Business Planning

From my experience the vast majority of companies with revenues less than, say £500k do not sufficiently plan ahead.  

We also know that small businesses are more likely to fail With this in mid what duty do we have, as accountants, to persuade our clients to plan ahead and ensure that they have considered what may or may not happen next year. Personally I think that we have a high level of duty to ensure our clients are sufficiently planning. The big problem is most small businesses probably will not pay a few thousand pounds to obtain the professional help required to sufficiently work with them to produce a financial, operational and marketing plan and put this into a written working document and a P&L, balance sheet and cashflow. So if a client cannot afford to pay our fees for this service – then what? Do we simply walk away and allow our client to roll into next year blind-folded?  We still have a duty to help our clients and especially those that cannot afford our services – so do the right thing. Discuss the need with your client and agree a reasonable payment plan. Possibly agree that they pay you the year after or contingent on the company hitting certain targets…. Just be imaginative with the payment structure. There’s always a way. For clients that refuse help and believe that they do not need to plan – what’s the saying “you can lead a horse to water………”  Andrew Millet FCA - - - -www.wisteria.co.uk - - - -www.wisteriaformations.co.uk