong defence against allegations of professional negligence. But this is not the whole picture.

During my talks I focus more on the practical and commercial issues  than on the legal ones as I have an accountancy and tax background rather than a legal one. In this context I make the point that, whilst the position is not free from doubt, slavishly following guidance that is patently wrong may not be a good enough excuse. There is some precedent for this in the world of medical negligence.

We need to recognise that some of the guidelines in membership handbooks may be out of date – and that the Courts will expect professional advisers to apply common sense. The test will be what would a reasonably competent accountant have done in the circumstances. If this would differ from the membership guidelines then you should have done so too. It seems the same is true for drivers – is it reasonable to follow your SatNav instructions if they are clearly wrong? The report today suggests the answer is ‘no’ – and you can’t get off by blaming your SatNav.

I don’t imagine that the recent ‘SatNav’ case will figure in future courses about professional negligence but it is a useful reminder that we are all expected to apply common sense rather than slavishly following generic guidance that may be out of date, irrelevant or dangerous.

Over the years I have collected dozens and dozens of stories of what it is that has led to problems for accountants. Such examples help inform my talks about how to avoid negligence claims. It’s also worth recognising how easy it is for things to go wrong; after all they do say that forewarned is forearmed.

So here is a selection of real life situations that have led to negligence claims against accountants. Don’t get caught out yourself:

• Unexpected obligations to overseas tax authorities
• Difficulties with liquidators due to auditors being officers of the company
• Failing to provide all relevant information to successors
• Failure to evidence independent advice as a trustee
• Difficult clients not providing all relevant information
• Nightmare clients who are not clear as to what they want
• Continuing responsibilities after ceasing to act for a client
• ‘bad’ partners in the firm
• Counter claims when pursuing outstanding fees
• Going beyond agreed scope of work and level of own competence
• Failure to spot employee fraud
• Clients who lose confidence due to poor communication
• Lack of clarity re scope of work and responsibilities
• Adverse media reports after disgruntled client leaves
• Casual relationships
• Third party (or interested party) putting pressure on client to complain
• Failing to spot technical issues
• Valuation related work when subsequent sale suggests a very different figure
• Clients looking for someone to sue

I have also addressed related points in previous posts on this blog – such as

• Expect more clients to seek advice on Tax Credits;
• That key term in PI policies
• Ten top tips to avoid professional negligence claims
• Are you at least ‘reasonably competent’?

If you’d like to know more about How to avoid professional negligence claims and protecting your practice from negligence claims and worse – then you may want to attend my next seminar on the subject.  Full details here.

If you’re unable to get to London for the seminar you can instead access the slides and notes from an earlier version of the seminar by following this link.

And if you have any examples of claims that you’re willing to share do please add them as comments to this blog post.

Many, but NOT all accountants, charge fees by reference to the time they spend working on a client’s affairs. Most accountants in practice still complete timesheets to show how much of their day has been devoted to each different client and to each different aspect of management, administration, marketing or other ‘non-billable’ time.

Thinking back to when I was in practice it was many years before I realised that a timesheet may have uses as a management tool but that it did not ‘prove’ how much time had been spent doing anything. It was a guide, nothing more. In my talks to accountants, eg: “How to make more money from your smaller clients” I ask accountants what they would bill in a variety of situations. The answers prove that the timesheet is a guide and that the ‘time costs’ that it reveals are rarely the same as the fees billed (or that could be billed).

In previous posts on this blog I have considered related topics such as: Timesheets and value pricing professional services; How do you set charge out rates?; Clients will pay high fees for good advice; and Setting fee rates – using costs incurred or value provided?;

I am astonished to find that I have, todate, made no previous direct reference to either Ron Baker or the VeraSage Institute ( a “revolutionary think tank for professional knowledge firms”).  I’ve been aware of Ron since first reading his book ‘Professionals Guide to Value Pricing’ in 2001.

Today I rectify that omission and do so by reference to a new post on the VeraSage blog: All accountants charge for their time. NOT!

The blog post refers to a Q&A found on a number of accounting firm websites (possibly as it comes as standard in a template web page):

“How do accountants charge?
All Accountants charge by time. The longer it takes to prepare your Return the dearer it’s going to be. Some businesses sell hamburgers. Real Estate Agents get paid commissions, and ACCOUNTANTS SELL TIME.”

