We are committed to providing a high standard of customer service. If you have any ideas as to how our service to you could be improved, or if you are dissatisfied with the service you are receiving, please let us know. In the event that you have a complaint, we will look into this carefully and promptly and do all we can to explain the position to you or address your concerns. If you are still not satisfied you may of course make a complaint to ICPA.

 

We will act in accordance with the Code of Conduct of ICPA (Independent Certified Practising Accountants) which we belong and will provide you with a copy of any such Code on request.

We will not accept responsibility if you act on advice given by us on an earlier occasion without first confirming with us that the advice is still valid in the light of any change in the law or your circumstances. We will accept no liability for losses arising from changes in the law or the interpretation thereof that are first published after the date on which the advice is given. 

All Accountancy Service Providers (which includes tax advisers, bookkeepers, payroll bureau) must comply with onerous duties imposed by the Terrorism Act 2000, the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, the Fraud Act 2006 and the Money Laundering Regulations 2007 (the “Anti Money Laundering Legislation”), which are intended to inhibit the activities of terrorists and other criminals by denying them access to technical expertise. If we fail to perform these duties, we risk imprisonment. 

Before we accept your instructions, we may need to obtain ‘satisfactory evidence’ to confirm your identity. In certain circumstances, we may need to obtain evidence confirming the identities of third parties, the source of any funds or other property, the purpose of any instructions or any other matter. We may also need to obtain further evidence after we have begun to act on your instructions and the evidence may include searching by electronic means. 

We assume that our clients are honest and law abiding. However, if at any time, there appear to be grounds to suspect (even if we do not actually suspect) that your instructions relate to ‘criminal property’, we are obliged to make a report to the National Crime Agency (“NCA”) but we are prohibited from telling you that we have done so. 

In such circumstances, we must not act on your instructions without consent from NCA. If NCA do not refuse consent within 7 working days we may continue to act. If NCA issue a refusal within that time, we must not act for a further 31 days from the date of the refusal. 

‘Criminal property’ is property in any legal form, whether money, real property, rights or any benefit derived from criminal activity. It does not matter who carried out the criminal activity or how removed the property is from the original crime. Even if you are honest in your dealings, if your property represents a benefit from someone else’s crime, we must still make a report. 

Activity is considered ‘criminal’ if it is a crime under UK law, no matter how trivial, and whether carried out in the UK or abroad. For example, tax evasion is a criminal offence but an honest mistake is not an offence

In order for us to complete this engagement, and to do so efficiently, we need you to provide us with all supporting documents required. Any failure to provide such documents and information, and to do so in a timely basis, will impede our services, and may require us to suspend our services or withdraw from the engagement. You agree to accept responsibility for any effect on your accounting records and financial statements of basic financial information or transaction documents not submitted to us, or losses that may result from their absence. We may ask for clarification of some items, but we will not audit or otherwise verify the data.

Our work will not include any procedures to discover defalcations or other irregularities. Unless you instruct us otherwise, we will apply the “realistic possibility of success” standard to resolve such issues in your favour where possible.

The law imposes penalties when taxpayers understate their tax liability. If you have any concerns about such penalties please contact us. HMRC may select your returns for audit. Any proposed adjustments are subject to appeal. In the event of a tax enquiry, we can arrange to be available to represent you. Such representation will be a separate engagement for which an engagement letter will be provided to you. Fees and expenses will be invoiced in accordance with terms we agree on for that engagement. 

In the event of non-payment of our fees for services rendered, we may exercise a particular right of lien over the books and records in our possession and withhold the documents until such time as payment of our invoice is received in full.

Whilst certain documents may legally belong to you, unless you tell us not to, we intend to destroy correspondence and other papers that we store that are more than seven years old, other than documents which we think may be of continuing significance. If you require the retention of any document, you must notify us of that fact in writing.

We do not hold client monies at any time. Fees paid by you in advance for professional work to be performed and clearly identifiable as such shall not be regarded as clients’ monies.

We will provide services as outlined in this letter with reasonable care and skill. Our liability to you is limited to losses, damages, costs and expenses caused by our negligence or wilful default. However, to the fullest extent permitted by law, we will not be responsible for any losses, penalties, surcharges, interest or additional tax liabilities if you or others supply incorrect or incomplete information, or fail to supply any appropriate information or if you fail to act on our advice or respond promptly to communications from us or the tax authorities.

Unless there is a legal or regulatory requirement to do so, our work is not to be made available to third parties without our written permission and we will accept no responsibility to third parties for any aspect of our professional services or work that is made available to them.

Unless we are authorised by you to disclose information on your behalf, we confirm that if you give us confidential information we will, at all times during and after this engagement, keep it confidential, except as required by law or as provided for in regulatory, ethical or other professional pronouncements applicable to us or our engagement.

