Salary survey shocks... HMRC's late penalty own goal
Most folk love a salary survey. It gives you a chance to indulge in that guilty pleasure of comparison with your peers.
According to the Office of National Statistics, the median household income for the UK, where the average house price is £225,000, is just £27,200.
So where do accountants fit into that picture? Lucy Skoulding at Accountancy Age has some answers.
Earning trends for accountants
Her survey into accounting earning trends sets the average annual salary of £62,042. But this can vary widely depending on factors such as gender and location or whether you're in practice or industry. Still, not bad.
Not good, though, is the gender pay gap. At 21.5 per cent, the profession is running at 3 percentage points above the national average.
Accountancy Age's editorial head honcho Emma Smith says: “The results of the survey demonstrate that the accountancy sector has much work to do to close the gender pay gap and ensure that women have the same career opportunities as their male counterparts.
“While the top accountancy firms have committed to improving gender diversity at senior levels, the profession as a whole needs to closely collaborate to advance dialogue on how real progress can be made.”
This issue is bound to be in focus at upcoming Accountex's round-table hot topic discussion on Women in Accountancy.
HMRC's late penalty own goal
HMRC cancels 270,000 late penalty notices in 2016, a freedom of information request by Clifford Chance, a law firm, finds.
That figure was 610,000 in 2015 and 400,000 in 2014. An improvement, but it still seems like a significant number worthy of investigation. Especially as it's software system problems like this that give people the collywobbles over making tax digital.