This is a sad misconception. It’s based on a misunderstanding and it’s a misleading myth. Accountants may try to determine SOME OF their fees by reference to time. They may try to  charge fees by reference to their time records but TIME is not generally what accountants sell.  If it were then the corollary would be that TIME is what people who want  an accountant set out to buy. And they don’t.

In my view accountants sell (or should focus on selling) Trust, Confidence and Peace of Mind. Indeed a quick Google search reveals an increasing number of firms who state this on their websites.  These are 3 of the key qualities, if not THE 3 key qualities, that clients seek when they want to appoint an accountant.  If  prospective clients do not quickly trust you, have confidence that you will do the necessary and give them peace of mind that they can rely on you, you will not keep them as clients; indeed they may not appoint you in the first place.

What do you think you sell as an accountant in practice?

Anyone who has heard me speak at seminars or enjoyed my mentoring programme will have heard me refer to the ABCDE of client service.

I was surprised recently to note that in the last 2 and half years I haven’t already blogged about this. But a quick search reveals that to be the case.

I first used it when training staff in practice almost 20 years ago. It’s evolved a little bit in that time but hasn’t required much change.

When I was in practice I explained to my staff that the ABCDE of client service summarised the five things that clients most wanted from their accountant. I encouraged my staff to keep it in mind whenever writing, phoning or meeting with clients. I also used this as a tool to help convince prospective clients that I knew how to look after them.

So here it is:

A = Advice – More than anything clients want Tax Advice.  A is NOT for Answers  – See previous post.

B = Barrier – Clients want us to act as a Barrier between them and HMRC.

C = Compliance – We deal with all of the Compliance paperwork and processes.

D = Dates – We make sure that clients know when they need to do things and when we’ll do things, when tax needs to be paid and when refunds can be expected.

E = Estimates – We provide estimates of the tax payable and repayable and update these as and when the information changes.

I remember playing around some years back and adding further definitions for additional letters (F, G, H etc).  But none stuck and five is about the right number anyway.

Does anyone care to try to improve on the above?

This was the message to accountants in a press release issued last week by the Tax Advice Network.   In it I warned that:

Accountants across the UK are likely to see a surge in requests for Tax Credit advice from couples considering getting married following the release of a controversial report highlighting the failings on the current Tax Credit System for married couples.

This followed on from The ‘Individualists Who Co-operate’ report issued last week by Civitas.

In fact I have been suggesting for some time that More and more accountants will find themselves having to advise on tax credits.

And this is also a  point I invariably make in my talks about How to avoid professional negligence claims and Mastering the Credit Crunch.

Question one
I always ask for a show of hands as to how many accountants in the audience advise clients about their entitlement to claim tax credits. I’ve spoken to groups of all sizes, from 20-180 and to date no more than 5 hands ever go up. This suggests to me that the vast majority of accountants are not currently advising clients about their entitlement to claim tax credits.

We know why don’t we. They are merely a new(ish) dressing for a social security benefit. Accountants have not traditionally advised on benefits. It’s not cost effective to do so and we don’t know all the rules. Some, but not all, accountants make clear in their engagement letters that they do not advise on tax credit related issues. That is their prerogative and in so doing they probably reduce the prospect of a client making a successful claim for negligence at a later date.

Question two
I then ask the accountants whether they advise their clients on how best to offset losses, on Capital allowance disclaimers, pension reliefs and (now) Annual Investment Allowances (AIA). Of course they all do. Indeed, securing tax refunds tends to go down well with clients. In fact, clients tend to value anything their accountant does that reduces the tax payable or that secures the biggest tax refunds. And if they perceive that their accountant isn’t doing all they could in this regard, they are inclined to switch to one who does.

Question three
So what happens if the loss claim, the AIA or other advice reduces the client’s income to a level whereby they would be entitled to claim tax credits?

So far as clients are concerned, tax credits are TAX credits.This means they are seen as TAX refunds. Exactly the sort of thing that clients expect to get help on from their accountant. And if their accountant doesn’t help in this regard then it won’t be long until the client switches to one who does. Especially if the client becomes aware that he missed out on claiming tax credits as his accountant didn’t tell him when he should have done so. (The 3 month limit on ‘back claims’ is a real problem here).

If the commitments I note at the end of my seminars and training sessions are anything to go by, an increasing number of accountants will be advising clients on their entitlement to claim tax credits. It doesn’t have to be time consuming and it can be done profitably.

