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Colin gives poetry lessons
Colin knows all about Finnish methods to avoid late payments. Click on the image above to share his wisdom
An ode to debt
With pay day still seemingly an age away and our credit card balance hitting its limit, TS has been concerned that nasty debt-collecting types might be popping around to demand cash for all those unpaid bar tabs.
It was with some comfort then, when we read that the physical persuasion of debt collection is on the way out. In Finland, where payment levels are exceptionally good, you needn’t worry about a big thug banging down your door. Instead, you can look forward to some poetry to convince you to pay up.
Apparently, one credit management firm ran a poetry campaign directed at middle-aged women that was very effective.
Perhaps this could herald a new, more artistic era in the accounts receivable department.
Accountancy Age judge bored out of a job
The legal world was rocked by last week’s revelation that High Court judge Mr Justice Laddie would be standing down because he was, it seems, bored with his job.
Talk like that is heresy in legal circles, but TS can well believe it, having previously sat before plain old Sir Hugh Laddie, as he will soon be known.
It was Laddie who presided over the dispute between Accountancy Age, the JDS and Deloitte .TS found the proceedings rivetting (well, we did win) but, in hindsight, all the signs were there that Laddie was trying to liven up proceedings.
Drawing on a famous media intrusion case, he asked at one point: ‘Was it for the better good of the world to disclose that Naomi Campbell had had a spliff or two?’ Later he raised an eyebrow at the JDS website. ‘Castigator,’ he said. ‘That certainly gets the message across.’
Relocation, relocation
When TS first came on to the Accountancy Age payroll, we were offered a relocation package. At the time, £100 seemed like a reasonable amount to move our desk as far away as possible from the rest of the staff.
But it looks like we’ve been fleeced, if some of the latest executive perks are anything to go by.
Richard Baker, the top man at high street chemist Boots, was given over £150,000 last year as part of a relocation package, after stepping down from Asda to take the job.
The end result was that Richie’s journey time to work was reduced by a whole 20 minutes, down to 55 minutes each way.
Cable & Wireless FD Charles Herlinger was also recently given £400k to move, although at least he was changing countries. TS feels that our location in the office needs to be reviewed, unless we are presented with some additional incentives to stay put.
An Ernest mistake
We know that the drama down at the High Court – you know, that case involving Ernst &Young and £2bn, as far as TS can recall – is a serious matter. But whether or not those compiling the cause list (the full record of cases in court on any one day) had to describe it in the way they did, TS is unsure.
Having in a recent court case misspelt Smith & Williamson as Sith & Williamson (R2D2 always did sound like an accounting standard), the cause list is now showing Ernst &Young as Ernest &Young.
The misspelling raises an interesting question in TS’s mind. If E&Y loses, does it have to pay up?
Hot and bothered at Equitable trial
More excitement from the Equitable case. TS understands that the recent heat has been too much for the lawyers involved in the case, baking in their suits in Court 76 (where in a double whammy the air-conditioning had also failed). After discussions with the judge, the poor mites were allowed to move to a shirtsleeve order.
How sweet, TS thought, that they had to ask, and that they call it shirtsleeve order. Just like school.
Meanwhile, others are also finding the going tough. One contributor to The Motley Fool’s discussion group wrote recently, after patient relaying of the day’s events in court: ‘I have given up reading the transcript due to an attack of extreme boredom.’ A life in the law is not for everyone. It seems to be a trend.
Long John Anstee hobbled
You might remember comments made by new ICAEW president Ian Morris recently about chief exec Eric Anstee. He admitted that his wife thought Anstee had 'piratical' good looks. You can read the story here.
So imagine TS's shock this morning at the ICAEW's annual conference when Anstee hobbled onstage with a cane under his arm, looking the spitting image of Long John Silver. However Morris was at pains (no pun intended) to point out the Eric had taken a fall playing tennis at the weekend. TS prefers to think that, in fact, he dropped a chest full of doubloons on his leg while burying his treasure on a remote topical island, letting out a hearty arrrrrrrrrrrrrrr as he did so.
Royal appointment at KPMG?
KPMG hearts are all a flutter. Any young lady from the Big Four firm reading The Times today will have noted that there are rumours Prince Wills could soon be photocopying and fetching the tea at the Big Four firm, as part of his work experience package over the Summer.
