Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice – shame on me. Nobody to blame, just myself.
As 31st of January is gone I want to have a bit of moan. I had a few clients to whom I’ve sent to sign tax returns ( via E-sign ). As deadline was approaching – few of them never came back signed. No answers on phone calls or emails. Without confirmation I am not submitting returns and all of my clients know that. Anyway, just by accident I did look into my clients tax account and guess what – return I have prepared has been submitted by client himself (or with somebody’s help). Not surprised they were ignoring me. And those were not new clients.
Unfortunately those actions will affect all of my clients as now I have decided to send only accounts, tax calc and page 8 to sign together with an upfront payment. Submission to HMRC afterwards.
Very disappointed but lesson learned.
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Your new idea is not unfortunate for your clients if they were going to pay you anyway.
But why not go the whole hog and ask for the fee in advance, before starting work. Then you won't need to chase for the money.
We accountants don't have much to bargain with once we've started work so need to take extra care we get paid. It's time to save time on debt collection.
I had one of these, H+W, were late anyway thought they'd cut us out of the equation and submitted the tax returns themselves.
Problem is they did it ON PAPER!
Turned £200 of late filing penalties into about £2,000!
I had one of these, H+W, were late anyway thought they'd cut us out of the equation and submitted the tax returns themselves.
Problem is they did it ON PAPER!
Turned £200 of late filing penalties into about £2,000!
Excellent.
I always always take half up front and balance on completion that way I avoid things like this.
I've had a couple of these over the years who have gone one stage further and altered the return - a flat £5k on the expenses, a flat £10k off of turnover.
We go to small claims for the fee - just done one recently, the judgement is sitting there, so next time they go to change their car/phone/mortgage they will be reminded.
And of course, AML report, contact HMRC fraud, write to HMRC and withdraw the 64-8 "previous returns cannot be relied upon" - hope they get whats coming.
Other than distrusting everyone, I'm not sure what the way around this is. Occupational hazard. Obviously the more clients on Direct Debit or up front the lower the aggregate risk.
If they have signed an engagement letter then you will be able to bill them.
If they do not pay, it is easy to recover the money via the small claims court. And if they do not pay they will have a CCJ against their name which can effect their ability to borrow money, get a mortgage etc.
I am surprised that you had more than one of these clients though as in my experience only ever had one like that and he paid when I threatened to sue him
