Tag: business owner

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How to prepare for a stress-free year end

The best time to prepare for a stress-free year end is nearly a year ago. Trite but true.  

But we are where we are so what can you do now? 

  • Make sure that all invoicing is up to date 
  • Make sure that you collect as much cash as possible from your clients. (See other articles on improving your cashflow and credit control procedures).  
  • Write off old, uncollectable debts to understand the true financial position 
  • Upload all purchase bills (next year you can start to add Hubdoc, Apron, or Dext so that you can do this as you go!) 
  • Chase the team for expenses 
  • Check for any draft sales invoices or purchase bills and either process them fully or delete them if necessary. 
  • Check for old, unpaid bills. Are these genuinely waiting to be paid or the result of a duplicate entry? (This often happens if the bank account is reconciled before uploading bills 
  • Reconcile the bank account (we hope you do this regularly anyway!) and chase VAT receipts for all payments 
  • Run a P&L by month and look for missing expenses each month such as 11 rent or software payments instead of 12. (Xenon Connect or Dext Precision software is great for this) 
  • Reconcile payroll to the accounts. Salaries should agree to payroll summary reports and balances owed to HMRC should agree to the business tax account 
  • Reconcile the final VAT return to the accounts and the business tax account. This is easiest if the VAT period is aligned with the year end. You can change your VAT period online in the business tax account. 
  • Review the Directors’ loan accounts (DLA) to make sure that they’re not overdrawn (and remind directors, yet again, not to keep helping themselves to company cash without declaring proper dividends!) 

Doing this early, and regularly, will help to make the year end easier. 

While you’re at it why not consider regular management accounts to provide a true financial position BEFORE directors draw money out of the business? It would save the company so much money on overdrawn DLAs leading to S455 penalty tax and tax/NI on P11D beneficial loans. 

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Understanding the gap between profit and cash

Lack of cashflow is the number one cause of failure in small businesses. Even profitable businesses still run out of cash. This can because they’re not forecasting their cashflow requirements properly as they grow (See our webinar on How to Scale Without Cashflow Chaos https://youtu.be/hmPssYUINWY?si=8nRJW-KGaAQfZRQy ) 

But sometimes businesses are busy tracking the wrong thing. Your profit and loss is only one of the reports that you should be looking at regularly. This doe not show: 

  • Timing differences between invoicing and payments 
  • VAT and corporation tax due to HMRC are big lump sums that still seem to surprise some business owners 
  • You might also have cash tied up in stock, work in progress and other uninvoiced work, and prepaid costs 
  • Directors, loan accounts often accumulate an overdrawn balance when director/shareholders help themselves to cash and call it ‘dividends’ without carrying out the necessary solvency checks beforehand. 

Ideally you should have a proper cashflow forecast and there is software that will connect to Xero (and other software) to help you to do this for yourself, or with our help. 

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The three levers that instantly improve productivity 

There are so many ways to grow your business that it can feel like a nightmare knowing what to do first so here are the three most effective levers to pull to instantly improve your profitability. 

1.Pricing 

Most businesses are under-priced and it just becomes a race to the bottom as there is ALWAYS somebody who will do it cheaper. Many accountancy firms are as much as 20-40% under-priced. 

This mini-course explains how to go about it and why you shouldn’t worry too much about losing your less profitable clients.

2.Productivity 

Getting things right first time reduces rework, structuring your time to minimise interruptions, and minimising or eliminating other inefficiencies will improve your productivity,  

3.Positioning 

Establish yourself as an expert or quality service and you will attract clients who value that expertise. This is a case of BEING better and also SHOWING yourself off better.  

Small tweaks can be more effective when time and other resources are limited.  

And, as usual, we have a resource that can help you so just email us if you would like a copy of our 30 day Profitability Boost Checklist (free) or to subscribe to our 30 day online course and group to ensure that you actually get it done (£199). hello@minervaaccountants.co.uk

Scale up 4 Growth grants are back!

For businesses with 5-249 employees and where activity and outcomes are delivered within a 50 mile range of UWE Bristol. Find out more here​. 

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The hidden costs of being too helpful to clients 

Here at Minerva Accountants we are fortunate to have the best clients. This is a deliberate strategy on my part as I feel that we do our best work for people we like. I often put down the phone after a call and think ‘that’s my favourite client!’ 

The downside of dealing with such wonderful business owners is that we have to remind ourselves not to be too helpful. 

  • Over-servicing and scope creep – while we include telephone support in most of our packages it’s easy to do too much. Much as I love my work I’m running a business and not a charity so it’s important to charge for extras. If it’s not a quick answer and requires either calculations or research then we book a paid call. 
  • Constantly saying ‘yes’ can have an emotional cost when it becomes hard to set boundaries when you need to say ‘no’ 
  • Giving away too much begins to erode profitability so you need to work extra hours or take on more clients. More clients means not enough time to service the ones that you already have so it’s a lose-lose. 
  • Setting expectations early is important. As in any good improv class the answer is ‘yes, and … ‘ In our case it is ‘yes, and … that will cost £x or £x per hour’ 
  • Clear boundaries improve client relationships. I’ve lost count of the number of times on online forums when accountants close to burnout are complaining about clients who expect them to answer the phone in the evenings or over the weekend. The simple answer is to turn off the phone (or send calls to voice mail) outside of office hours.  

I hope you are setting the right boundaries in your business for your profitability and your health. Good clients won’t push these boundaries. 

If you think you’re over-servicing then contact us for our Over-Servicing Assessment and reclaim your profitability  

Scale up 4 Growth grants are back! 

