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RSM Robson Rhodes takes part in soap opera
It seems that RSM Robson Rhodes is making a foray into the cut-throat daytime soap sector. The mid-tier firm has been doing an uncanny impression of a Neighbours storyline by dragging out a plot line for as long as possible. The firm was set to sign off on a high-profile partnership with its US counterparts RSM McGladrey in December, but like any good potboiler it’s kept the viewers guessing by drawing out the situation. The latest we’ve heard is that ‘we are waiting for the execution of the definitive agreements’. We’ve been waiting for nearly three months now. When will the firm reach the nail-biting end to the saga? Tune in next week/month/year to find out.
Man U fan advises Liverpool sale
One has to feel for Colin Gillespie, the PricewaterhouseCoopers corporate finance partner who was the lead adviser to the Liverpool board on the sale of the club to Americans George Gillett and Tom Hicks.
Gillespie, you see, is a fan of fierce Liverpool rivals Manchester United, but had to bite his tongue when the boss told him to start pulling some long hours at Anfield.
And if that was not humiliating enough, Gillespie actually had to miss a few Man United games and crunch through the Liverpool numbers instead. Gillespie promises TS that he was professional at all times and that football ‘was just a sport’ after all. Tell that to Bill Shankly.
Oughton, but not down
What next for John Oughton, head of the Office of Government Commerce, the body that regulates and scrutinises government procurement of things like IT and consultants, who is leaving at the end of March?
At a Public Accounts Committee meeting recently he said his immediate plan was to go and watch some cricket. ‘Immediately, I shall be heading for the BA2155 to go to watch some World Cup cricket,’ he said.
Sensible man (and TS is still angling for an invite, if anyone wants to seriously impress us).
After that, the feeling is, and let’s just call this one a racing certainty, that he will end up at a consulting firm.‘I am not going to do anything in the short term,’ Oughton said.
Deloitte is our bet, given its liking for high profile figures but no doubt all of the Big Four will be dangling monster salaries in front of him. Even without his inside knowledge, the firms will still do OK out of government consulting, TS reckons.
Death and taxes
TS has always regarded tax as a grim subject, especially at the end of the month when a third of TS’s already meagre salary disappears into the ether.
A recent case involving a company called Funeral Planning Services, however, gave grim tax a whole new context.
The funeral service group was engaged in a, er, life and death struggle with HM Revenue & Customs over whether its product should be exempt from VAT.
Disposal of the remains of the dead, TS is told, and the making of
arrangements for, or in connection with, the disposal of the remains of
the dead are VAT exempt. HMRC, however, contended that because Funeral
Planning Services was offering customers a product that covered funeral
costs, and ‘outsourced’ the actual undertaking, the exemption should
not apply.
In the end, the funeral policy provider left HMRC for dead, as it were,
as the tribunal ruled in its favour. The old death and taxes cliché has
never been more relevant.
Call that breakfast!
TS hobnobs with the movers and shakers of the accountancy world, so it’s no surprise that your illustrious newshound expects to be catered for in the manner to which this hack extraordinaire has been accustomed to especially as we don’t earn enough to afford posh tucker.
After trudging to the impressive edifice of E&Y’s offices at More London Place with the prospect of the ‘famous E&Y breakfast’, TS was expecting to be greeted by a banquet worthy of Henry VIII.
Instead of shining silver tureens concealing an early morning tucker,
TS ‘feasted’ on a (cold) croissant and was forced to pay attention
instead of being diverted by the expected 4,000 calorie breakfast.
Despite UK revenues of more than £1bn last year, there wasn’t a bacon roll in sight at the Big Four firm’s plush offices.
Some of you out there may think TS is being a bit cheap at E&Y’s expense, but then again so was the breakfast.
ICAEW's Pathway too tough for ACCA, CIMA and CIPFA members
TS noted with interest, and some amusement, the recruitment figures from the ICAEW's Pathways scheme.
In case you'd forgotten, Pathways was introduced a year ago by those within Moorgate Place to nab CIPFA, ACCA and CIMA members.
These members require five years' experience and must be recommended by two ICAEW members. They are then required to undertake a case study.
The first figures from the institute reveal that just 61% of members who tried to join in the year passed.
TS finds this all very interesting. Are other institutes' accountants simply not qualified enough to join the ICAEW?
And the number that have joined, you ask expectantly? 65.
Is 65 really that significant a figure? It will be interesting to hear whether the other institutes have taken on more ICAEW members than vice-versa over the past 12 months.
Countering TS' cynicism, ICAEW learning and professional development exec Dr Raymond Madden was pleased at the 'tute's progress over the year: 'Since we launched Pathways in February last year, we have been delighted by the calibre of individuals who have expressed interest in what the ICAEW has to offer them.'
Perhaps it's 65 members more than the 'tute would have had prior to Pathways.
Honestly though, it's not really a conflicts of interest/merger failure headline grabber, is it?
Anyway, TS wants to hear from anyone who know someone that swapped sides, or didn't pass the exams. Was it you? Are you pleased to move across, or unhappy you didn't pass? Get in touch on the blog or email us at takingstock@accountancyage.com.
PwC lawyers go Mayflower mad
If TS could turn back time, it would have opted for a lucrative career in law rather than scrounging for a living as a lowly-paid gossip page hack.
