Month: May 2019

Taxfiler integrates practice management in its accountancy and tax software

Award-winning tax and accountancy cloud-software provider Taxfiler, launched Taxfiler Practice Management at Accountex in London last week.

The integrated application enables micro practices to manage day to day priorities and complete activities ahead of compliance deadlines.

Taxfiler Practice Management provides a consolidated view of all client compliance data, relationships and activities. It is centred on the client record, automatically sending alerts for tax and compliance deadlines by populating task lists. As a result, accountants can efficiently manage day to day priorities by tracking workloads, tasks and jobs.

Following the acquisition by IRIS in 2018, Taxfiler has accelerated investment in its next generation of cloud-based compliance software for micro practices. The business has doubled its product development capacity and increased customer support to service the growing customer base.

Micro accountancy practices

The new cloud-based practice management functionality has been designed for essential everyday work in micro accountancy practices.

Taxfiler founder and director, James Reeves explains, “As the industry moves to a digital accountancy economy, our customers are demanding more integrated functionality. Managing the practice is an ongoing issue many of our customers face. They are providing impeccable compliance services but need to create more efficiencies to grow their business.

“Taxfiler Practice Management sits at the core of the cloud accounting revolution, increasing the flexibility, collaboration and efficiency of accountancy professionals, wherever they are based.”

Fundamental processes

The platform originates from Farnell Clarke, a leading digital accountancy firm that has been a 100% cloud practice for the last decade. Using the fundamental processes built and implemented by Farnell Clarke, Taxfiler customers can enjoy the unsurpassed efficiencies developed by the digital practice.

Will Farnell, founder and director of Farnell Clarke says, “It’s been a great opportunity to use our practice experiences to help fellow accountants build successful digital firms. The industry is embracing the rapid changes taking effect in the market and alongside the experience of Taxfiler, I believe we can help other practices thrive in the digital economy.”

For the first time in its history, Taxfiler has realigned pricing according to the functionality needed for the different size of practice. Practice Management functionality is included, enabling customers to benefit from structured practice management.

The new pricing is effective from 1 May for new subscribers. Taxfiler will contact existing customers to ensure they are aligned to the package best situated to their needs.

The packages are:

Startup. Single User. Up to 10 clients. £10 per month. This new package has been designed for independent practitioners or those who are launching a practice.

Solo. Single user. Up to 30 clients. £20 per month. Solo users will benefit from additional functionality including MTD for VAT, IRIS OpenSpace Link and Practice Management.

Pro. Multiple users. Unlimited clients. £30 per month, per user. Pro users benefit from integrated practice management and can access document management and email management if required.

Team. Unlimited clients. £199 per month for 10 users. Team users benefit from additional discounts for more than six users in the practice.

by Rob Deighton

That's another fine mess for KPMG!

For KPMG, it's another day and another £5m (fine, that is) plus a rap on the knuckles from the accounting watchdog. This time it's for a 'substandard audit' of the Co-op Bank 10 years ago.

Last week KPMG was fined £6m and issued with a severe reprimand by the FRC over its audit of insurer Equity Syndicate Management.

In the latest indiscretion, the FRC says KPMG and partner Andrew Walker “both admitted that their conduct fell significantly short of the standards reasonably to be expected of an audit firm and an audit partner”.

Walker was fined £125,000 and reprimanded. Both he and the company admitted misconduct.

Capital black hole

The fines relate to  a proverbial "capital black hole" of an incredible £1.5bn after the bank’s 2009 purchase of the Britannia building society.

Here's the official word from the FRC...

"The Financial Reporting Council (FRC) has imposed sanctions against KPMG Audit Plc (KPMG) and its audit partner Andrew Walker, following their admission of misconduct in relation to the audit of the financial statements of The Co-operative Bank plc (Co-op Bank) for the year ended 31 December 2009.

• KPMG has been fined £5 million (discounted for settlement to £4 million) and severely reprimanded. The firm will also pay £500,000 towards the FRC’s costs.
• Mr Walker has been fined £125,000 (discounted for settlement to £100,000) and severely reprimanded.
• In addition, all KPMG’s audit engagements with credit institutions for audits with 2019, 2020 and 2021 year ends will be subjected to an additional review by a separate KPMG Audit Quality team, who will provide reports to the FRC.

The Misconduct occurred shortly after the Co-op Bank’s merger with the Britannia Building Society (Britannia).  KPMG and Mr Walker both admitted that their conduct fell significantly short of the standards reasonably to be expected of an audit firm and an audit partner in two areas:

1. the audit of Fair Value Adjustments (FVAs) in relation to loans within the commercial loan book acquired from Britannia; and
2. the audit of FVAs and liabilities under a series of loan notes, (Leek Notes), which were also acquired from Britannia.

The Misconduct in respect of these two areas included: failures to obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence; failures to exercise sufficient professional scepticism and a failure to inform Co-op Bank that the disclosure of the expected lives of the Leek Notes in the financial statements was not adequate.

The FRC has also separately considered the conduct of the Chief Financial Officer of the Co-op Bank.  He has previously admitted Misconduct and was excluded from membership of the ICAEW for six years.In addition to the penalties, all KPMG’s forthcoming audits for credit institutions for the years 2019, 2020 and 2021 will be subject to FRC scrutiny. Last week KPMG was fined £6m and issued with a severe reprimand by the FRC over its audit of insurer Equity Syndicate Management more than 10 years ago."

by Rob Deighton

HMRC voice data collection falls foul of GDPR

HMRC's voice recognition ID service is illegal and data collected from its use must be deleted says the Information Commissioner's Office

The  ICO was asked to probe the tax authority by Big Brother Watch.

