Legal issues and career advice.. not much then!

stefanboro

Hi all,

So, I am fully AAT qualified and part-ACCA qualified.

I have had nine months of experience working within an accountancy practise where I have had a vast array of clients to manage. I have learnt a lot very fast from essentially being thrown into the deep end.

One of my clients is trying to poach me and is doing a jolly good of it too. I would essentially be working as a financial controller for a company that has a turnover of £1.8mil and is set to double that this year - being responsible for ALL of the accounts and ALL of the tax (CIS, PAYE, VAT, CT and even directors SA100's).

All well and good. However, myself and the company are aware that strictly speaking I am unable to sign of the accounts of limited companies and that all we will have to do is employ the use of a chartered accountant to audit my work and give the thumbs up.

Am I correct in this? If so, what's the going rate for such services? Also, are there any other limitations that I should be aware of?

I will be massively appreciative of any advice I get in this!

Cheers,

Me.

Monsoon

stefanboro wrote: »

Hi all,

So, I am fully AAT qualified and part-ACCA qualified.

All well and good. However, myself and the company are aware that strictly speaking I am unable to sign of the accounts of limited companies and that all we will have to do is employ the use of a chartered accountant to audit my work and give the thumbs

Me.

Anyone can call themselves an accountant and 'sign off' accounts. The restriction is on audit, for which you need to be a registered auditor, but thats not what they are asking for, if I have read correctly.

So, you could do it.

Would that be as self employed or as their employee? If the former then the problem you will encounter is the ACCA practicing rules as a student of theirs - ACCA students are only allowed to do self employed work up to trial balance. If they are headhunting you to be their employee, I don't see any problem.

sdv

stefanboro wrote: »

Hi all,

So, I am fully AAT qualified and part-ACCA qualified.

I have had nine months of experience working within an accountancy practise where I have had a vast array of clients to manage. I have learnt a lot very fast from essentially being thrown into the deep end.

One of my clients is trying to poach me and is doing a jolly good of it too. I would essentially be working as a financial controller for a company that has a turnover of £1.8mil and is set to double that this year - being responsible for ALL of the accounts and ALL of the tax (CIS, PAYE, VAT, CT and even directors SA100's).

All well and good. However, myself and the company are aware that strictly speaking I am unable to sign of the accounts of limited companies and that all we will have to do is employ the use of a chartered accountant to audit my work and give the thumbs up.

Am I correct in this? If so, what's the going rate for such services? Also, are there any other limitations that I should be aware of?

I will be massively appreciative of any advice I get in this!

Cheers,

Me.

Only limited company with a turnover of £4 million and above are required to have mandatory audited accounts and signed by ACCA/ACA qualified accountants.

AAT fully qualified accotants can not sign these accounts anyway.

AAT qualified or not, there is nothing to prevent you or anybody else to prepare company's / individual'saccounts and submitt them to HMRC, as company accountants.

You don't have to employ chartered accountant to audit your work, but it will give weight and credibility if submitted by them to HMRC

If you do all the work, your company should not expect to pay more then £1,500 excluding company secretarial work

Steve Collings

In terms of the signing of the accounts, I would clarify this point by speaking to the Authorisations Department at ACCA (to be on the safe side). Sometimes their call centres can give conflicting advice.

Just really to clarify SDVs post. Financial statements only need to be audited where if the accounting period commences on or after 6 April 2008 the turnover is more than £6.5 million OR if gross assets (fixed + current) exceed £3.26 million (there are additional thresholds for groups). In addition, if external financiers require an audit (despite otherwise qualifying for exemption), a statutory audit will need to be undertaken. Also, don't forget if these thresholds have been breached in the previous year (thus needing an audit in previous year), but the thresholds have not been breached in the current year, the company will still need to be audited because it must be classed as 'small' for two successive years. I have seen countless numbers of accountants fall into this trap and have their knuckles wrapped because of it (and fined).

Audited accounts need to be signed by a statutory auditor, not necessarily just an ACCA/ACA qualified accountant. The ACCA/ACA (or member of another CCAB body who can perform audits) MUST hold statutory auditor status in the UK, not just be qualified by that particular Registered Supervisory Body.

Best wishes and good luck!

Steve

stefanboro

Hi Guys,

MASSIVE thank you for the responses.

I will be taken on as an employee but we have plans for myself to have an accountancy practise of my own too as they have 50 - 300 subcontactors who need tax returns doing so there is large scope to form a niche accounting service for this sector.

I have taken on board all of the advice and will contact ACCA for their guidance.