I am thinking of starting my own business as a bookkeeper for sole traders/small businesses and as a member of the ICB have to get a Practising Certificate and Professional Indemnity Insurance before I can start. However, I have been reading a lot of the posts on here and am finding it all a bit daunting so I would be grateful for any advice from experienced bookkeepers about starting up. I plan to build it up gradually as I can't afford to give up my current employment in the hope that the clients come flooding in. I have attended 4 workshops run by Business Link on starting your own small business and after each one felt really positive about it but now I am not so sure.
I have also been looking into Professional Indemnity Insurance and getting quotes; I want to make sure I am getting the right cover but they all differ so much. The ICB has a 'special deal' with one company with supposed discounts, however this one has turned out to be one of the most expensive and with £1000 excess! Business Link also advised getting Public Liability Insurance to cover visitors to my home as well as me visiting them, do other people have this if they work from home?
I am in a major quandry here and would really value any advice that is offered! By the way I dont have any experience, I just studied and took the exams, passed with distinction and decided I would like to get out of the rat race. My current employers will not give me a chance to use my new qualification as the person who does the accounts will not share the work with anyone as she wants to keep tabs on it all the time and yes I have thought of looking for employment elsewhere to gain some bookkeeping experience but every single advert says that experience is required! It's a no win situation - how can you get the experience if they won't take on someone who's newly qualified?
Looking forward to receiving your comments - thanks a lot
I would say if you have no experience the best way to give you an all round experience of many different industries is to get a job as a trainee accountant for a couple of years, if you enjoy the work then you may be able to get promoted within the company, or if not it gives you a good bookkeeping/accounting background to go it alone, and if you are on good terms with the accountants you worked for they may recommend their clients to you to do their clients bookkeeping as many accountants don't like doing just bookkeeping work they prefer doing accounts.
Hi, There are usually quite a few bookkeeping jobs being advertised on an ongoing basis in most regions of the UK, such as acounts assistant, purchase/sales ledger clerk etc. This is, in my experience, probably one of the best ways to get into bookkeeping work and then you can progress from there and build up your experience, plus the pay is reasonably good to start with.
