Designated’s top tips when choosing an accountant

Designated’s top tips when choosing an accountant

Accountant

10 things to look for when choosing an accountant.

 It is important to take your time when choosing an accountant. Now that so many businesses and people are working remotely, location isn’t so much of an issue – meaning you can look to hire the best talent to suit you and your business, wherever they are located.

Designated has been able to recruit a team of dedicated accountants that will best suit our clients, here are some of the qualities that we looked for:

Highly Organised

Accountants have a very busy role, with several deadlines throughout the month or quarter, they need to be aware of what is coming up when and who needs to be informed within the organisation. Any data or information must be collected in good time to avoid any last-minute scrambles.

Excellent Time Management

Going hand in hand with being highly organised, one of the top qualities needed by your accountant is excellent time management skills. With so many tasks that will quickly pile up if they are not seen to, your accountant must be able to assess how much time is needed to complete each task. For a senior accountant, there may also be elements of team management and meetings with the company’s leadership that can take up a lot of their valuable time.

Highly Experienced (within your sector) 

Being able to offer a wide range of skills can only come with many years of experience. Your new accountant should be able to offer a selection of testimonials and references backing up their work. Your accountant’s knowledge and experience need to extend to your particular area of business. While ideally, a prospective accountant may have dealt with many different types of industries it is recommendable that they have worked with yours so that they can hit the ground running.

Attention to detail 

Your accountant should be analytical, paying close attention to detail with the ability to spot errors quickly and efficiently. Your accountant should have the skills to be able to review and identify inconsistencies in large amounts of data or information. Attention to detail is necessary to ensure consistency and accuracy in financial reporting. This information can be used to help make crucial business decisions so it must be correct.

Honest and trustworthy 

Your accountant needs to have a strong sense of ethics. Integrity is a valued characteristic within an accountant, they must know right from wrong and always display integrity in their accounting and bookkeeping work. You need to be able to trust your accountant, you also need to know that if something goes wrong and if they make an error, they will be confident and honest enough to discuss this with you so that the mistake can be rectified.

Flexible

Your accountant may be analytical and structured but it is also important that they have a sense of flexibility in their work. Not everything is going to go to plan and they’re not going to always be able to gather the information that they need from a business owner or senior leader when they need it. Another reason why time management is important for this role. A high level of agility is also necessary for quick response to regulatory changes in the industry only then can they provide quality service to the business.

Up to date with the latest technology

If you’re searching for an accountant, you need to know and understand the latest technology that your prospective accountant can use. Designated is a Xero bronze partner and our finance team are all zero certified advisors trained by Xero to deliver you the best financial support. Xero is the perfect finance solution for most businesses providing a fully integrated suite of services, for example, Xero integrates with your bank account to enable easy reconciliations. 

 Up to date with ongoing training and certifications

If you’re searching for an accountant you must ensure they have maintained the proper certifications and are continuing their training and development within the industry. Thanks to the digital age, things are changing all the time, though it may not affect their workload right away, over time technology trends will continue to transform the accountancy industry.

Communication Skills 

Your accountant needs to possess excellent communication skills. They must be able to inform senior leadership of updates and changes in clear and easy to understand language. Accountants can impact critical business decision making, so they must be heard and understood. They may also need to collaborate with employees in different departments, with perhaps little financial experience, so explaining things in a way that will be understood. This leads us nicely onto our next point.

Collaboration

A good accountant can recognise their place within an organisation, make the most of networking and getting to know their colleagues. Accountants are team players and provide support to different departments in the organisation – that’s why they should be able to efficiently communicate the knowledge of their expertise to clients and decision-makers.

At Designated, we believe that a good accountant is needed throughout the year and not just at year-end to prepare your annual accounts and self-assessment. Your dedicated Designated accountant will do this and so much more.

  • Bookkeeping
  • Monthly management reports
  • Payroll
  • Accountancy
  • Strategic financial support

If you would like to know more about working with Designated’s accountancy team, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with Michelle for a friendly chat: michelle.elliott@designatedgroup.com

Accountancy vs Bookkeeping

Accountancy vs Bookkeeping

Accountancy vs Bookkeeping

 

For somebody who doesn’t work in finance, it can be difficult to distinguish the difference between accounting and bookkeeping, as there are some administrative areas that can overlap depending on the structure of a business and how many employees it has working in its finance department.

