I have an upcoming meeting with what I hope will be my first client - a local fish and chip shop.
Any advice of specific issues with this type of business please? I assume it would be defined as 'manly cash based' for MLR purposes, but how do you handle stock, not just the potatoes and fish but all the other incidentals (pickled egg anyone?). What about goods bought but given away e.g. wooden forks.
It's not unique but I just want to make sure I'm thinking through all the issues before meeting the client as well as hopefully when I have signed them up.
make sure their till is working properly! I personally don't like cash based businesses, they never seem to be water tight.
How many staff do they have and are they ALL on the payroll? Probably a classic they will pay the Saturday night staff 'cash' out of the till for their shift.
General things like price of goods, whats their mark up? Do they think they are making a profit? Who's being doing the bookkeeping previously, have they been doing it themselves or was there another bookkeeper, and if there was one have they disappeared?
I don't want to sound the alarm bells and scare you off but just be careful as it is a cash based business. Its easy for them to 'give away' a portion of fish and chips to their mate on a saturday night.
