Ok so following on from my great day networking today, I may have some work farmed out to me from an accountant.
I have no idea, where even to start on this now.
Do I have to complete MLR on each client that gets passed to me to work on or just on the accountants that's passing me the work?
I would assume the accountant would be paying me and passing the cost onto the actual client, plus his bit on top.
What should I be looking at charging? I don't want to out price myself and I don't want to under sell myself, but I'm sure they won't be expecting to pay full rates as they have provided me with the work in the first place.
Any help greatly accepted
cheers in advance
Ipad auto correction corrections
-- Edited by Eilef on Friday 4th of September 2015 11:07:24 PM
Hi Eilef
I would start with pulling together a list of questions you have for the Accountants so you can glean the nature of the clients and the work involved, volume, timing (ie is anything time critical eg VAT due tomorrow!), whether or not it is something you are comfortable in doing, software used, specifically what you can do for him/he wants you to do. Even if you dont ask all of the questions at the first meeting it means that you should then be ready for any questions he may have of you and will indicate your thoroughness. I suspect the first question to him, much like the 'tell me about you' question you asked at the networking meeting could well be ' tell me what it is you have that you would like me to take on'
Be careful not to take on too much at one go, given that you are working full time elsewhere. The worst thing you can do is agree to do it all and then not be able to complete the work as that would lose any credibility youve managed to build up....best to be honest from the start about staggering it/taking on less to ensure it gets done. I would find out (via indirect questioning) if this is a short term assignment or more long term, either way its great experience for you at this stage of your career. You will find out that you will most likely be doing more studying than you did before as you happen across issues you havent been taught on your course, so ensure you build enough time in for all that extra reading and research you will need to do.
I cant advise on charging as I dont know what the rates in your area are like to start with. You need to do some research locally if you can. Go in with an idea of your top price and your absolute bottom price, dont drop below the latter, but be prepared to come down on the former. You could start by saying 'I normally charge my clients £xx' and then go in with your subcontracting rate once you have seen his reaction to your pricing. Although that doesnt always work with those who have their poker face on during negotiations. Remember though he needs you just as much as you need him at the moment so I would suggest you are in quite a strong negotiating position.
Good luck and let us know how you get on
__________________
Joanne
Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017
Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.
You should check out answers with reference to the legal position
With regards ML-if you are only working for them and they aren't your clients you don't need a licence -the accountants will have their own ML in place
My licence is being processed by the ICB already so I'm not worried about that really.
Just if I needed to do checks on the people I'm working on or the accountant, but the consensus is that I won't need to do anything.
Just worried now about what he's going to throw at me, I have never done reall accounts before, except my own business and a friends childminding but I just need to stop worrying and believe in myself.