Investigators looked at the voice authentication process for customer verification on some of HMRC’s helplines, which were introduced in January 2017.

They concluded that HMRC failed to give customers sufficient information about how their biometric data would be processed.

Withhold consent

HMRC also failed to give them the chance to give or withhold consent, breaching the General Data Protection Regulation.

A notice was issued to HMRC in April compelling HMRC to delete all biometric data held under the system, for which it does not have explicit consent.

Steve Wood, ICO deputy commissioner, says: “Our investigation exposed a significant breach of data protection law – HMRC appears to have given little or no consideration to it with regard to its voice ID service.

“Innovative digital services help make our lives easier but it must not be at the expense of people’s fundamental right to privacy.

"We welcome HMRC’s prompt action to begin deleting personal data that it obtained unlawfully."

by Rob Deighton

One Paper Lane makes UK debut with tech to help accountants build better practices

One Paper Lane, a U.S.-based digital automation and collaboration platform, will launch in the United Kingdom in collaboration with M&A and strategy consultants, Foulger Underwood, at Accountex 2019, stand 490.

The partnership will bring One Paper Lane’s (OPL) acclaimed technology platform to UK-based accountants for the first time, with workflow transformation capabilities that streamline processes, reduce overhead and automates their practice areas and client management work.

“We only look to collaborate with partners we believe will have a tangible impact and address a real need in the marketplace,” said Keith Underwood, Foulger Underwood managing director. “OPL’s scalable, flexible and affordable offering will provide an essential tool to assist UK accounting practices to evolve and improve profitability.”

Foulger Underwood, an experienced team of M&A and strategy consultants, is working exclusively with OPL on the launch. OPL’s cloud-based process automation and collaboration platform has been tried and tested in the U.S. and other global markets across business segments.

“What we offer accountants is simple. Our tools allow you to streamline, automate and improve processes thereby increasing productivity and improving both the client and team member experiences,” said Gaurav Mirchandani, CEO of One Paper Lane. “We’re very excited to be working with Foulger Underwood to replicate the success we’ve seen with our clients in other parts of the world.”

Visit stand 490 at Accountex London on 1-2 May 2019, and attend Keith Underwood’s roundtable discussion on Wednesday 1 May at 2.00pm,  ‘How to enhance your clients’ experience and improve profitability using digitalisation tools and workflow analytics’, and Gaurav Mirchandani’s Presentation on Thursday 2 May at 10.15am,  ‘How Digital Transformation and Cloud Collaboration Can Deliver the Best Client Experience’.

To learn more about One Paper Lane, to read case studies and request a demo, visit www.onepaperlane.com.

To learn more about Foulger Underwood, please visit www.FoulgerUnderwood.com.

by Rob Deighton

Accountancy bridges the digital divide

Data released today has highlighted the move to digital communications and integration as the industry progresses towards a digital accountancy economy.

IRIS Software says it has seen an unprecedented increase in e-approvals between accountancy practices and their clients, with 215,750 documents approved in January 2019.

That's a 328% increase from the 150,000 e-approvals in January 2018. IRIS OpenSpace is used by over 3,300 practices and 500,000 SMEs. As expected, Companies House electronic submissions have also seen a marked increase, jumping by 17% in 2017 and 21% in 2018[1].

Commenting on the propensity towards digital communications, Nick Gregory, chief marketing officer forthe group, says: “Accountancy professionals are bridging the digital divide. Of course, the push from HMRC and MTD legislation has driven the need, but as a result, there is increased appetite for greater efficiency and time saving on the digital journey.”

Total electronic tax return submissions across all IRIS products have seen a significant increase. With the final two months of the financial year yet to be released, 3,448,108 submissions have been made to HMRC using IRIS solutions to January 2019. This already surpasses 2017/18, with a total number of submissions of 3,269,694.

From April 2018 to March 2019, 3,341,273 documents were submitted via third party software to Companies House. 38% (1,283,707) of these submissions were made using IRIS Software Group solutions.

“This matters as firms need to interact with clients more frequently and in return, clients are demanding more digital interaction with their accountant. Practices are responding by improving communications and workflows to ensure they can deliver what they’ve promised on time and within budget.”

Integrated functionality has become critical in the battle for efficiency and productivity. Over ten per cent of IRIS customers (2,700 practices) are using IRIS Connector to import data from QuickBooks, KashFlow, Xero, FreeAgent and CSV files.

“We see a significant change in the landscape over the coming years,” continues Nick Gregory. “Integration will be at the helm of the accountancy ship as professionals select best of breed technology and expect it to talk to other applications. Just in the same way household names such as Sky and Netflix have partnered, industry vendors will need to work closely together to create greater efficiencies for customers. There’s been lots of work to date, but we must forge deeper relationships to make this work for everyone.”

The IRIS vision is to enable accountants to increase the productivity and effectiveness of their practice while unlocking client and practice data to deliver new and more valuable advisory services.

[1] Companies House submission figures show a move from paper submissions to electronic:

by Rob Deighton