Wills' 'City' work experience has aroused the most interest of his new projects; the others are the usual schlock charity work type engagements. But Wills has insisted on the City as he thinks it could help him with charity fundraising.
TS is not quite sure how that works, but it is worth pointing out that some scurrilous rumour-mongers are suggesting KPMG could be where he learns those new tricks. The reason being the Sir Michael Peat connection. Peat's firm has now become the P in KPMG while Sir Michael is currently private secretary to Prince Charles.
Other suggestions are Barclays private bank, where Wills' uncle, Lord Fellowes, is chairman, or Coutts, where mummy keeps her cash. Feisty young ladies at KPMG, hoping to oust Kate Middleton as Wills' new lady, will hope those suggestions are just intended to mislead the paparazzi.
Merv gets Wimbledon fever
At this time of year, many, many people suddenly get the urge to stroll down to their local tennis courts for a set or two, having never picked up a tennis racquet since precisely a year previously. Take a stroll through any local park this weekend and you will see a plethora of overweight souls huffing and puffing around a court desperately trying to hit a small yellow ball.
So it may be no surprise to hear on the grapevine, well the FT anyway, that Bank of England supreme Mervyn King has been playing a lot of tennis lately. Besides his normal partner, cabinet secretary Gus O'Donnell, Merv has also been playing with former Wimbledon ladies champ Martina Hingis. Lets hope he managed to put up a better show than TS does during its annual tennis Saturday.
Colin blogs on!
TS has a new addition to its online portfolio. You can now read about the escapades of Colin and the others at Winkwater International right here. To see this week's strip simply click on the thumbnail image below these words.
Two heads are better than one
‘There’s only ooooooooone Mike Warburton,’ TS was heard singing while staggering home from Grant Thornton’s press bash last week. Alas, our song was somewhat inaccurate, for it was revealed over a few pints of something cool and frothy that Mike, a tax partner at GT, has an identical twin. ‘Yes, it’s true,’ he later confessed to TS. Mike and Peter, as his twin is known, went to the same school and university. ‘We used to alternate beards, six months on and six months off. It didn’t half confuse the ladies.’ Mike is well-known for being able to talk the hind legs off a donkey. TS can only wonder what Christmas is like in the Warburton household.
Bunch of ‘Weed’os
When TS thinks of the huge volume of work constantly being thrown its way, we’re often reminded of the Red Weed from War of the Worlds, and that very creepy tune from the Jeff Wayne musical version. It just seems to gradually take over everything.
We thought this may have just been an oddity of TS’s, so we were a little relieved to read about a PricewaterhouseCoopers employee who has a similarly creepy imagination. An article in the Financial Times, quoted senior auditor Peter Quest as calling his emails ‘triffids’. The reason? ‘You can spend all day killing them, then you turn your back for a second and those red things, those triffids, have taken over your screen again.’
TS knows exactly how you feel Peter. We’re just wondering whether you get the recurring dreams that wake you up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night as well.
It's just not cricket
Apart from the smell of freshly-cut grass and a dozen gigantic fruit-filled glasses brimming with Pimms, TS loves nothing more in the summer than the sound of leather against willow and the sight of 11 men in white jumpers waiting for two other men to depart a large rope-enclosed field. Some people even pay to watch the sport of cricket, while a lucky few attend corporate hospitality areas.
So TS was shocked to hear last week that KPMG’s corporate box overlooking a charity match in aid of the Tsunami appeal at Lords was empty. Meanwhile a poor, solitary member of Ernst & Young’s press team was left to, not only take a day off from his holiday quota to watch the match, but also to pay for his own ticket!
TS understands Big Four comrades can only go so far, but the next time KPMG bails out of watching the cricket, we’d happily be the twelfth person for the day.
Long distance chairing
Anne Redston, formerly of Ernst & Young and voted tax ‘personality of the year’ in the recent Taxation awards, will shortly catch the slow boat to China.
Redston is heading off to practise her Chinese for four months, and leaves in August. That much we know. What has recently come to TS’s attention though is Redston’s plans to continue in her role as chair of the personal tax committee, among other roles, at the Chartered Institute of Taxation.
Some may question how she will carry out her duties to the full from across the world, but TS has absolute faith in her. After all, we wrote this piece while sitting on a beach in Bognor (it would have been Bermuda but gossip doesn’t pay well).
