SJD Accountancy - returning to quality service standards?

[FK1]

Now I've had a follow up email asking if I want to set up a new Limited company - WTF! I explained I've had a company registered for 14 years and will just need to transfer from SJD.

It is not a bad idea to dissolve one and open a new Ltd providing there is a legitimate business reason (e.g. no "Phoenixing"). SJD helped me to closure my old company (charged £360 3 years ago) when I were leaving them.

Generally I was rather happy with their services just after many years I started to feel stupid to pay (it costs £1728 pa incl. VAT). For such straight accounts as a typical contractor ones it should be up to £300 pa.

[MPwannadecentincome]

Sad to see service levels have gone down as I had excellent service when I started in 2013 including the accountant coming to visit me.

Now it is very different, for example, it was 1 business day before payroll was due in April 2019 whenI was told the PAYE details... and that was after chasing. Being abroad I am not constantly online or even on 4G to get to business bank a/c to setup the transfer and I am with a stupid bank (that they recommended) who don't know what a fast transfer is. Also anything out of the ordinary isn't handled well. I am out of pocket on overseas personally spent expenses as I wasn't told until too late that the exchange rate on the accounts at year end is the only one that counts so the exchange rate I incurred and repaid myself against was "wrong". I never had that problem when I was employee. How am I supposed to know what the exchange rate is going to be at the year end when I want to claim it now? They are certainly not setup for multi-currency, they want me to keep 2 separate spreadsheets as I have a EUR account but that is impractical as I can't reconcile the total dividends I can safely withdraw. I have to constantly remind them to do my EU Sales Return.

I referred a friend to them a year ago when they started their Ltd Co and they are unhappy, it seems it was not properly explained how to use the online tool. I have stayed on the spreadsheet as I know how it works and nobody has convinced me the online tool will handle multi-currency. I think they have too many contractors and not enough people and for the service level I think it is expensive so will consider moving when I get to end of the year as hopefully by then I will be back to 1 currency.

[simondolan]

Sad to see service levels have gone down as I had excellent service when I started in 2013 including the accountant coming to visit me.

I referred a friend to them a year ago when they started their Ltd Co and they are unhappy, it seems it was not properly explained how to use the online tool. I have stayed on the spreadsheet as I know how it works and nobody has convinced me the online tool will handle multi-currency. I think they have too many contractors and not enough people and for the service level I think it is expensive so will consider moving when I get to end of the year as hopefully by then I will be back to 1 currency.

That spreadsheet will never be killed off.

[ContrataxLtd]

Sad to see service levels have gone down as I had excellent service when I started in 2013 including the accountant coming to visit me.

Now it is very different, for example, it was 1 business day before payroll was due in April 2019 whenI was told the PAYE details... and that was after chasing. Being abroad I am not constantly online or even on 4G to get to business bank a/c to setup the transfer and I am with a stupid bank (that they recommended) who don't know what a fast transfer is. Also anything out of the ordinary isn't handled well. I am out of pocket on overseas personally spent expenses as I wasn't told until too late that the exchange rate on the accounts at year end is the only one that counts so the exchange rate I incurred and repaid myself against was "wrong". I never had that problem when I was employee. How am I supposed to know what the exchange rate is going to be at the year end when I want to claim it now? They are certainly not setup for multi-currency, they want me to keep 2 separate spreadsheets as I have a EUR account but that is impractical as I can't reconcile the total dividends I can safely withdraw. I have to constantly remind them to do my EU Sales Return.

I referred a friend to them a year ago when they started their Ltd Co and they are unhappy, it seems it was not properly explained how to use the online tool. I have stayed on the spreadsheet as I know how it works and nobody has convinced me the online tool will handle multi-currency. I think they have too many contractors and not enough people and for the service level I think it is expensive so will consider moving when I get to end of the year as hopefully by then I will be back to 1 currency.

Sounds like Freeagent would work really well with you, handles the multi currency pretty well.

The currency/expense situation sounds strange too, yes the foreign currencies at the year end are translated at the exchange rate at the year end but this shouldn't affect any withdrawals you've paid to yourself during the year if done at an approved rate already.

Martin
Contratax Ltd

[jamesbrown]

Sounds like Freeagent would work really well with you, handles the multi currency pretty well.

Second that. I recall, with gritted teeth, having to manually handle fx invoices and transactions and constantly explain to my previous accountant their mistakes related to fx. It’s seamless in FA.

[DolanContractorGroup]

Second that. I recall, with gritted teeth, having to manually handle fx invoices and transactions and constantly explain to my previous accountant their mistakes related to fx. It’s seamless in FA.

Agreed! Big fan of FA! Very straightforward to check over FX transactions.

KR
Sophie

[Mr.Whippy]

Not sure if they still have this SLA, if you don't get an answer within 1 working day they will return that month's fee.

No, they don't offer that anymore. Their promise is not as good as it once was. If they fail to meet their promise, the CEO will look into it and provide a response as to why. But, no money back.

I moved from SJD to Dolan after 8 or 9 years because the service level really did drop and I was also sick of the spreadsheet.... I couldn't be happier with FreeAgent and Dolan (who incidentally have the money back offering that SJD no longer have). The switch was seamlessly handled by Dolan with very little effort on my part.

[Jess inniAccounts]

Sad to see service levels have gone down as I had excellent service when I started in 2013 including the accountant coming to visit me.