However, while bookkeepers and accountants share common goals, they do support your business in different stages of the financial cycle.

Bookkeeping is more administrative, recording financial transactions. Accounting is more subjective, giving you insights into your business’s financial health based on the information provided by bookkeepers.

If you’ve ever wanted a clear definition between accountancy and bookkeeping, keep reading.

What is a Bookkeeper?

Bookkeeping is a legal requirement for all businesses of any size to carry out, and it refers to the recording of the financial transactions of a business, whether a sole trader, a partnership, or a limited company.

A bookkeeper will record all transactions either manually or within an ERP system like XERO and keep copies of all invoices, receipts and evidence of these incomings and outgoings.

The role of a bookkeeper will include:

  • Recording financial transactions
  • Posting debits and credits
  • Producing invoices
  • Preparation of financial statements (balance sheet, cash flow statement, and income statement)
  • Maintaining and balancing subsidiaries, general ledgers, and historical accounts
  • Completing payroll

What is an Accountant?

An accountant has expert knowledge surrounding taxes and accountancy. A business needs to consider more than just the in’s and out’s calculated by a bookkeeper, the right accountant will guide and act as financial business partner, ensuring all allowable expenses are claimed and all decisions are tax efficient to not only the business but the owners, directors, and partners.

The role of an Accountant will include:

  • Preparing adjusting entries (recording expenses that have occurred but aren’t yet recorded in the bookkeeping process)
  • Reviewing company financial statements
  • Analyzing costs of operations
  • Completing income tax returns
  • Aiding the business owner in understanding the impact of financial decisions

Designated Accountancy Services

All business owners want to have complete control of their business finances and have an up-to-date view of their financial performance. Our team of Designated accountants are experts who work with you on a flexible basis, whether you need support one day a month, one day each week or more.

Designated is a Xero Bronze Partner and our finance team are Xero certified advisors, trained by Xero to deliver you the best financial support.

Do you wish you had answers to questions like these?

  • How much tax will I need to pay next year?
  • How much profit did we make last month?
  • What do you mean by Tax Digital?
  • Am I managing payroll in the most effective way?

If so, then our Accountancy services may be your solution, please get in touch:

Vicky Garbett, Head Of Accountancy vicky@designatedgroup.com 020 7952 1460 

Top social media trends for your 2022 marketing strategy

Top social media trends for your 2022 marketing strategy

Social Media Trends 2022

Your customers are already searching, liking and sharing their favourite products, brands and services on social media—and they’re spending more time on these sites than ever before. But this activity doesn’t stop at consumer products, they are using social media in all aspects of their lives. 

Investing in social media marketing can help you grow your business thanks to its cost-effective advertising, smooth eCommerce capabilities, and the ability to give your brand a way to engage with your customers in a  human way. 

If it’s not easy for them to find you online, they can easily become frustrated and find another provider that better serves their needs.

Social media has become an essential part of the marketing mix, with more than three billion people worldwide spending over two hours a day socializing on social networks and messaging apps. Your business can tap into this pool of potential customers to increase user engagement and gain new leads—but you need to build a social media strategy that accurately reflects your business’s goals.

That’s why looking to the experts for their social media top tips and trends can be a great place to start as you begin to build your marketing and social media strategy. 

Hubspot recently shared their top to trends to look out for in 2022 and beyond

  1. TikTok will dominate the social media space.
  2. Reaching new audiences will become the number one social media goal for businesses.
  3. Companies will make more dedicated social media hires.
  4. Augmented Reality will become consumers’ preferred way to try-on products and interact with brands.
  5. Businesses in the B2B space will increase their investments in Instagram and Twitter.
  6. Influencer marketing will mature in 2022.
  7. Social advertising will become more sophisticated.
  8. Businesses will invest in more long-form and short-form content, as well as live audio chat rooms.
  9. Social selling demands will grow.
  10. Consumers will crave snackable content.

 There are many social media trends reports circulating but they all seem to share the same ideas, this is interesting when many brands have written off platforms like TikTok, seeing them as a fast-growing pandemic fad or influencer marketing as low return on investment. 

As marketers, it is interesting to be part of an industry that is constantly evolving, and with now people more than ever using social media to inform their purchasing decisions, it has never been more important to ensure you’re making the most of the tools and platforms available to you. When social media isn’t prioritized, organizations miss out on the 

opportunity to optimize platforms and turn them into revenue generators. 

