Depth where your practice needs it.

1. Case 1A client is on the margin scheme, no software supports the record-keeping, Making Tax Digital is a struggle, and if the scheme isn't followed the whole sale is at risk of a VAT charge.
2. Case 2A client is buying a trading business and the seller's solicitor has described it as a TOGC. If that is wrong, VAT lands on the purchase price and your client has not budgeted for it.
3. Case 3A builder client has been invoicing with VAT where the reverse charge should have applied. The customer has been reclaiming it. Both sides now need unwinding.

The most expensive area on this page to get wrong, and the one where a second pair of eyes pays for itself fastest.

1. Case 1A client with several companies files corporation tax as normal. HMRC match data from self-assessment or Companies House and ask about associated companies. Additional tax, penalties, and a client asking who missed it.
2. Case 2A client with two very different trades in one company wants to sell one of them. Separating the trades first can substantially reduce the tax on the sale, but only if it is done in the right order and early enough.
3. Case 3Two shareholders want to go their own way, each taking part of the business. Getting the structure wrong turns a reorganisation into a distribution, with the tax bill that follows.

Usually worth £3,000–£15,000 in advisory fees, and the single most common moment a good client is lost to a larger firm.

1. Case 1A long-standing client mentions, in passing, that they have been living abroad for most of the year and have an overseas pension. The return you have always filed may no longer be the right one.
2. Case 2A client is gifting property to their children and believes this removes it from their estate. Several rules say otherwise, and the planning only works if it is set up before the transfer.
3. Case 3A client has had a nudge letter from HMRC about offshore income. What happens next depends almost entirely on how the first response is written.

1. Case 1A client in care or hospitality pays above the National Minimum Wage but does not pay for travel between calls, and rounds shifts to the scheduled time. The exposure is calculated across the whole workforce, not one employee.
2. Case 2A client has been treating a long-term contractor as self-employed. The contractor has just asked about holiday pay.
3. Case 3A director has been taking money out of the company all year with no record of whether it is salary, dividend or loan. It is now nine months after the year end.

1. Case 1A client's bank wants a twelve-month cash flow in the lender's own template, in a fortnight, and the bookkeeping is four months behind.
2. Case 2A client is growing, profitable on paper, and keeps running out of cash. Nobody has looked at the working capital cycle.
3. Case 3A client is busy but not making any profit, sees VAT and PAYE money in the bank without realising it isn't theirs, and prices by guesswork because nobody has explained mark-up.

The route from an annual compliance fee to a monthly advisory one, under your brand.

1. Case 1You have reached a technical position you are fairly confident about, and the fee does not justify the time it would take to be certain.
2. Case 2A client has questioned your treatment of something and you want to check your ground before replying.
3. Case 3You are about to give advice that will be acted on for years, and you would rather it were reviewed once.

Fixed price, usually the same week. Nothing leaves your office with your name on it until you are comfortable. For most practices this is the easiest place to start.