Game, set and match to PwC
TS would like to offer its warm congratulations to PricewaterhouseCoopers for winning our very special competition.
Unfortunately it's not the 'best present given to TS' award. That still goes to Deloitte for the Christmas champers. No, this is the far more coveted 'first accountancy firm to put out a press release linking the start of Wimbledon with personal tax' award.
You may have heard this one before, Accountancy Age has even done a few times, but with Wimbledon starting on Monday, some people like to rent their houses out, or start a little sideline – perhaps strawberries and cream from their front garden - to earn a little extra cash. Many of these people, amazingly, fail to declare the cash to the tax man but the Revenue is apparently onto them.
Well done again to PwC, who pipped KPMG to the post this year. Unfortunately the only prize that comes with this award is kudos.
TS quite fancies some strawberries and champagne now. Ok, we'll just skip to the champers.
The home of frosty knickers
TS stumbled across something quite remarkable the other day. Some of you may have heard of accountant Ken Frost, who has attracted a certain notoriety in opposing the ICAEW’s merger with CIPFA and CIMA. But his work does not end there.
Apart from his stopthemerger website, Ken also has a personal site, www.kenfrost.com (‘The Living Brand’), which has to be seen to be believed.
From rants about Croydon council to delightful apercus on love and life, Ken’s site is truly hypnotising. TS was, though, disturbed to come across ‘The Emporium,’ which sells branded ‘Ken Frost’ clothing.
Not only can you get Ken Frost T-shirts, caps and baby grows, you can also get a themed thong, complete with Ken’s catchphrase ‘In your face’ and his face emblazoned on the front. Yours, if you can believe it, for just $8.99.
No Land ahoy at E&Y party
Unfortunately the season of summer media parties is upon us and TS is swapping tranquil nights in for schmoozing, drinking fine wines and snacking on canapés.
The first of the summer was Ernst & Young’s at its London HQ on the riverside. The event was a glorious mix of idle gossip and accounting banter with senior members of the firm.
But TS was disappointed to learn that chairman Nick Land hadn’t managed to turn up, despite personally inviting us (according to the invite sent in the post). Apparently he was on his way back from a ‘working’ trip to Ghana.
Perhaps next time, Land could simply take the press with him on his trips to exotic locations and kill two birds with one stone.
Getting in the ‘zone’
When TS arrives at its paper-strewn desk every morning and starts attempting to locate the keyboard, it sometimes wishes it was more like accountants, whose attention to detail everything in its place, and a place for everything is the hallmark of the profession.
But did PKF need to extend this obsessive streak to its recent media party? At last week’s drinks at Guildhall, where the great and the good of the mid-tier firm and its clients were mingling, each different area of the business was sectioned off into colour-coded zones. The taxmen were not allowed to stray into the corporate finance area, the consultants into the business recovery zone and so on.
The arrangement did make it easier for a slightly inebriated TS to locate the relevant people, but we suspect that even the lushest ligger may have had trouble getting this party started.
A brief history of accounting
TS likes it when time flies. You know, just after afternoon tea at the desk with just a bit of Solitaire to keep one company.
But those ICAEW guys and gals just take the biscuit when it comes to moving time faster than Einstein had suggested possible.
According to the schedule for the 125th birthday annual ICAEW conference, Ernst & Young partner Peter Forbes is going to take us through the history of the profession…..but has only been scheduled for a 10 minute slot. That's quite a challenge at less than a minute a decade.
Surely a bit of background info on Enron, or the formation of the IASB could make ten minutes disappear quicker than you can say Consultative Committee of Accountancy Bodies?
There are some however, possibly lawyers, who would suggest that ten minutes chatting about the last 125 years of accountancy would actually feel like a lifetime.
Accountants help snake in the grass
It might be said that accountants are often employed to help out snakes, but rarely are they talking about real life reptiles.
But accountants Moore and Smalley have been called in to help get a business to teach people about snakes, spiders and all other sorts of scary creatures off the ground. The firm has been advising a company called Nightbreeds, which will be have a mobile zoo, educational workshops on the creepy crawlies and offer re-housing services.
TS wishes Nightbreeds well, but will be more than happy if the Lancashire-based business doesn't become too successful and start plying its trade around the corner from TS towers. We can't stand the horrible things.