If you’re looking to reach new audiences, trial new platforms, increase your paid social investments or create snackable content to share your story, then our marketing team which includes experts within the social media sphere can help guide you through the process. 

 

Managing small business cash flow and income in 2022

Managing small business cash flow and income in 2022

finance designated

Content from this article was originally posted by XERO.

 While there are many advantages of being your own boss and running your own small business it isn’t always easy and it can come with hurdles you didn’t even know existed. Then throw in 12 months of restrictions, lockdowns and uncertainty.

The scale of the impact felt by the self-employed is abundantly clear in latest research by simply business. They found Covid-19 will cost SMEs an estimated £126.6 billion – double what owners predicted it would cost them. With six million SMEs in the UK – accounting for over 99% of all businesses, 33% of employment and 21% of all turnover – this £126.6 billion hole in the books of small businesses is a huge blow to the economy.

 It’s been a lean time for small businesses, and especially the families supporting them.

Xero’s small business trends report shows that 60% of small business owners are worried about their household finances running low. So while 2022 will hopefully be a year of rebounding sales and revenue, owners really need that to carry through to the business’ bottom line.

What the experts say

“Businesses must analyse margins and focus on the products and services that generate actual profits as they try to restore cash to the business,” says Ya Wen How, an accountant at AccountServe, who participated in the report.

While there will be a temptation to withdraw any spare cash from the business as ‘owner’s drawings’, experts say it’s important to be mindful of upcoming and potentially unknown expenses.

“Owners often overlook upcoming business expenses when taking drawings, which creates cash flow issues later,” says David Stephens, an accountant at Stephens Financial Services. These cash flow issues create further disruption to the household budget because money has to be put back to the business. 

“Rather than clearing out the business bank account, owners are better off paying themselves a modest amount at regular intervals,” Stephens advises.

Takeaways for small businesses

There are a few things small businesses can do to help support their recovery according to Xero’s small business trends report:

  • Analyse your business margins and focus on products that generate the most profit

  • Create a ‘rainy day fund’ within the business so you’re not constantly loaning it money from your personal savings

  • Schedule regular, sustainable drawings to ease home budgeting

  • Keep your regular drawings modest, as you can always give yourself a bonus payment at the end of a good year

Check out other trends for 2022

Read Xero’s small business trends report to learn more about how to manage your cash and income to set your business up for success in 2022.

How to complete a self-assessment tax return. Let’s talk taxes.

How to complete a self-assessment tax return. Let’s talk taxes.

Taxes Self Assessment

Before we can tuck into the Turkey, let’s talk taxes. Although many of us are about to wind down for Christmas, now is actually a perfect time to get ahead for the new year and start gathering everything we will need to prepare for HMRC’s self-assessment tax return.

If you have been wondering whether you need to complete a tax return, the following guide should give you all of the basic information you need. For further details please head to https://www.gov.uk/check-if-you-need-tax-return.


Do I need to complete a self-assessment tax return?

Most people are taxed at the source and do not need to worry about submitting a self-assessment tax return, “however, if in the last tax year (6 April to 5 April ) you have worked as self-employed or as a partner and/or earned more than £1,000 (before taking off anything you can claim tax relief on)then you must register as self-employed with HMRC.

It’s also worth noting that any directors of limited companies that wish to receive dividends must also be registered as self-employed to ensure they are correctly taxed.”

You will not usually need to send a return if your only income is from your wages or pension. But you may need to send one if you have any other untaxed income, such as:

  • money from renting out a property
  • tips and commission
  • income from savings, investments and dividends
  • foreign income

HMRC may contact you with a tax return to complete if:

  • You have untaxed income from investment, land or property, or from overseas.
  • You make capital gains above the annual exempt amount (£12,300 for 2020-21 and 2021-22). you were required to fill in a tax return last year.
  • You’re a pensioner who gets a reduced age-related allowance, though you may be sent a special short version that requires fewer details.

 

It is however your responsibility to make sure that you declare all taxable income, on time. If you receive a tax return, you must return it, regardless of whether you owe tax or not.

How to register and submit a tax return

If you’re looking to submit a tax return for the first time, you’ll need to register for self-assessment first. The steps are below.

Register with HMRC: The process will vary depending on whether you’re self-employed, registering a partnership or not self-employed – you should click on the option that applies to you. You can register online via HMRC.