You agree that, if we act for other clients who are or who become your competitors, to comply with our duty of confidentiality it will be sufficient for us to take such steps as we think appropriate to preserve the confidentiality of information given to us by you, both during and after this engagement. These may include taking the same or similar steps as we take in respect of the confidentiality of our own information.

In addition, if we act for other clients whose interests are or may be adverse to yours, we will manage the conflict by implementing additional safeguards to preserve confidentiality. 

If we use external or cloud based systems, we will ensure confidentiality of your information is maintained.

We reserve the right, for the purpose of promotional activity, training or for other business purposes, to mention that you are a client. As stated above, we will not disclose any confidential information.

We will inform you if we become aware of any conflict of interest in our relationship with you or in our relationship with you and another client ,unless we are unable to do so because of our confidentiality obligations. We have safeguards that can be implemented to protect the interests of different clients if a conflict arises. If conflicts are identified which cannot be managed in a way that protects your interests, we regret that we will be unable to provide further services.

  

This clause applies to personal data provided by or on behalf of you in connection with an agreement to provide business services or any engagement letter. Each party shall comply with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) (EU) 2016/679 when processing such personal data. In particular, you will ensure that any disclosure of personal data to us complies with the GDPR.

We will use appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect against unauthorised or unlawful processing of personal data and against accidental loss or destruction of, or damage to, personal data. We will not sub-contract any processing of personal data unless that personal data continues to be subject to an appropriate level of protection. To the extent that we act as data processor for you, we will only process personal data in accordance with your instructions.

 

Unless you instruct us otherwise, we may, if appropriate, communicate with you and with third parties by email or other electronic means. The recipient is responsible for virus checking emails and any attachments.

With electronic communication, there is a risk of non-receipt, delayed receipt, inadvertent misdirection or interception by third parties. We use virus-scanning software to reduce the risk of viruses and similar damaging items being transmitted in emails or by electronic storage devices. Nevertheless, electronic communication is not totally secure and we cannot be held responsible for damage or loss caused by viruses or for communications which are corrupted or altered after despatch. Nor can we accept any liability for problems or accidental errors relating to this means of communication, especially in relation to commercially sensitive material. These are risks you must bear in return for greater efficiency and lower costs. If you do not wish to accept these risks, please let us know and we will communicate by paper mail, other than when electronic submission is mandatory.

Any communication by us with you sent through the postal system is deemed to arrive at your postal address two working days after the day the document was sent.

The advice and information we provide to you as part of our service is for your sole use, and not for any third party to whom you may communicate it, unless we have expressly agreed in the engagement letter that a specified third party may rely on our work. We accept no responsibility to third parties, including any group company to whom the engagement letter is not addressed, for any advice, information or material produced as part of our work for you which you make available to them. A party to this agreement is the only person who has the right to enforce any of its terms, and no rights or benefits are conferred on any third party under the Contracts (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999.

 

Each of us may terminate our agreement by giving not less than 21 days’ notice in writing to the other party except if you fail to cooperate with us or we have reason to believe that you have provided us or HMRC with misleading information, in which case we may terminate this agreement immediately. Termination will be without prejudice to any rights that may have accrued to either of us before termination.

In the event of termination of our contract, we will endeavour to agree with you the arrangements for the completion of work in progress at that time, unless we are required for legal or regulatory reasons to cease work immediately. In that event, we will not be required to carry out further work and shall not be responsible or liable for any consequences arising from termination.

We will submit form 64-8 to HMRC (or complete an online authorisation) which authorises HMRC to send us copies of formal notices. In practice, HMRC will treat this as authority to correspond with us, in which case they will not correspond with you except to the extent that they are formally required to do so. However, this authority does not apply to all HMRC correspondence, and even where it does, HMRC sometimes overlook it. You should therefore always send us the originals or copies of all communications you receive from HMRC.

You have the right to cancel within 14 days without giving any reason. The cancellation period will expire after 14 days from the date you enter into the contract.

To exercise your right to cancel, you must inform us of your decision to cancel this contract by a clear statement (eg, a letter sent by post, fax or email). 

To meet the cancellation deadline, it is sufficient for you to send your communication before the cancellation period expires.

 

If you cancel this contract, we will reimburse you for all payments received from you. We will make the reimbursement without undue delay, and not later than 14 days from the day on which we are informed about your decision to cancel the engagement. We will make the reimbursement using the same means of payment as you used for the initial transaction, unless you have expressly agreed otherwise; in any event, you will not incur any fees as a result of the reimbursement.

 

We will not begin work on the attached schedules of services before the expiry of the cancellation period unless you specifically instruct us to do so.  

If, during the cancellation period, you asked us in writing to begin the performance of our services and then cancelled, you will pay us a proportional amount for our services performed up to the date of your cancellation, compared with the total amount for the whole assignment.

Privacy Policy updated on: 25 May 2018