TS experienced this epiphany after receiving news of the PricewaterhouseCoopers' lawyers reaction to the costs award in the Mayflower tribunal.
Apparently the lawyers involved were in a meeting on a totally unrelated topic when the news that Big Four firm had been awarded costs of £400,000 buzzed through to the arsenal of Blackberrys in the room.
The excitement was obviously too much, as the client in the room looked on while the lawyers whooped for joy like American footballers after a touchdown. Nothing like a big fee to get the blood racing, eh? TS is investigating how to go about making a career change – like working for new sister title Legal Week.
Sir Mike rings the changes at BT
There are some mutterings this morning that Sir Mike Rake (TS cannot, under any circumstances, call him Sir Michael - sorry, it wouldn't be right) may not have the right experience in becoming chairman of BT, given his lack of public company jobs in the past. TS thinks there's one sense in which KPMG and BT are quite similar, though. One is facing questions over its domination of the market, and the other is, er, facing questions over its domination of the market. KPMG obviously participates in something of a humble oligopoly, of course, whereas BT is a big old monopoly. A step up, then, in more ways than one.
Colin chats about Monro tax decision
Read Colin's views on the Angus Monro tax case here.
Last week's ICAEW council meeting saw it shorn of the heavy burden it has worn in recent years, handling 'potential' conflicts of interest and losing merger battles.
There was even time for brevity and some bare-face cheek, noted TS.
In a discussion about its new logo, Alan Lindsey, a London-based sole prac, was bemused that dear old Accountancy Age published so many letters knocking the new design.
Arthur Bailey led a chuckling council to suggest that as Accountancy Age was represented at the meeting, perhaps it should stick up for itself. TS decided discretion was the better part of valour, and kept quiet.
But now is time for a response. Having spoken to those in the know at Accountancy Age, apparently no positive letters were sent in regarding the new logo, hence the hacks weren't able to publish any.
Tailby asks Accountancy Age for 'tax avoider' details
Chris Tailby didn't get to be head of anti-avoidance at HMRC without being as sharp as a new pin. Tuning in to listen to the top taxman on Accountancy Age's Insider Business Club webcast this week , TS heard Chris turn the tables and start asking questions of his own. As our esteemed editor in chief Damian Wild asked listeners whether they thought it legitimate to engage in tax planning, Chris didn't miss a beat. 'Could we get the names and addresses?' he asked.
Second Life for tax avoiders
TS was scoffing meat pasta with KPMG’s Sue Bonney the other day when the topic of the Second Life popped up. For the non-anoraks out there, Second Life is a virtual world where various dweebs create characters called ‘avatars’, who then go about making a living in this fantasy world. Yep, very weird, but apparently quite lucrative.
The fantasy world, of course, has its own currency and such is the popularity of this virtual space that people in the real world are prepared to stump up real, hard cash for the ‘lindendollars’ in the geek realm.
Anyway, it seems tax planners have seen some potential in this little set up (are we surprised), as has the Internal Revenue Service. So does this mean that HMRC officials are going to have to start creating tax warden avatars to track down all the virtual avoiders?
Progressive train of thought
TS loves a bit of corporate training. What can be more satisfying than targeting the boss at the paintball away day or sleeping through a morning of Tony Robbins Personal Power videos?
Reports floating around the papers recently suggested that KPMG shared a similar enthusiasm for ‘executive life coaching’, and had hired a firm called Illumine to instil a bit of ‘can-do’ attitude into the troops. TS immediately conjured up images of John Griffith-Jones running across a hot bed of coals while circles of KPMG partners chanted: ‘We can drive up profits. We can. We can.’
Sadly for TS, the reports seemed to have been misconceived. ‘We haven’t hired a firm of that name. And we don’t go for any wacky training,’ a spokesman said.
If there are any KPMG partners who feel that they are missing out, TS is always eager to dance around a flip chart with a boom box on its shoulder, or you can fill in TS with your own firm’s loony ‘progressive’ training regimes. Email takingstock@accountancyage.com
Kids cough up VAT
You’re never too young to learn about the intricacies of the VAT system, as the little folk who pour into Tumble Tots play centres are finding out.
The tiny tots have been drawn into a VAT battle with the taxman because their mums and dads have not been paying VAT on Tumble Tot
T-shirts, nursery rhyme DVDs and kiddy insurance, among other items the tiny folk receive for their £19 membership fees. HMRC argued that VAT at the standard rate should be paid on this £19, while Tumble Tots argued that the zero and exempt rates should apply to some of the goods. In the end, the High Court ruled in favour of the taxman.
The little tykes will have to start coughing up. If you play, you gotta pay.
Please mind the GAAP
As a privileged member of the accounting fraternity, TS is accustomed to rubbing shoulders with the big cheeses, but the recent AIM conference was more like a game of sardines at lunchtime.
After pushing the need for decent preparation, the organisers clearly had a few GAAPs in their own designs as attendees were left to jostle for a spot at one of the few circular tables provided.
There was a serious lack of goodwill as TS suffered the indignity of eating the slap-up lunch standing up because there was no seating provided either!
TS read between the lines and interpreted the situation as a cunning gambit by the event planners to spark some business combinations and get people talking, but stony faced delegates were more worried about getting the chicken stew all over themselves.
Maybe more thought should be given to the key intangibles like chair demand and table space next year.