Get your Unique Taxpayer Reference (UTR) number: HMRC will send this to you in a letter after you register. The letter will give instructions on how to set up your Government Gateway account.

Use your activation code for your Government Gateway account: Once this is done, you’ll be sent another letter in the post containing your activation code. You’ll need this to complete the set-up of your account – you should do this promptly as the code will expire.

Complete your account setup: It’s only once your Government Gateway account is up and running that you’ll be able to log in and submit your tax return.

HMRC warns that the whole process could take up to 20 working days, so make sure you don’t leave it until the last minute.

 

What are the deadlines for completing a tax return

The deadline for completing a self-assessment tax returns are:

5 October 2021: Deadline to register for self-assessment for the first time

31 October 2021: paper tax return deadline 31 January 2022: online tax return deadline (HMRC says you can submit up to 28 February 2021 without getting an instant penalty)

31 January 2022: tax payment deadline for 2020-21 tax owed, plus any outstanding tax from 2019-20 if you took out a payment arrangement with HMRC. If you pay your tax by payments on account you may have already made payments towards this bill.

HMRC has the power to charge increasingly expensive penalties if you miss the tax return deadline, which starts with a £100 fine from the first day your return is late.

If you need help completing your tax return, our experienced and professional Accountancy team can carry out the leg work for you, ensuring a smooth, simple and stress-free process. Contact Vicky by telephone 0207 952 1460 or via email at info@designatedgroup.com

 

The ultimate business hashtag list 2021

The ultimate business hashtag list 2021

Ultimate business hashtag listv designated

    What are hashtags and why should you consider using them for your social media marketing? What is the best business hashtag list to use for your business?

    A hashtag (#) is a label (or labels) attached to a social media post. It’s a simple way for people to search for common topics across social media platforms.

    You might be familiar with hashtags on Twitter, but they are used widely across LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest. You can follow hashtags you might be interested in on LinkedIn and Instagram, plus you can add them to Instagram and Facebook Stories.

    The key with hashtags is to fully understand your audience and ensure you use the most relevant hashtags for your content. We talk more about this in our recent blog post Why use hashtags in your social media posts

    So where can you start? We’ve done some initial research for you on the most popular business hashtags list, which can be used for many types of businesses. Don’t try to use them all at once! Experiment with these broad hashtags and see which ones work for you.

    Does this all seem like too much effort? Do you not have the time to do all the research needed to get the most effective list of hashtags for your business?  Why don’t you let our team at Designated look into a social media strategy for you and take care of all your hashtags at the same time!

     

    The Best Business Hashtag List for Instagram

    #businesscoach

    #digitalmarketing

    #digitalbusiness

    #business

    #investing

    #wealth

    #money

    #businesstips

    #startup

    #entrepreneur

     

    The Best Hashtags For Marketing for Instagram

    #adwords

    #mktdigital

    #inboundmarketing

    #googleadwords

    #marketingconsultant

    #facebookads

    #digitalagency

    #socialmedia

     

    The best hashtags for Medical for Instagram

    #heathcare

    #medstudent

    #nurses

    #healthcare

    #pharmacy

    #medicalstudents

    #clinical

    #nurse

    #medicallife

    #medicalcare

     

    The Best Hashtags For Restaurants for Instagram

    #chef

    #foodtruck

    #dinner

    #restaurant

    #familyrestaurant

    #finedine

    #instarestaurant

    #restaurantstyle

    #bestrestaurants

    #restaurantlife

     

    The Best Hashtags For Fitness for Instagram

    #fitsporation

    #fitnessmodel

    #fit

    #workout

    #instafitness

    #gymlife

    #getfit

    #fitnessaddict

    #gym

    #fitnessmotivation

     

    The Best Hashtags For Events for Instagram

    #specialevents

    #partyplanning

    #event

    #eventservices

    #corporateevent

    #eventpros

    #eventsplanning

    #venues

    #eventsplanner

    #eventmanager

     

    The Best Hashtags For Recruitment for Instagram

    #interviewtips

    #applynow

    #careergoals

    #employers

    #employer

    #careerdevelopment

    #jobinterview

    #recruitmentagency

    #jobsearching

    #recruiterlife

     

    Want to find out more about using social media to raise your brand awareness and drive sales, contact designated’s marketing director Michelle who would be happy to tell you all about our fab team: michelle.wheeler@designated.com