For businesses with 5-249 employees and where activity and outcomes are delivered within a 50 mile range of UWE Bristol 

https://www.uwe.ac.uk/business/businesses-and-employers/scale-up-4-growth

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Why most businesses plateau and how to break through 

1.There is a limit to how much one person can handle, both in terms of practical work and mental load. Even if you are prepared to work an 80 hour week! If you want a decent work-life balance then you need to systemise, automate, and delegate in order to grow beyond your personal limits. 

2.More clients doesn’t always equal more profit. The most profitable clients are often those that are the best for for your business. These fit your systems so you can work more efficiently AND they fit your expertise so you can provide better value. 

3.Every business has bottle necks. These might be in the workflow itself or it may be that you and your limited time are the bottleneck. 

4.You need to make the mindset move away from technician to business owner. Stop trying to do everything yourself. This will increase your profitability, scalability and saleability 

If you’d like a copy of our Small Firm Growth Breakthrough Blueprint please email hello@minervaaccountants.co.uk

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A double workload ahead? 

I’ve been speaking on the topic of MTD for 10 years now. Initially to our own clients, then to other accountants and bookkeepers, and now to business owners. One of the reasons I’ve been trying to encourage people to pull their finger out is because there will be a period of double work. 

In case you haven’t already realised, and it seems that many haven’t, you will have to submit a normal tax return for 2025/26 AND three quarterly returns for 2026/27 during the 10 month period April 2026 – Jan 2027. 

Do, if you aren’t ready for MTD yet … pull your finger out! (And give me a shout if you need a hand) 

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What’s your UX like? 

User experience (UX) can make or break your business.  

I woke up at silly o’clock this morning dreaming about the poor UX in a particular bit of our accounting software. Every time I use it I get annoyed. There’s a similar irritant in our practice management software. Things that were poorly designed. 

We try our best to ensure that dealing with Minerva Accountants is smooth and seamless. We work with tech-savvy clients so we use a lot of automated chasing BUT we also ensure that any client who replies to the emails is met with a human response. 

We prefer to communicate by email for traceability and so that the whole team can see what is happening with clients BUT, if something is not straightforward, we leap onto a telephone or Zoom call. 

AI and technology can make things run smoothly behind the scenes but it takes a human to think through a human friendly UX. Take some time this week to review the customer journey in your business and make it as smooth and friendly as possible. 

1.How do the first contact you? 

2.What is your onboarding process? 

3.What is the process for delivering your goods or services? 

4.What happens when something goes wrong? 

5.How easy is it for customers to speak to a human being of they need to? 

What one thing can you do to improve each of these touchpoints? 

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Would you give up your business and go back to employment? 

Every business owner has probably considered this at some point, and you may even think about it on a regular basis. 

Comfortable, regular income, regular hours (even if you do end up working more than your contract), the ultimate responsibility lies with somebody else, and you can hand in your notice and walk away if things become too much. 

But compare that to the freedom of running your own business. I set up my own small accountancy business after I was unable to find flexible work that would allow me to prioritise my young children. I was only going to do a few sets of accounts from the kitchen table but my corporate background running businesses meant that it grew far beyond that. I started, built, and eventually sold, Hudson Business Accountants and Advisers while working an average of just 25 hours per week. (If you want to know how then read my first book, The Numbers Business: how to build a successful cloud accountancy practice) 

Now that my kids have grown and flown, I work a full week, but I run three businesses. Okay, two businesses and a side hustle. Whilst I still enjoy flexible hours, all my businesses are remote as I like to work as I travel. And our whole team have the same freedom. 

As the business owner I also get to choose the work that I do and the clients that I work with. We only have the nicest clients which make work more enjoyable AND we are more motivated to do more for them. And I love it when we can help others, whether business owner clients of Minerva Accountants or accountant clients of Hudson Business Advice, to have that same business that they dream of. 

If I could find an employer who shared my values and provided enjoyable work and the same flexibility, I would jump at the stability of employment but, until then, I love what I have built. And I want to help others to fall back in love with their business too. 

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We all have the same 24 hours per day … 

How patronising! Am I the only one who gets wound up by trite comments like this?  

We might all have 24 hours per day but we have very different responsibilities and priorities. 

You might have family to care for, health issues, different work/business commitments, different commutes, gym and fitness requirements, food prep, and a need for good sleep AND quality relaxation. 

There are all sort of processes/hacks that we can implement to get more out of our 24 hours. I try to share many of them here.  

But please, don’t judge others or feel that you have failed because you don’t get as much done. 

When I had small children I worked a 25 hour week which taught me to be very efficient and to insist on well trained clients who fitted our business well. Now that my kids have grown and flown my time is my own.  

I still choose to work ‘only’ 35 hours per week using the processes and automation that I learned in my first businesses. These days I am able to travel more freely and take advantage of working holidays. I still don’t seem to prioritise the gym though! 

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Compliance alone won’t grow your business

Good compliance is essential. It keeps you legal. But it is always looking backwards and does little to help a business to grow. Many accountants only do once a year accounts and many business owners are happy with this.

Real growth comes through planning, looking forward, and taking actions.

To help with this we run FOUR strategic planning days Jan – Mar (2 for accountants and 2 for other business owners) and another in the Autumn.

But we don’t just run them for other people. My year end is July, a legacy from when my life and business revolved around my young children and the school year. I work through the same SPD myself every Summer to work out my priorities and plans each year.

We look at:

  • Personal goals
  • Business goals
  • Your offer
  • Your competitors
  • Your ideal client
  • Your positioning and USP
  • SWOT analysis
  • Goals
  • Blockers
  • Actions

Yes, I know that covers more than strategy but, for small businesses, it’s enough to have a clear plan and we have clients who come back to repeat the exercise with us.

When did you last look at your own business in this way?