Pierce has been providing accounting services to professional service businesses across the North West for many years.
Our experience makes us ideally placed to understand some of the complex compliance legislation facing businesses in this sector.
As a professional services firm ourselves we understand the challenges and risks facing your businesses and the opportunities available.
Our professional practices team and support allows you to focus on your own business, knowing that you can rely upon the support provided by our advisors.
Our clients come from a wide range of professional services firms including:
Our team helps support and advise professional service firms by providing advice ranging from traditional accountancy services, partnership agreements, incorporation advice, profit planning, partner succession planning to business structure.
We have an expert solicitors accounts rules team, trained to the highest standard, to ensure an efficient and value-added solicitor accounts rules assignment.
On 25 November 2019 the Solicitors Regulation Authority implemented the new SRA Accounts Rules 2019 to replace the previous version of the rules from 2011. The new rules are principle based and much less prescriptive than previously. As a result they allow much more flexibility to solicitors who will need to use greater professional judgement to ensure compliance.
There are only 13 rules, as opposed to 52 in the previous version, and no guidance on how to apply them in practice. The strict time limits imposed by the old rules are no longer in place, instead, firms will have to decide what is appropriate for their practice as long as they are acting in their clients’ best interests. For example, the requirement to bank all client monies by the following working day is no longer present; firms can impose their own time limit within reason. This reflects the changing nature of practice where most transactions are carried out electronically and firms may not have a bank branch local to them.
The SRA expect firms to document their policies and undertake relevant training for fee earners and accounts office staff. In most cases, firms will be compliant with the new rules if they maintain the systems and processes which ensured they complied with the old rules. However, there are opportunities to make life easier and less prescriptive under the new rules.
Yes, your business structure should definitely be reviewed. There are significant advantages in operating as a Limited Company or as a Limited Liability Partnership. These different structures generally bring less personal ‘risk’ and can bring tax advantages. Each case should be considered on its own merit and a review of your structure is always recommended.
Our focus on quality in a number of key business sectors enables us to deliver practical, commercial solutions to your own unique problems.
As our clients come from a wide variety of backgrounds, good accounting and business advice has helped them develop and grow their business over the years. However, with the dynamic and complex nature of their specialised sectors, we ensure our staff are at the forefront of any sector changes, so we can proactively advise our clients along their journey.
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