Penalties or Profit: What’s Your Choice This Tax Season?

There’s no escaping it; the busiest month of the year is here, and you barely have a few weeks before the January 31 deadline comes knocking at your door. The time to procrastinate has passed, and things are starting to get serious and intense now.

January is synonymous with panic for growing accountancy practices in the UK. This is a time when accountants are reportedly the most stressed, trying to strike a balance between work and personal lives. Amidst the chaos, their physical and mental health often goes for a toss and practice owners are left finding backup resources at the last minute to avoid late filing.

This is a story accountants have lived over and over for years. But this year, you can write a better ending to it. All it takes is one decision – to outsource tax returns to an experienced and reliable service provider.

January 31: A date that can make or break your practice

The terror of January 31 is no alien to the accounting industry. Come January, accountants begin getting nightmares about the looming deadline. Even as practice owners try their best to master the art of balancing, there are plenty of things that can go wrong during the last month of the Self Assessment season.

The UK is currently in the midst of a recession. To add to it, the inflation rate is going up and so is the number of accountants quitting their jobs to look for better opportunities. Moreover, we have just returned from the holiday season. It is possible that one or more of your resources may take time off due to sickness or unexpectedly extend their leaves. If the absences persist for even a couple of days, a lot can go wrong, leading you to miss the critical January 31 deadline.

And what happens after that? Missed deadlines invite the wrath of HMRC in terms of penalties. Not only will you have to bear the brunt of fines, but you also lose clients’ valuable trust, which is the foundation of your business association. The deadline can thus make or break your practice, depending on how well you manage the tax filing job.

Outsourcing to the rescue

January is already quite late to assess your firm’s capacity. This is a time when you must have backup resources hired and ready to take on the additional work that comes your way. But if you haven’t done that yet, don’t worry, there’s still hope. With tax preparation outsourcing, you can create capacity within your firm and manage all the last-minute tax returns efficiently without the fear of missing the deadline.

Outsourcing tax preparation offers numerous advantages to growing accountancy practices. Some of them are listed below.

Experienced resources: The greatest advantage of personal tax preparation outsourcing is that it allows practices to hire highly experienced and skilled resources. Since many practices get last-minute tax filing requests from clients, having extra resources at hand is crucial. However, in the current situation of talent crunch, hiring new resources is extremely difficult and expensive.

With outsourcing, you can easily hire talented resources to work as an extension of your team at cost-effective prices. These resources are well-versed with UK tax laws and can prepare and file taxes in record turnaround time.

Latest technology: One of the effective ways to get through January is to automate time-consuming tasks. But implementing new technology is easier said than done. To begin with, you will have no time and resources to switch to new software or assess what should be automated during the busy season. In addition, it may be a costly affair as you will need to train your resources first.

Delegating tax return outsourcing to India can help deal with this challenge. India is one of the top outsourcing destinations for UK accounting firms owing to Indian accountants’ excellent technical skills. These resources can help you adopt new technologies into your processes and make tax filing easier and more efficient.

Increased profits: The tax season is a major opportunity for small and medium accountancy firms to attract new clients, take on more work and earn higher profits. However, issues such as capacity crunch, lack of technical expertise, and poor planning often prevent practices from achieving their goals.

This is where outsourcing can be crucial. When you outsource tax preparation, you increase your turnaround time and efficiency. With this, you can easily take on more work and focus on value-based services, such as advisory, that are crucial during the tax period. Outsourcing also frees up your internal resources to regularly interact with clients, who can pitch additional services and open new revenue streams for your practice.

The choice is yours!

There are two possibilities when wrapping up the tax season: miss the deadline and pay penalties or outsource tax returns and maximise your profits. There is a third possibility of making your internal teams work relentlessly, but you may end up losing critical resources to a competitor. This is why the act of balancing is vital during the busy season.

Whether you sail through the tax season effectively depends on how well you delegate tasks. Although your existing staff may be capable of handling all the workload, it is always a good idea to be prepared for unexpected developments. Even if you don’t get a huge volume of last-minute requests, you can delegate the cumbersome tax preparation work to the outsourced team and have your internal staff work on building client relationships and providing higher-value services.

Once you navigate the tax season efficiently, you can easily win clients’ trust and pitch your practice’s additional services. It can also help position your firm as a reliable advisory partner helping clients make critical business decisions.

So, what will you choose this tax season – Penalties or Profits?

If you chose the latter, NOW is the right time to take the plunge. With January already here, UK tax return outsourcing is the only viable way to ensure a successful tax season.

If you are looking for a reliable tax outsourcing partner for your practice, QXAS is your ultimate destination. With a vast experience of 13+ years, we have helped several accounting firms double their profits during the tax season.

To connect with one of our outsourcing experts for a free consultation, call us at +44 208-146-0808 or drop an email at [email protected]. To explore more of our services, log on to Outsourced Accounting, Bookkeeping, and Payroll Services | QXAS UK (qxaccounting.com).