How the Best Accounting Outsource Services Are Helping Accountants in the UK Stay Stress-Free

Work stress is plunging countless accountants in the UK into mental health crises. Ever since the lockdowns were unexpectedly rolled out, everyone in the UK’s accounting industry has had to work long hours that too remotely. While other businesses and industries were temporarily shut down, the accountants kept working to ensure their clients don’t go permanently out of business.

• Despite the pandemic-triggered nightmare, 2020/21 was a decent financial year for the UK’s government. Close to £873 billion was collected in taxes from the public sector. Income tax collections were well over the £200 billion mark, and the government also collected £161 billion from VAT.

• Accounting firms were and continue to be at the forefront of these collections so much so that tax consultation is now a £5 billion profession in the UK. However, not all accounting firms in the UK were able to take on tax preparation and advisory duties because of their ever-increasing general workloads.

• According to a study by the Chartered Accountants Benevolent Association, 61% of chartered accountants in the UK feel that their large workloads negatively impact their personal lives. In the study, around 22% of accounting professionals said they think about resigning once a week.

Now that accounting professionals have to work from home, concerns about their mental health are growing stronger. 2021 could be the most professionally challenging year for accountants in the UK.

Managing Zoom Meetings, Tax Deadlines, and Concerned Clients 

The challenge of working remotely is taking a toll on many accounting professionals. Small-scale accounting firms, in particular, struggled a lot as they didn’t invest in technology that allows their accountants to take on complex accounting tasks remotely. Many accounting professionals have failed to adjust to new remote work models because of work pressures like –

• The new Brexit regulations have confused many small-scale business owners. These businesses are turning to their accounting firms to navigate through these legal changes.  

• New deadlines. The latest VAT and SA deferrals have left many business owners confused. Recently, the Chancellor declared that businesses would be given extra time to pay any deferred VAT in instalments. So, many firms aren’t paying full VAT at the end of March 2021. This causes more confusion for accounting firms in the UK.

• Several businesses have also received 3-month deadline extensions and payment deferrals. 

All of these changes are obviously causing confusion amongst accounting professionals and impacting their productivity. Many small-scale accounting firms cannot take on more work, despite the demand for accounting assistance being higher than ever. The easiest solution to these problems, as many large-scale accounting firms in the UK have discovered, lies in outsourcing certain activities.

Outsourcing – The Best Solution for Overworked Accounting Firms

Small-scale accounting firms in the UK can learn a lot from the bigger firms, especially when it comes to outsourcing. In a bid to stay competitive, several large-scale accounting firms in the UK have engaged in outsourcing since 2010. These partnerships paid off splendidly in 2020, when remote working became the norm for accounting professionals. These firms were able to leverage their offshore accounting teams’ skills to take on more responsibilities, projects, and clients. 

• Having an in-house accounting team supported by an experienced offshore team helped these firms expand their lists of clients. Instead of refusing work, these accounting firms simply redirected certain accounting responsibilities to their offshore partners.

• Be it creating financial reports, payroll management, or day-to-day bookkeeping – these offshore experts are trained in British accounting standards and can easily handle any task that an average accountant in the UK can accomplish. 

• Plus, these offshore experts charge very minimal fees. Their cost-effective services helped several large-scale accounting firms in the UK to stay in net profit, even in 2020.

Now, cloud-based accounting technology allows smaller accounting firms with limited resources to create such long-distance professional partnerships. By launching such partnerships in 2021, these firms can expect – 

Easier Workloads 

The upcoming economic challenges of 2021 present the perfect opportunity for small-scale firms to start providing business advisory or tax advisory services. With an offshore team overseeing routine accounting responsibilities (filing taxes, filing VAT, payroll management, bookkeeping), the firms’ in-house British accountants can focus on providing face to face consultancy services to clients.

Providing these advisory services at such a vital time can help accounting firms strengthen their long-term commercial objectives. More importantly, these firms get to expand without having to put excessive amounts of work pressure on their already overworked in-house teams. 

Adapt Faster to Technological Changes 

The ‘Make Tax Digital’ movement isn’t the only technological revolution that the UK’s rapidly changing accounting industry will experience in 2021. Most accounting firms in the UK are expected to switch to cloud-based accounting platforms by the end of this year. The best accounting outsource services providers use private cloud networks, advanced data security tools, and the latest accounting software tools like XERO.

These professionals offer 24×7 availability, a quality that many firms in the UK will need once the hectic tax season begins. These technologically advanced offshore accounting experts can help small-scale accounting firms embrace these changes in the most stress-free way.