You may try DIY accounting and bookkeeping practices during your initial business days.
However, the major problem with business owners lies in spending a certain amount of time in accounting. It often takes away a bigger portion of your vital time from other revenue-focused business activities.
This makes hiring an accountant in businesses an essential need, but not everyone can afford their costs. Therefore, hiring the best online accountants is their most convenient option.
Firstly, they charge you only for their services and save on overhead costs. Secondly, they save you time and offer top-tier services to maintain their reputation in the industry.
Now, the question is how to find the perfect online accountant. This blog post will help you with the process.
Table of Content
Who is an online accountant?
An online accountant is a professional like an in-house accountant who helps you maintain your business finances, analyse balance sheets, and file taxes.
The only difference between the two is that an online accountant works remotely, and they usually charge you only for their services.
When you meet with an accountant in your locality, you get together to discuss your accounting needs and provide them with your finance details and account access. Then the accountant does their work depending on your needs. Some of the duties may include submitting your tax returns, preparing financial statements, monitoring cash flow, guiding on investments, advising on financial decisions, and so on.
An online accountant also performs these tasks, but you do everything remotely instead of meeting them in a physical space and handing over documents.
You can speak to them via phone and email, share digital files, and access your business accounts online, and they handle your needs online. Usually, they use online accounting software or cloud services to connect with you and closely monitor your business’s financial health and success.
Questions to ask a potential online accountant
Any business can benefit from online accounting services if the accountant suits their needs. Therefore, we have listed a few questions you must ask an accountant before hiring them for your business.
1. What qualifications and experience do you have?
You must be sure about the qualifications of an accountant before hiring them. It is because the term “accountant” isn’t legally bound in the UK, and anyone with a little accounting knowledge can call themselves accountants.
Therefore, you must look for a certified or chartered accountant and check the details of their experiences or training.
2. How long have you been in the accounting domain?
Even though an online accountant has higher qualifications, you must look into their experience in the domain. It is because experienced accountants understand how to handle your business finances and accounting needs better.
Plus, they have greater knowledge and skills than a newcomer in the industry who might not know the hidden challenges of the industry.
3. Do you have experience working in my niche?
Every business has unique challenges to overcome at different points in time. Therefore, assessing only the experience of an accountant is not enough for your business. You must also ask about their industry expertise.
If they have worked with businesses in your domain, they will know about several unwanted challenges and can lead down solutions faster than others.
4. What accounting services do you offer?
Now comes the major question that you must ask an online accountant: What services do they provide? Before assessing their services, you must clearly understand what services your business needs.
This gives you better insight into what you can expect from the online accountant and helps you understand what accounting requirements they can fulfil. You can later compare their services with other accountants to hire the best fit.
5. Are you using the latest online accounting software?
A proactive online accountant will use all the latest accounting software versions and follow trending techniques. You can ask the accountant about these tools and techniques and how you can benefit from them.
Usually, when using these tools in-house, you need to spend a huge amount on purchasing them, buying subscriptions, and updating them from time to time. But, with an online accountant, you can save on such business expenses.
6. What details do you need from me?
Nobody wants to drag accounting and tax processes longer. Therefore, it is essential to ask the accountant what details you need to provide them to fulfil your requirements. This enables you to keep things organised and share details faster so that they can fulfil their tasks smoothly.
7. How should we connect with each other?
With an online accountant, you cannot visit their physical office or set up a face-to-face meeting whenever needed. Therefore, you must ask them about the communication medium like phone calls, email, or video meetings. This keeps you stress-free at times of need and connects your experts easily.
8. What are your charges and pay structure?
As you know, your accounting needs may not be the same as your business associates. Similarly, multiple other reasons affect an accountant’s charges. You must ask them about how they will charge you for their services. Usually, an online accountant charges you per hour or a fixed rate for their services. Ensure you ask them about any hidden charges initially to avoid disappointment.
9. Are you aware of tax laws or industry-specific legislation?
Ask your accountant whether they know the UK’s changing tax laws and industry-specific regulations.
You can assess their knowledge by asking about a few changes in tax laws and how they will impact your business or some questions related to accounting standards in the UK.
This will allow you to understand their knowledge, help you comply with the rules, and avoid paying unnecessary penalties.
10. Do you have any references from other businesses?
Finally, you must ask an online accountant for their past client references. Usually, these professionals have a well-managed website showcasing client reviews and testimonials. You can directly contact them to ask about their original work experience with the accountant.
Conclusion
In our guide today, we have shared some of the top tips for choosing an accountant, which will help you search for potential accountants.
These professionals not only save money and time but also provide top-notch accounting services. However, you must be careful in choosing the potential accountants for your business.
