Hi,

I am considering setting up a tax consultancy service for accountants, IFA's, solicitors & other professional advisers. The service would be to provide answers to one-off queries, tax planning and also Tax Return completion.

I would appreciate it if any professional advisers out there would let me have their comments as to why they would or would not use such a service.

If undecided, perhaps you could say what factors would persuade you to contact a tax adviser.
Many thanks
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There are a couple such things out there already e.g. Tax Cafe etc

Can I suggest that you introduce yourself first on the introductions section so we know a little about you.
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My accountant offers this service already, so am I being spoiled then??
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Hi Elaine,

Thanks for that, but where is the introductions section? (I only joined today so plse forgive)
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As Elaine mentioned... there are a few things out there. Tax Cafe (http://www.Taxcafe.co.uk), and the Tax Advice Network (http://www.TaxAdviceNetwork.co.uk) are a couple to look at - both geared towards a service for accountants, tax specialists etc.

David Toohey
The Accountants Circle (http://www.accountantscircle.co.uk/)
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Hi Elaine,

Thanks for that, but where is the introductions section? (I only joined today so plse forgive)

See general forum towards the bottom of the list
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I would not use it personally as I have suffcient knowledge both personally and in house, though I do feel that many one man band accountants would find such a service useful.

Accountants are expected to have expertise in the area of tax and not all are.

Additionally if you ensure that you are constantly up to date in all areas and offer pro-active planning and opportunity support, as well as a telephone helpline then I can see it working.

Lots of competition by bigger outfits with economies of scale, large marketing budgets and aggressive advertising not to mention experts in every area, that said you should be able to find your niche market if you play it right.
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We too already have this covered with me (yes I have sometimes been known to handle tax :) ) and 2 CTA's, both of them are also part of the Tax Advice Network.

To offer a bit more insight though, if I had to source tax help I would go for something like the Tax Advise Network, Mark Lee offers instant credibility and they have vetted their members so I would be secure in the knowledge they would be able to offer the right member with the right skills and experience for what we need.

So the question is can you advise on all aspects of complex tax and if not what would you do? Also what is your experience and why should someone use you?

That said, there is definitely a market for the right skills and to this end joining the Tax Advise Network maybe something you consider?

Hope this offers a little help.

Good luck with whatever you decide.

Jason
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Thanks to David and Jason for the plugs above. Much appreciated.

Susanah - by all means get in touch. If you satisfy our membership criteria you could join the Tax Advice Network and benefit from our marketing and PR reach - you would also be able to continue operating as an independent tax adviser.

Coming back to your questions I learned a great deal about this side of the business when I ran the Tax Support for Professionals team at (what was then) WJB Chiltern - now BDO Chiltern.

What follows are broad generalisations:

Most good accountants are like GPs. They know what they don't know and when to involve a specialist. I've asked hundreds of them what they look for in this regard. Typically they want practical commercial advice they can understand from people they know or to whom they have been recommended. I created the Tax Advice Network specifically to address the concerns that accountants had expressed to me about these issues and, at the other end of the spectrum, the tax support available from larger accountancy and tax consultancies.

Most IFAs seem to want experienced tax support related to tax avoidance schemes - whether to help them encourage clients to go into such schemes or to be able to warn clients away from riskier schemes. IFAs tend to only want to pay for tax support if they are securing a fee for their advice - they don't earn much for advising clients NOT to do something.

When I was at Chiltern I had many lawyers get every excited about the tax support services that we offered. When it came to it however they rarely used our services. They preferred to go straight to tax counsel (keeping it within the legal community).

Hope this helps.
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I am always very wary of tax advice specialists after suffering poor advice from several firms over the years. I have never thought of myself as being anything more than the "average" accountancy GP, but once or twice after consulting the so-called specialists, I have been left with the impression that I knew more about a specific subject than they did!

Before I'd consult a specialist, I'd now want to know exactly what their specialisms were and what their experience was. To me, just working in a tax department of an accountancy practice for a few years, or having been a tax inspector at HMRC for a few years, just isn't enough, yet that is exactly what many of the firms seem to be. Tax is too big a subject for people to vaguely say "tax consultant".

A typical GP accountant who has, say, 25 years experience, can probably cope with 95% of tax work from the average typical small business client base. It is the really nasty cases that he wants help with. What I have seen of many of the "tax specialists" is that they aren't able to cope with the 5% of nasty cases - they are trying to complete on the bread-and-butter tax compliance and basic tax planning work that the average, competent GP accountant can already cope with in-house.
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We have used a couple whom we have picked up from the ACCA lecturing circuit for specialist work and have found them very knowledgeable and helpful in their own areas
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I can certainly imagine your service being of use if you were offering some real niche specialisms, for example income tax or VAT in foreign jurisdictions, people with detailed experience of practices in a particular industry, etc etc.
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Before I'd consult a specialist, I'd now want to know exactly what their specialisms were and what their experience was. ..... Tax is too big a subject for people to vaguely say "tax consultant".

I've heard this before. It's one of the reasons why all of the tax specialist members of the Tax Advice Network have to provide detailed profiles. The accountants and others who require tax support can pick a specialism and then choose between the profiles of different advisers to help them, by reference to the profiles and also the ratings and testimonials of other users. (It takes time for these to build up of course)
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