IFRS hatred boiling up
You would think that by now everyone would be on top of IFRS, but it looks like the poor audit slaves in practice - those stuck in the actually quagmire of new figures earning the big fees for the partners - have had their lives horribly complicated by fair value accounting and what-not.
TS heard recently, on very good authority, that one beleagured Big Four prole openly said she hated IFRS because every time she phoned the firm's internal IFRS employee helpline, she seemed to get different answers. Those interpretations are complicated deary, but don't worry, TS has never really understood IFRS either.
Dark side of Gadget Shop flop
Fresh from his succumbing to the dark side of the Force in the recent Star Wars film, Darth Vader is going up for sale.
Well, at least a three-foot metal version of him is, as administrators from PKF look to flog the wares from the Gadget Shop, those purveyors of useless things that you never new you wanted.
Consultants King Sturge are organising the sale of Vader and fellow Star Wars baddie Boba Fett as part of an auction of Gadget Shop stuff, which will be broadcast via a live webcast.
But Gadget Shop lovers need not worry, PKF’s Brian Jackson told TS that the shop’s brand has already been sold to another retailer, so shopping for lava lamps, flashing pens and singing fish won’t be a thing of the past.
A passion for pepperoni
After a hard day filling the back pages with gossip from the accountancy world, TS loves nothing more than to flop down in front of the telly on a quiet weekend and devour a large pizza accompanied by the obligatory tinny or two.
For this reason alone TS would love to have Domino’s Pizza FD Lee Ginsberg over for dinner, as long as he was cooking. Before Ginsberg took over the financial hotseat at the pizza company, he was sent on a course by Domino’s to teach him how to make the things he accounts for. Ginsberg says that perfecting the base was the most difficult task.
Free next week Lee? TS can feel a craving for Pepperoni Passion coming on.
An estate agent’s dream
There is a fine art to being an accountant. Balancing the books requires a trained eye for figures and the ability to squeeze every last ounce of value from a company’s assets.
So you may be surprised to hear, as TS was, that Deloitte partner and former ICAS president Cahal Dowds has recently purchased the most expensive town house in Scotland, and paid almost £1m over the asking price for the privilege of doing so.
The six-bedroom Victorian mansion called Rosefield, in one of the poshest Edinburgh suburbs, was snapped up by Dowds for £2.6m within days of it going on the market, beating eight other househunters. Now, TS knows that asking prices are slightly different in Scotland, but £1m over still seems somewhat toppy.
TS is waiting for its invite to the mansion-warming to drop through the letterbox.
Inquiries, inquiries, inquiries
The government may well be committed to trying to reduce the red tape burden, but TS reckons at least one area of business regulation is still on the increase: investigations.
Take the situation at poor old Rover. We’ve already had the FRC rooting around in their accounts. Then the DTI said it was launching its own investigation into how the car manufacturer ended up in such a sorry state.
Now we hear that the National Audit Office is to investigate (wait for it) the DTI’s role in the failed attempt to bail the company out. TS can’t wait to see who starts an inquiry into the NAO’s inquiry. Perhaps former Rover directors could have a go.
Shiver me accounting timbers!
Following the recent revelation that the now former ICAEW president Paul Druckman is a Womble (supporter and shareholder of footy club AFC Wimbledon), it seemed appropriate that new president Ian Morris today likened chief exec Eric Anstee to a pirate. Yes, you heard it right, a pirate. The revelation almost made TS choke on the duck main course being consumed at the ICAEW President's lunch this afternoon.Indeed, Morris revealed to guests that his own wife had indeed suggested Anstee was 'handsome' and 'piratical looking'!
We all know that Anstee will need a lot more than swarthy good looks to deal with CPD, institute mergers et al. Sightings of a plank emerging from one of the hall's windows out onto Moorgate Place
cannot be confirmed.
Gatecrash our press bash?
'So what accounting issues can we expect on the front of the bean counters bible this Thursday dear TS?', one of Ernst & Young's media team asked during yesterday evening's rather pleasant but windy champagne summer reception at the firm's One More Place in London.