Now it is very different, for example, it was 1 business day before payroll was due in April 2019 whenI was told the PAYE details... and that was after chasing. Being abroad I am not constantly online or even on 4G to get to business bank a/c to setup the transfer and I am with a stupid bank (that they recommended) who don't know what a fast transfer is. Also anything out of the ordinary isn't handled well. I am out of pocket on overseas personally spent expenses as I wasn't told until too late that the exchange rate on the accounts at year end is the only one that counts so the exchange rate I incurred and repaid myself against was "wrong". I never had that problem when I was employee. How am I supposed to know what the exchange rate is going to be at the year end when I want to claim it now? They are certainly not setup for multi-currency, they want me to keep 2 separate spreadsheets as I have a EUR account but that is impractical as I can't reconcile the total dividends I can safely withdraw. I have to constantly remind them to do my EU Sales Return.

I referred a friend to them a year ago when they started their Ltd Co and they are unhappy, it seems it was not properly explained how to use the online tool. I have stayed on the spreadsheet as I know how it works and nobody has convinced me the online tool will handle multi-currency. I think they have too many contractors and not enough people and for the service level I think it is expensive so will consider moving when I get to end of the year as hopefully by then I will be back to 1 currency.

I don't understand the exchange rate point, you should be converting the currency on the date of purchase to know how much to repay yourself (which I assume is what you've done and been told it's wrong?).

It's not difficult to support multi-currency, if the software works correctly. Are you being charged more for this?

[mcat]

Unfortunately SDJ doesn't understand FRS or basic book keeping

Sad to see service levels have gone down as I had excellent service when I started in 2013 including the accountant coming to visit me.

Now it is very different, for example, it was 1 business day before payroll was due in April 2019 whenI was told the PAYE details... and that was after chasing. Being abroad I am not constantly online or even on 4G to get to business bank a/c to setup the transfer and I am with a stupid bank (that they recommended) who don't know what a fast transfer is. Also anything out of the ordinary isn't handled well. I am out of pocket on overseas personally spent expenses as I wasn't told until too late that the exchange rate on the accounts at year end is the only one that counts so the exchange rate I incurred and repaid myself against was "wrong". I never had that problem when I was employee. How am I supposed to know what the exchange rate is going to be at the year end when I want to claim it now? They are certainly not setup for multi-currency, they want me to keep 2 separate spreadsheets as I have a EUR account but that is impractical as I can't reconcile the total dividends I can safely withdraw. I have to constantly remind them to do my EU Sales Return.

I referred a friend to them a year ago when they started their Ltd Co and they are unhappy, it seems it was not properly explained how to use the online tool. I have stayed on the spreadsheet as I know how it works and nobody has convinced me the online tool will handle multi-currency. I think they have too many contractors and not enough people and for the service level I think it is expensive so will consider moving when I get to end of the year as hopefully by then I will be back to 1 currency.

Unfortunately, when it comes to foreign currency or capital gains, SJD are clueless and they will get it wrong. Worse, they will get it wrong in a way that will cost you significant money in unnecessary tax. They really dont understand FRS apart from the first chapter. They really dont understand the difference between revaluation and fx gain loss or how capital gains are worked out. They cant do basic double entry book keeping. They would have costed me over £16,000 in extra tax because of mistakes had i not spotted them. Luckily I know finance so i can do this but unfortunately others cant and they get fed bolx like you are.

You are doing it correctly and they are wrong. All your fx transactions should be recorded at the daily spot rate when the transaction occurs. This includes invoices issued, paid, cash paid in/out, expenses paid etc. When transactions get closed (ie, invoice settled) a fx gain/loss will be generated. You will be taxed on this. At year end, any open balances (unsettled invoices, euro bank accounts, etc) will be revalued at the yr end rate with a resulting revaluation gain/loss. You wont be taxed on this but it will appear in the accounts.

If it is just euro expenses you are paying yourself then these should just be recorded and converted at the rate on the day you make the expense "claim" and if not settling/paying immediately then the payment converted on the day you make it together with any FX gain/loss from when you made the claim. If there is an open balance at the end of the year (ie, you have claimed but not paid some of the euro expenses) then this balance would be revalued and appear on your financial statements (together with any revaluation gain/loss) but this will not affect what you get paid. Your payment will go at whatever the spot rate is on the day you make it and the gain/loss from the value when you made the claim recorded on your P&L affecting the profit you will be eventually taxed on. I hope that helps.

Accounting s/w will do all this automatically for you. Unfortunately, the SJD spreadsheet wont and you are relying in the accountant to do it properly instead. They won't, either through sheer incompetence or laziness. I haven't yet figured out which one applies to SJD but I am tending to think it is the first. Good luck.

[metalthor]

SJD accountancy unprofessional services and dishonest commercial relationship

We've seen a lot of criticism about SJD accountancy recently. But have they turned the corner? If you look at trustpilot, they had some shocking reviews, but in the last month, they've had 47 consecutive four or five star reviews!! Time to re-evaluate and give them another chance?

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I have been using SJD accountancy services since 2014 until 2019. Disappointingly during this period, I have been exposed to a lack of professionalism, constructive changes and dishonest commercial relationship.
It has taken to 2 years to them to set up a direct debit
SJD has reduced the level of services, charge for services that were included in the package.
SJD has introduced penalties of 175 pounds for late self-assessments submissions and they don't send any reminder
SJD tends to delegate all work to their customers.
SJD hide the fact that they are regulated accountancy company. Check the complaint procedure no third parties involved.
AVOID IT
Do not hesitate to contact me for further information such emails as prove if evidence.