How UK’s Accountancy Firms Can Optimize Accounting Outsource Services

By Sarala Vanga On Jan 31, 2021

Why should hard-pressed leaders of accountancy firms in the UK devote their attention to outsourcing? Well, there are several reasons. Firstly, a substantial and rapidly rising number of accountancy firms in the UK are already partnering with offshore accounting experts. These accountancy firms’ leaders realize that large-scale outsourcing can seriously transform their firms’ fortunes. Even in other industries, outsourcing is a core part of business strategies. In the stock market, whenever large-scale outsourcing deals are announced, share prices go up.

With that being said, small-scale accountancy firms in the UK can also experience the opposite of these results if they don’t properly plan, resource, and manage their outsourcing efforts. The outsourcing of finance and accounting responsibilities to cost-effective locations has become immensely popular in the last few decades. Here’s how the accountancy firms in the UK succeed at making outsourcing substantial parts of their commercial policies –

Setting Core Foundations

Before accountancy firms in the UK find accounting outsource services, firm leaders need to decide which tasks they want to outsource. The best accounting experts in cost-effective areas like India are adept in UK accounting. Calculating the VAT returns or even understanding the UK’s tax laws – these offshore accounting experts equip themselves with all the skills they need to be considered employable as per international standards. So, small-scale accountancy firms in the UK can benefit a lot from working closely with these senior accounting experts. However, it’s impossible to determine an accounting team’s proficiency without spending at least a month with them.

Hence, small-scale accountancy firms in the UK should start their outsourcing journey by delegating small and risk-free tasks to their offshore partners. These low-risk assessments need to be used as tests for the outsourcing department. Typically for the UK’s accounting firms, the most commonly outsourced accounting responsibilities include –

Taxation: Preparation of tax returns (corporate and personal) using accounting software tools like IRIS or CCH is difficult. Outsourcing experts who can handle taxation-related tasks with ease can be trusted in the long-term with more complex responsibilities.
Finalization of Accounts from Half-finished Records: Another good way to test an offshore accountancy team is to give them incomplete or half-finished records and ask them to prepare final accounts. The best accounting specialists can create final account reports from any available record such as bank statements, the number of VAT returns filed, etc.
Payroll Management: Payroll management is a commonly outsourced accounting responsibility. High-quality accounting specialists should also be able to prepare and file annual returns on the internet for their clients.

Offshore accounting specialists usually charge on an hourly basis. So, buying some of their time to test them with these basic responsibilities can help the leaders of small-scale accountancy firms in the UK determine whether an offshore accounting team is worthy of their partnerships. Given that 65% of the businesses that outsource once, continue doing so in the long run, finding the perfect offshore partner as quickly as possible can be highly beneficial for small-scale accountancy firms in the UK.

Also, Read: 8 Major Challenges Of Corporate Account Handling

Selecting Offshore Accounting Experts with Bookkeeping Expertise in Multiple Industries

Since small-scale accountancy firms in the UK deal with clients from various industries, they need their offshore bookkeeping experts to be proficient in bookkeeping for various industries. The top offshore accounting specialists have experience working with businesses from various industries like – construction, real estate, health, management consultancy, plumbing, etc. Having offshore accounting specialists who know how to read the books of businesses from different types of industries in the workforce can drastically reduce the workload of in-house employees at small-scale accountancy firms in the UK.

According to Deloitte, most accountancy firms outsource with the expectation of reducing expenses, enabling in-house employees to focus on core functions, and resolve capacity issues. With an offshore accountancy team that’s proficient at handling all types of bookkeeping responsibilities, irrespective of the industry, small-scale accountancy firms in the UK can experience –

Cost-reductions: Be it preparing final accounts for a local optics center or creating VAT reports for a nearby real-estate agency – the finest offshore experts of accounting can handle any accounting task, irrespective of the client, at much lower fees.
Core Focus: As these offshore accounting experts deal with technical responsibilities like creating financial reports for the firm’s clients, in-house employees of the firm can focus on expanding the business, having a face to face meetings with high-value clients, and other more rewarding jobs.
Capacity Issues: The UK’s small-scale accountancy firms often fail to retain employees because the quality of work in these firms doesn’t improve over time. After all, no accounting professional from the UK wants to create tax reports for local businesses. These ambitious accounting professionals want to work for bigger institutions. Hence, small-scale accountancy firms in the UK are constantly raided by bigger firms for their employees. As a result, these smaller firms are often under-staffed. With partnerships with offshore accountancy teams that can handle all types of bookkeeping responsibilities, this persistent issue can be resolved.

Also, Read: How to Move on From a History of Bad Credit

In addition to these qualities, small-scale accountancy firms in the UK must also look for technological capabilities from their outsourcing partners. Cloud-based accounting is the future, and it’s highly important these firms partner with offshore experts who are in tune with these international standards of modern accounting!