Have you been facing issues with charging clients for CJRS grants? I know I have.
A number of clients have been really reasonable: they'd asked me to do it, and stated that they realise there will be a fee.
Other clients have asked me to do it, and when I've said "OK, the fee will be £x per claim" (which is generally quite a small fee) they've replied with "It's OK, I'll do it myself". In other words, they acknowledge that they are perfectly capable of doing something themselves, but expect me to do it for them, for free! The cheek!
Most recently, a client asked me to do a claim for them, and I gave them an indication of fees; I processed the claim, sent them an invoice for less than I quoted. Their response - "Not very happy with the invoice, as I could have done the claim myself". Bear in mind they specifically asked me to do it!
So many clients asking me to take the time to do the work, take on the risk of getting it correct, and to not charge for doing so. I don't know about you all, but I'm doing my best to pursuade clients to do their own CJRS claims!
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I avoid this trouble by not charging specifically for it. I just regard it as part of the payroll service for which a fixed fee is agreed in advance.
I get that. But your fee was fixed prior to the new work. That's like subscribing to, say, Sky (other providers are available) for a fixed fee, then asking for a bolt-on package down the line and expecting the fee to be the same, because it was fixed.
I appreciate your stance, for the sake of not ruffling feathers, but I don't agree about the fee being fixed, because it was set based on different circumstances.
Having just spent 1 hour 45 minutes formulating a single claim then, yes, I'll be charging!
The ONLY one so far that a client thought they were competent to do themselves they've over claimed. So there will be an extra charge to them for putting that right.
Yes I always said I was charging and have charged all but my sole Director clients. I am glad that I did if this is going on until October and will be quite complicated.
Most advisers weren’t going to charge so I wonder if this will change now.
None have done it themselves or even contemplated doing so.
Actually I did do another one for free and this was the most complicated and I have been told one of the staff members was overpaid blah blah. I just followed the rules and they approved the calc but could not go through this aggro every month every client! For free or for the minimal fees I am charging.
We have had a mixture. We set out clearly at the outset that it was extra work, thus chargeable, gave them a formulaic matrix as to how we would charge and about a hundred or so payroll clients asked us to do it for them. Some local firms went freebie, others charged two or three times the amount we did. I'd imagine the issue only arises where you dramatically overcharge for the work.
I'm not aware of anyone (even the Gold/Silver/Bronze merchants) charging a percentage of the claim, but I'm sure some unscrupulous soul will have. We estimated the time cost but overall raised about £12k and claimed around £500k in the first week. I suppose it helps that this works out as a rather small percentage of the claims if you look at it that way.
Running a small payroll bureau with clients that are longstanding I have done the claim for nothing as I feel for them in the position they are in and they were all straightforward. Plus it was only for a couple of months. However we now know Furlough is extended to October. That puts a slightly different slant on it. There is rolling Furlough which is extra work. There is factoring holiday pay with the added headache of isolating the top up 20% the client has to pay. A letter is to go out saying I have no option but to charge. I have given hours but there is only so much that can be absorbed
We are not charging and will not charge.
We are in the fortunate position that all clients have continued to pay the monthly fees, plus the Local Authority gave us 10k which we didn't need
Your client's response that they are not happy with the invoice as they could've done the claim themselves is ridiculous.
With the exception of audits and such, our clients *could* do everything they pay accountants to do themselves.
But they don't. Why should this be any different?