Anyone know how much a client could claim in tax credits this year if they registered for them from April and , as a result of AIA (or losses) they have no taxable income this year? Assume partner has no income and there are 2 children.

—

If you’re on Twitter you can tell your followers about this by clicking here to: Tweet a link to this blog post. You can send the tweet, which contains a shortened link, as is or edit it.

And you can follow me @bookmarklee and @TaxAdviceNet depending on your interest.

This is the inevitable follow up to my recent posts: Twitter is not for accountants, If you’re not on Facebook you need to be on LinkedIn and Blogging myths for accountants.

I am probably one of the most active UK accountants on what are commonly referred to as ’social networks’.  I prefer the term ‘online communities’. Some have more of a social than business focus. Others are evidently only for business related networking. And some of these miss the fact that professional services (such as accountancy services and tax advice) are provided by INDIVIDUALS, not by businesses.  And People buy People.  The brand message, especially of the bigger firms, MAY provide a degree of comfort and reassurance but in the main the ’sale’, the engagement and the services will be attributed to individual advisers.   RELATIONSHIPS are not built up overnight – whether in a business or a social context.

That’s one of the reasons why I am so excited by the developments in online communities. It’s also one of the reasons why I started my own in 2007 (The Tax Advice Network) although it’s not as sophisticated as the more mainstream communities.  That’s deliberate as I’d like to think that I know and understand my main target audience (accountants in practice in the UK).  I speak to thousands of them at conferences and seminars around the UK each year. I don’t sense very much real interest (yet) in online networking and online communities.  When it happens I’ll be ready for it – or maybe I will inspire it?!

For the moment there are a few sites that facilitate and encourage accountants to post blogs  (but see my expose of Blogging myths for accountants), to comment on current news threads and to ask and answer technical questions.

I’ll write about these in a subsequent blog. I’ll also discuss and highlight some of the non-accountant specific business and social online networks and how accountants could benefit from becoming more involved with these – and how to do so without wasting loads of time.  But there’s no rush. None  will become mainstream for accountants in practice in the UK in 2009 (for much the same reason as to why Twitter is not for accountants.

What else would you suggest that I address on this subject?

Some readers of this blog will be aware that I recently created a new seminar for accountants:  Mastering the credit crunch – Your practice, your advice, your future.

During what was a highly practical and commercial half day I suggested that the credit crunch (or recession as now seems to be accepted as a more accurate description of the economic climate) presents new challenges and new opportunities for accountants.

Simply stated, if we carry on doing what we’ve always done we will probably be LESS successful than in the past. Why? Because more of our clients will be suffering financially and this will impact on their willingness and ability to pay us and to stay in business. Our fee incomes and profits will fall unless we do things differently.

Feedback from the hundreds of accountants who attended the seminar was more positive than I had previously dared hope.  And I will shortly start sharing with the attendees the follow up feedback that is still being collated.

In the meantime I have no plans to repeat the seminar so am now  making the slides and notes available for download through the Tax Advice Network website.

I’m serving as an evaluator at my local speakers club, Harrovians, this evening. The club is affiliated to Toastmasters International and encourages evaluators to follow a well established structure when evaluating speeches:

Commend, Recommend, Commend.

I was about to post an item about this but then checked and realised that last July I posted an item here entitled ‘sandwich feedback‘ which is much the same thing.

I won’t repeat what I said last year. Instead let me amplify those thoughts.

I believe that when we provide feedback we do it to motivate the other person. One of the challenges is to get the balance right. The more experienced the speaker the more interested they will be in the constructive observations (the ‘recommends’ element of the praise sandwich. Certainly that’s true for me. It’s always nice when someone cares enough to package the constructive feedback inside some positive comments but what I’m most interested in is how to enhance my current efforts.  I’m lucky. I typically get rated 4 or 5 out of 5 by over 90% of every audience I address. But I’m not complacent and am always keen to improve and get better – whilst accepting that you can’t please all of the people all of the time.

The degree to which someone packages their feedback is an indication of how constructive they are seeking to be or how simply critical they are. If the latter then perhaps they have their own agenda.

The bottom line is that constructive feedback is only worthwhile if the recipient is in listening mode and is interested in taking the feedback on board.  What can you do to help ensure that happens?