Role of an Accountant in an Accounting Firm

What is the role of an accountant in a Accounting Firm? The accountant is a partner you have to be sure you can count on in an accounting firm. We will, therefore, choose it with the highest care. We will ask advice from people who have had good experiences, for example; or we will read online comments that have been verified.

Role of an Accountant in an Accounting Firm

Role of an Accountant in a Modern Accounting Firm 1

Essential Confidentiality

The accountant consults documents related to your activities and even your personal life. So it has to be someone you trust because he (or she) knows a lot about you. Of course, he is bound by professional secrecy; but having found the rare pearl allows him to sleep on his two ears.

An Essential Duty of Rigor

It is also essential that your accountant does some serious work. This means that he must be perfectly competent and rigorous. If he makes mistakes because he lacks knowledge or professionalism, you may be in trouble for his fault.

You can also lose money if you have chosen the wrong provider. Again, there is an excellent reason to take the time to choose your accountant carefully.

A Very Honest Accountant

It is essential to be assured that your accountant is honest. What we mean by that is not that your accountant could try to make money from you; this type of case is quite rare, but that he could charge you excessive amounts. And as the accountant’s work is often somewhat cloudy for us; we do not realize the number of hours he needs.

We will, therefore, trust him, and in these cases, we can have unpleasant surprises. It is, therefore, better to have chosen an accountant we know is entirely honest and reasonable.

Other Services

An account or accountant is not satisfied with keeping your annual accounts up to date, and he can perform many other tasks in accounting firm and offer you other services. He is a real administrative pro.

Accounting firms have different profiles, which allows you to take advantage of reasonably broad skills. An accountant in an accounting firm has so much experience that they can also defend your interests; in litigation, advise you, make your business plan, etc.

It can, therefore, be interesting to know what exactly you need and to check that the accounting firm; you intend to contact corresponds to what you need. It is perhaps there, moreover, that one finds what one expects from a modern accounting firm.

Contact an Accounting Firm

If you have not been recommended the first-rate pearl; we advise you to find out about the specialist firms that offer their services. This may be where you will find the accountant. You need.

To give you an idea of ​​the services offered by these companies, we have inspected the websites; of the leading companies and here we deliver a small summary of the services they offer. The accounting firms of a specific size firstly offer you a wide range of accounting services.

Keeping the accounts is, of course, the first thing to think about. Still, it is also interesting to ask real professionals; to take care of the balance sheet, the tax declaration, and even tax optimization.

If you know a little about these last aspects; you will understand how delicate it is to take care of it; and why it is advisable to do it yourself or entrust the task to an unskilled person. In an accounting firm, you often have the possibility of asking for advice; as well as the creation of your company or even the realization of a business plan.

Not doing this work yourself frees up time; and gives you the confidence that it will be done by people who are used to it. Calling on a company of this type can also be an opportunity to take advantage of other administrative services.

Do you have staff?

The firm can probably make their payslips, draft employment contracts, handle tax declarations, and much more. In the legal field, possibilities are also offered by individual firms; either because they have lawyers and jurists, or because they have experts in certain legal aspects; such as transfers of the seat, transfer of shares in companies, activity changes, etc.

You have a lot to gain by asking a quality firm to take care of all these time-consuming tasks. You can focus on what you can do, as can your staff; who are free from all of these administrative aspects that can put them off.

The Operation of an Accounting Firm

The profession is structured around an entity: the accounting firm.

Within it, several stakeholders share different tasks and responsibilities. Besides, the year of a firm is divided into several key moments; that should be well-known to understand this profession’s particularity fully.

Robot Portrait of the Accounting Profession

In 2017, the profession counted around 21,000 accountants and 22,000 companies or associations of accountants; including 130,000 employees and 6,000 trainee accountants.

With nearly 2 million client companies, the accounting market claims a total turnover of around 11.5 billion Euros. The average age of a chartered accountant is 51, while 15% of the workforce is over 60.

The Accounting Firms are Divided into Three Types of Structures:

Small Firms

A structure employing less than ten employees, represent 83% of the profession for a third of the overall turnover.

Medium-sized Firms

With structures between 10 and 1,000 employees, make up 17% of the sector for an overall turnover of around 36%.

Large Firms

Finally, large firms represent less than 1% of firms but still generate 31% of the sector’s turnover. Finally, be aware that 77% of VSEs / SMEs use a firm. Generally, a small or a medium, and 90% of business leaders believe that the chartered accountant is a trusted professional.

The Different Contacts Within a Accounting Firm

The accounting firm brings together several players who stand out; in terms of experience, skills, cost, and risk coverage in the event of a tax audit. There are generally four types of stakeholders in a firm

The Accounting Head of Mission

He manages a portfolio of client files. He often performs basic operations (recording accounting operations, preparing the balance sheet, etc.); on which the accountant in an accounting firm then relies to carry out his mission of strategic advice. It is also common for firms to employ trainee chefs de mission.

The Accountant

The accountant in an accounting firm leads his team, and he guarantees them proper bookkeeping. It has a role of review and strategic advice. It is worth noting that he is the only one to benefit from professional liability insurance; which covers his clients in error.

Using an accountant in Perth is, therefore, a guarantee of quality and protection. In any case, the mission of the chartered accountant and his team is freely fixed; with the company at the start of the collaboration.

The Trainee Accountant

Do not be afraid of the term; the status of a chartered accountant in an accounting firm is not a function. This is a three-year training supplement allowing the acquisition of professional practice to prepare for the diploma tests of a chartered accountant.

The trainee accountant in an accounting firm will not be present to make photocopies, far from it. Depending on the firm, he will have a confirmed collaborator or head of the mission position. Still, in all cases, he will carry out various tasks both in the field of accounting review and that of the statutory auditor.

The Auditor

He intervenes in an exact framework: he is legally mandated to carry out a control mission only, a “legal” certification mission, while the chartered accountant can intervene in a contractual framework for assistance and advice missions. The auditor has broad investigative powers, but at no time does he interfere with the business’s management.

What time of the year is most in need of a Chartered Accountant?

Considering the “attending physician” of a company, we would like to say that it is all year long that a business owner needs to exchange and interact with his chartered accountant in an accounting firm. However, we can quickly identify several crucial moments, delicate deadlines to manage for both the business manager and the accountant in the accounting firm.

For example, we can cite the annual closing of an accounting year, the fiscal period, the VAT declaration, etc. Depending on the structure of the company, the dates of these deadlines may vary.

If it were necessary to retain only one important date, the best known, it would undoubtedly be in the balance sheet period. For most companies, it is carried out on 31/12 of each year, which means that the accounts are stopped on this date to allow the accountant to take stock. Then comes the review meeting, which allows you to draw the line to follow for the following year.

Like a healthcare professional, a chartered accountant must intervene in healing, if a problem exists, but he must also do prevention by regularly distilling advice every month. To better manage your business. The best would be to schedule a monthly telephone, physical, or videoconference appointment to take stock of your various files. Believe us, it is not a waste of time, on the contrary.