After weeks of the deliberations and debates, the Accounting Excellence judges can reveal today the leading firms vying for the coveted awards.
This year sees last year’s winners return to defend their titles, past favourites try to reclaim gold and new faces emerging to dethrone accountancy’s high flyers.
Given the global pandemic, it’s impressive to see the categories as hotly contested as ever, with as many entrants grappling for the main prizes as in previous years.
However, these firms will have to wait a little longer than usual before they find out if their firm’s name is pulled out the award winner’s envelope. While the government’s lockdown restrictions have eased recently, restrictions on large gatherings could last into the autumn.
In response to this uncertainty, the Accounting Excellence Awards night celebration has been moved from September to 2 December 2020. The awards will be a virtual event and free to attend. Click here for more details and to register your place.
New Covid-19 categories
Pushing the date into 2021 gives the Accounting Excellence awards the opportunity to applaud practices and vendors who have gone above and beyond the call of duty during the Covid-19 lockdown.
Over the past few months on AccountingWEB, we have heard stories of accountants working around the clock to support their clients through the crisis. Inspired by the profession’s unstinting response, Accounting Excellence has added three Covid-19 Hero categories to this year's awards:
- Covid-19 Hero award: Accounting firm
- Covid-19 Hero award: Supplier
- Covid-19 Hero award: Individual
In addition to the new awards for suppliers, firms and accountants who supported clients through the crisis, the Accounting Excellence Awards has re-opened the bookkeeping category with some added Covid-19 questions and more time to highlight the efforts bookkeepers have made supporting business clients
Here are the finalists for the 2020 Accounting Excellence Awards:
Digital and Innovative Firm of the Year
- Crunch
- de Jong Phillips
- flinder
- Inform Accounting Ltd
- Soaring Falcon
- We Run Your Practice
Fast-track Firm of the Year
- flinder
- Inform Accounting Ltd
- Makesworth Accountants
- Pell Artists
- Sterling Accounting Solutions
New Firm of the Year
- 2 Sisters Accounting
- Countplus Accounting
- MacroFin
- YesTax
- Youtopia Solutions Ltd
Small Firm of the Year
- The Accountancy Practice
- de Jong Phillips
- Pell Artists
- Scholes CA
Software Innovation of the Year
- Circit
- Fluidly
- Inflo
- Sage
- Xero
Medium Firm of the Year
- Inspire
- Makesworth Accountants
- Pentins Business Advisers
- Seymour Taylor
- Thorne Widgery
Practice Pioneer of the Year
- Alastair Barlow
- Daniel Crowther
- Lucy Cohen
- Nathan Keeley
- Simon Cowie
Investing in People Award
- DNS Accountants
- Dunkley's Chartered Accountants
- Inca Caring Accounting
- PJCO Chartered Certified Accountants
- Sterling Finance (UK) Limited
Large Firm of the Year
- Crunch
- Kreston Reeves
- MHA Carpenter Box
- Smith Cooper
- Whitley Stimpson
Client Service Award
- Crunch
- DNS Accountants
- Inform Accounting Ltd
- Kinder Pocock
- PJCO Chartered Certified Accountants
- Seymour Taylor
Sole Practitioner of the Year
- The Accountancy Office
- Complete HQ
- Daniel House & Co Ltd t/a DH Accounting
- Melanie Curtis Accountants Ltd
- the numbercrunchers
Specialist Team of the Year
- Cooper Parry
- Jeffreys Henry LLP
- Pell Artists
- Stryde
- YesTax
Accounting Excellence programme
The Accounting Excellence awards represent much more than February award’s night. Building on the ethos of the award programme to learn and share ideas, AccountingWEB will talk to the finalists and entrants to discover the latest trends emerging within the profession.
From our preliminary findings from this year's entries, we have seen a surge in cashflow forecasting work driven by accountancy firms working with clients to secure business support loans.
Elsewhere, digital marketing is back on the agenda after a lull during the Making Tax Digital for VAT transition. Before Covid-19 hit, the 2020 entrants returned to blogging and content marketing, with a side order of SEO. With face to face marketing paused due to the lockdown, we will be looking to see how firms are maximising and tracking their online activity.
Onboarding is another trend to look out for in our upcoming coverage. The number of firms updating their client engagement processes has doubled since last year. Will these firms may continue to follow the digital workflow to capture, catalogue and communicate more effectively with prospects?
Over the coming weeks and months, AccountingWEB will explore these trends in more detail.
