Recommend an accountant for a Wellington sole trader

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timmmay

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#235941 10-May-2018 17:53

I use a mid sized accounting firm in Wellington to do my tax returns, one based in Lambton Quay. It's fairly simple, almost everything in Xero, and the tiny amount of information not in Xero is provided in well organised spreadsheets.

The past few years the bill has gone up by 10% per year with minimal changes to what I do, to around $650 plus GST. That's not terrible, but it's not awesome either. It used to be $450 plus GST.

Can anyone recommend an accountant that's suitable for this kind of situation, ideally cheaper than current. Don't mind sole trader, book keeper, etc, and physical location is probably irrelevant too given I never see my current accountant. Even someone who can just advise on how to use Xero well enough that I can do it all myself would be fine, as I think Xero can generate all tax returns.

mattwnz

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#2013545 10-May-2018 18:35

That is cheap compared to what I pay which is around 1k, for essentially the same thing. Maybe I need to look around myself.

nutbugs

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#2013558 10-May-2018 19:00

Sound to me like you are getting a good deal. I pay a lot more than that.

frednz

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#2013590 10-May-2018 20:41

It's not all that difficult to do this yourself. It may take a while the first time you do it and I would advise that you get a qualified accountant to check your work until such time as you are confident you are doing things right.

Alternatively, you could try and negotiate with your accountant, ask what his hourly rate is and tell him that you are dissatisfied with the price increases.

timmmay

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#2013603 10-May-2018 21:13

All the accountant does it enter home office expenses and a little bit of income not already in Xero and have it generate the reports, as far as I can tell.

I have pointed out the price has gone up by 10% every year, and that I'm happy with the service but not the pricing trend, and asked how to prevent further increases.

I have no interest in doing it myself. I know what I'm good at, and it's not accounting, I'm happy to pay reasonable fees for someone to do this for me.

Interesting that others pay significantly more.

mattwnz

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#2013658 10-May-2018 22:11

You could ask why it is going up 10%, as that is a lot more than inflation. Maybe it is a case that they were cheap to begin with to build up a cusomter base. Mine hasn't really gone up for about a decade, it has remained around the $1k level. Partly because their systems are more automated now than they used to be.

I agree, stick with what you are good at. Its a small cost for piece of mind too.

timmmay

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#2013713 11-May-2018 06:06

An accountant is some piece of mind, until you have to sign their letter which says "I accept all responsibility, the accountant isn't to blame if something is incorrect". I just sign what they send me, there's no way for me to check it.

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#2013844 11-May-2018 09:48

As others have said, that is cheap compared to other prices I've seen bandied about for similar situations - in the order of half the price. Perhaps more importantly, one of the biggest complaints of my business-running mates is the standard of accountancy available to the average small business owner is pretty low. If you're happy with your current accountant at that price, I would think carefully before shifting.

I did come across this outfit a few weeks back: https://hnry.co.nz/

I haven't used it myself, but it looks like an interesting approach of turning a self-employed contractor into something more like a PAYE payer. But:

- its only for sole traders (IR3 filers, not IR4 via a company)

- you're taking a bit of a credit risk with Hnry (payments go via their trust account)

- the payment structure is 1% of income - I think it would work best for someone doing contracting on the side; could get spendy if all your income goes via Hnry. Although I'm guessing you're paying for Xero too, so that's another 330 to 660 per annum that could be saved on top of the ~650 accountant's fees.

timmmay

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#2013900 11-May-2018 11:12

Because I get salary, self employed income, and overseas income I couldn't use a simple service like that. That's similar to what contracting companies do.