Case Studies

Tax Savings

I took over the accounts of a small business which were previously undertaken by an “Excellent Accountant and Bookkeeper”. I quickly identified that although the tax forms were completed on time and accurately, my new client was paying more tax than they needed to (for example not claiming home office costs). In addition I recognised that by moving to flat rate VAT the client would gain significantly. In the first year I saved the client far more money than I charged them.

Cost Savings

On reviewing a small (two man) business I identified a number of ways in which the financial health of the business could be improved. An example of cost savings was a 75% reduction in IT costs by changing both the supplier and the way the company operated. I was very pleased that our fees for the exercise were recovered from the savings gained within a few weeks.

Financial Controllership

A financial and risk review was undertaken following the acquisition of a company with 50 employees. Having introduced a very simple and cheap Purchase Order System, it was quickly identified that an employee was fraudulently processing invoices for a different company (with a similar name) through the books of this company. As a result we recovered well over £100,000.

Process Improvement

I was engaged by a small Services Company to undertake an Activity Based Costing exercise to ascertain how much in processing it cost the company to take on a new client. I identified that the costs were between £600 and £650, effectively the processes and costs were out of control. I recommended process review work (process reengineering) to the new CEO and FD. Within a short time we implemented a new process with better service levels, monitored key performance levels and importantly reduced the costs to under £250.

Business Contingency Planning

I reviewed one English Company's Disaster Recovery Plan and discovered that it had telephone numbers of contacts in Wales. It was, in fact, a copy of a Welsh site's plan with just the company name changed but all the contact details being for the Welsh company. The explanation was - it keeps the auditors happy! As many of the basic procedures in the plan were essentially right it was very simple to update the plan and fill the gaps. I also changed the priority given for establishing offsite IT connectivity to protect the companies Bank Accounts. The benefits of changing the plan soon became apparent as shortly afterwards it was initiated.