'Well, there's the issue over the Finance Bill, Grant Thornton and BDO Stoy Hayward ramping up their mid-tier profiles in the face of Big Four dominance, and…'
TS was then suddenly stopped in its tracks. In the middle of some riveting bean counting banter TS was halted mid-convo as four 'tourists' suddenly decided to doggedly slip through a very small gap between the firms' HQ and the Thames in order to gate crash the press bash. This was quite clearly an attempt to scoop a few glasses of free bubbly and some of those delicious deep fried Camembert's that were being dished out by a handful of courteous catering staff. 'Oooh yes, I will have one more sausage please' TS was heard repeating several times.
Luckily these 'dangerous' felons were politely ushered away and the mingling could continue. Unfortunately, as TS turned round to natter a bit more, we were informed that E&Y's chairman, Nick Land 'could not be with us', instead he was flying back from Ghana where he had been visiting some of the firm's employees.
TS was pleased the unwelcome guests had been dealt with but it's a pity they didn't get to meet Mr Land in the flesh.
GT to conquer the world?
TS is confused. Grant Thornton has launched a Big new campaign against the Big Four. They're hoping it will be a Big success, bringing Big rewards (everything comes in fours here, you understand).
What confuses TS is some of the ideas involved. The Moon (the Big Four) is to be contrasted with Neil Armstrong (GT), implying that they are to achieve what seemed impossible. Everest (Deloitte etc) is contrasted with Edmund Hilary (GT again), and Goliath (you can guess by now) with David.
So far, so good. But what about their next example, The World and Columbus? Columbus, TS pointed out to a Grant Thornton press officer, discovered America, not the World. Is the challenger frightened of using the term America as either representing the Big Four, or as something it intends to conquer?
'Columbus challenged the convention that there was not a world beyond the Gibraltar straits,' the spokesman at Grant Thornton says.
As a paid up member of the Flat Earth Society, TS is unconvinced.
Tweedie's pot problem
TS was delighted to see this morning that Sir David Tweedie, illustrious head of the IASB is still on form. Having quite a reputation for his laugh-out-loud speeches, as witnessed at last year's Accountancy Age Awards, his latest anecdote found its way into the Financial Times today.
Here, to ensure the mirth is undiluted, we produce it for you unaltered, but we have to admit we never thought of Sir David as a stoner.
'Tweedie said he had to call one in when he moved into a new house near Edinburgh. In the garden was a large plant that looked a bit like parsley.
But his neighbours, based on prejudice about the previous owners, said it was cannabis. A horticulturist summoned by Tweedie couldn't name the plant either, but advised: "Pick it, dry it, smoke it . . . and if you're still worried about it, it's parsley."'
Give the Muppets a break
Some may argue that those responsible for changing that tax breaks for movies made in the UK are a bunch of Muppets, but now the real Muppets have been hit by the changes.
Jim Henson's Creature Shop, which has been responsible for special effects in dozens of movies as well as the Muppets, looks set to close its doors due to the uncertainty over film tax, as well as a weak dollar.
The company's 23 permanent staff have been told they could face redundancy if a review finds that shutting the Shop is the best way forward.
TS imagines the poor workers are about as happy as Marvin, the paranoid android created by the company for the recent Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy movie. Perhaps they simply need Miss Piggy to take a trip down to the Treasury to sort things out. A few hiii-ya's on Gordon Brown and the tax situation would be resolved in no time.
The answer to accounting's problems
Despite the recent overturning of Andersen's conviction for obstruction of justice, the fall out from the paper shredding episode is still hitting the profession hard.
But at last there may be an end in sight. Instead of all this increased regulation, Sarbanes-Oxley and the like to restore confidence in the audit process, how about just using a 'trust serum'.
A study at the University of Zurich recently discovered that trust levels in humans can be raised by making them sniff the hormone oxytocin, an effect that can last up to two hours.
No longer will accountants have to justify their every move and back up their findings with reams of paperwork. From now on all they have to do is simply spray their clients with a dash of oxytocin and say 'trust me I'm an accountant' and everything will be hunky dory.
TS is wondering if you can steep newspapers in it as well.
Institute double books itself
Being such a high-flying socialite, TS is accustomed to having a full diary, where numerous soirées and dinners clash. Still, it was with some surprise that TS realised the ICAEW’s corporate finance faculty was hosting its annual dinner at Mansion House on the same evening that the institute itself was holding its yearly bash at Moorgate Place.
