You sound like the taxman I can understand HMRC making these sorts of comments but cannot think why this is any business of accountants, it simply confirms a view that accountants act for HMRC and not their clients.
Have a look at Quality Management Software (SA2000) Upto a couple of years ago I too had only one partnership return to prepare and I found that this provider has excel based returns and is very reasonably priced.
You need to buy one licence per return current price seems about £13, with no ongoing commitment.
Affordable PI cover I was in a similar situation , with low fee income many of the Insurers seem to eat a lot of the profits, I eventually got suitable cover from Simply Business and later Caunce O'Hara - either might suit you.
Available hours Assuming your accounts assistant can hit the ground running, ie minimal training - other than your in house systems, then work it out another way .
Say 35 hours per week for 46 weeks - allowing 4 weeks hols plus bank hols - equals 1610 hours per year.
If they handle say 60 clients they can allocate an average of close to 27 hours per client per year.
So a lot depends on the estimated time each client takes over the year.
Try this one I similarly have only a couple of Partnership and a single trust return to prepare ,I use SA2000 excel based forms, basically these are pay as you go and are worth looking at for the odd one or two such returns.
My answers
You sound like the taxman
I can understand HMRC making these sorts of comments but cannot think why this is any business of accountants, it simply confirms a view that accountants act for HMRC and not their clients.
Have a look at Quality Management Software (SA2000)
Upto a couple of years ago I too had only one partnership return to prepare and I found that this provider has excel based returns and is very reasonably priced.
You need to buy one licence per return current price seems about £13, with no ongoing commitment.
Affordable PI cover
I was in a similar situation , with low fee income many of the Insurers seem to eat a lot of the profits, I eventually got suitable cover from Simply Business and later Caunce O'Hara - either might suit you.
Available hours
Assuming your accounts assistant can hit the ground running, ie minimal training - other than your in house systems, then work it out another way .
Say 35 hours per week for 46 weeks - allowing 4 weeks hols plus bank hols - equals 1610 hours per year.
If they handle say 60 clients they can allocate an average of close to 27 hours per client per year.
So a lot depends on the estimated time each client takes over the year.
Try this one
I similarly have only a couple of Partnership and a single trust return to prepare ,I use SA2000 excel based forms, basically these are pay as you go and are worth looking at for the odd one or two such returns.