TS understands that the double booking had something to do with Prince Charles attending the institute’s event. Naturally, TS was on both guest lists, and did a kind of Phil-Collins-at-Live-Aid by appearing at both.
Sadly, few were able to follow our lead as we discovered only 11 people had been invited to both functions. This did, however, prevent a complete rescheduling of one of the events. TS doesn’t know who the illustrious 11 were, although it did note there were a few empty seats sat Mansion House. Ah, the lure of royalty.
Charlie tames ruling accountants
A quick dash to Moorgate Place and we found Prince Charles in knockabout mood. Most royal families have had to get used to seeing their power wane over recent decades and the Prince seemed to acknowledge that he too had come to terms with his proper place.
‘It came as a shock to realise accountants run the world,’ he confessed to the crowd. ‘So I thought it best to capture and tame a few.’Chief among them is, of course, Sir Michael Peat, the Prince’s bike-riding principal private secretary and an accountant whose family put the ‘P’ into KPMG. For him, the Prince saved his best line: ‘My PPS is from a long line of hereditary accountants…’
Dinner clashes with the footie
If the ICAEW’s corporate finance faculty thought competing with Prince Charles was a tough task, it was in for a nastier shock when it discovered that its annual dinner also clashed with the Champions League final (congratulations to Liverpool).
The evening’s guest speaker, Channel Four chairman Luke Johnson, didn’t stand a chance. Johnson’s last words had barely left his lips when guests began pouring out of the dining room. TS, somewhat reluctantly leaving behind the latest in a long line of brandies, followed the exodus to the pub over the road to check the score.
TS overheard one faculty member saying he had never seen a place empty so fast, especially with all that free booze on offer. We have every sympathy for the unfortunate organisers. If you can’t lure a corporate financier with an open bar, what else you can do?
Drinking on the job?
TS, of course, enjoys the occasional dram, but like some others, is able to marry this with its strong work ethic.
Take administrators Menzies Corporate Restructuring, which has invited tenders for the stock of The Red Lion Blending Company consisting of a quantity of top notch Scotch. Since the administrators were appointed in November 2004, the stock has been ‘re-gauged’, ‘nosed’ and found to be ‘well preserved’, with a ‘deep amber hue and fruity aromas’. But in TS’s humble amateur drinking opinion, Menzies should start selling the 195 casks.
Or at least that’s what it says it has left: it’s had seven months to try and sell them so perhaps that number has diminished somewhat.
Enron flick sickening
TS loves going to the movies, the 15-year old hotdog made of approx 3.3% sausage meat, the salted popcorn that has the consistency of cardboard and the lovey-dovey teenagers in the back row who, when bored of kissing, enjoy throwing rock hard sherbet lemons at TS's head.
But TS was left with a queasy feeling in the pit of its stomach after coming out of an advanced screening of the new rise and fall of Enron documentary, entitled 'The smartest guys in the room'.
The comprehensive and shocking 110-minute film takes the viewer from the early visions of energy de-regulation champion, George Bush 'friendly' Enron CEO Kenneth Lay and his partner in 'crime' COO Jeff Skilling as well as the rise and rise of the former corporate giants' inflated stock price and flawed mark to market accounting system to its final colossal fall from grace when it filed for bankruptcy in December 2001. Just over one month after that one of its top executives, Cliff Barker, tragically committed suicide.
TS was amazed and saddened at how all the lies, greed, corruption and massive flaws in corporate America brought a company and thousands of employees and pension holders to its knees.
You get the feeling that a little more than a blueberry tofu cream pie should have been thrown at Skilling by an investor during an Enron meeting in June 2001.
Lay and Skilling are currently await trial, set for January 2006.
Where are the Bermuda bookkeeping babes?
When people dream of their ideal job, TS bets many will revolve around doing it on a sun drenched tropical island paradise. But surprisingly, a lot of women don't seem willing to take a chance and follow that dream.
In Bermuda, despite having the third largest insurance industry in the world, there is a chronic shortage of female accountants, a fact which seems to be hitting the male accountants out there the hardest.
Things have got so bad that on a recent trip to the island the MD of a recruitment company found that female company was the overwhelming wish for accountants on the island.
So ladies, if you've ever dreamed of going through the books lying on a beach drinking a cocktail from a coconut shell, and having a bunch of slavering male accountants hanging around you, now could be the time to make a change.
