In Your Shoes - Lauren Miller

New week. New goals.

On checking my emails first thing this morning, it is great to see emails from two potential clients.  Both are recommendations from existing clients, one is a small business operating as a sole trader who is keen to work alongside a more proactive firm of accountants.  The other enquiring about an extremely generous tax relief, known as the seafarers’ earnings deduction.  What a great start to the week.  I follow up on those immediately. 

I have a high level specialist tax report to finalise for a client.  It’s a family business where parents are looking to pass some of their share in two businesses to the next generation, in the most tax efficient manner.  They also want to know their current exposure to inheritance tax, which I calculate could be as much as £250k, depending on who dies first.  This can be mitigated with my suggested tax planning measures.

Tax doesn’t have to be taxing

The 2017 Tax Return season is in full swing. I approve a number of client’s Tax Returns to be issued via our high security document sharing portal. One client, who is due a tax refund of £5k happily approves his Return.
One of my clients has asked for my assistance in reviewing their pension arrangements. I arrange for my colleague, an independent financial advisers with our sister company, Johnston Carmichael Wealth to give them a call.
Alongside one of our tax directors, I have been reviewing the tax implications on the partition of a family business involving land and buildings. This has been particularly challenging project with different taxes at stake. Following careful consideration of the tax implications, the capital gains tax liability has reduced from an unmanageable £400k to nearer £20k. That is some feat considering that the value of the assets involved is in excess of £18m.

Dream Big. Work hard.

Sandy Manson, our Chief Executive Officer announced Senior Manager promotions today. Along with 7 other colleagues, I am delighted to learn that I have been promoted from Tax Manager to Senior Tax Manager. I won’t lie, the day has been a bit of a blur with numerous phone calls and emails of congratulations from colleagues throughout the firm. When it starts to sink in, I suddenly see this not as a promotion for doing my job well but by demonstrating my potential to do more. It would have been rude not to buy cakes for everyone in the office to kick off the celebrations!
I head to a client meeting with one of my colleagues from Business Advisory to discuss the tax implications of varying a will. This is to enable assets to pass to the next generation free of inheritance tax.

Every day is a school day.

I attend a course on using PowerPoint for presentations. I can put my learning into practice straight away, as I have a couple of presentations scheduled this month. The first being on Tuesday 27 June 2017 where I will be talking to local accounting and finance professionals about the tax implications of renting a property, alongside two of my colleagues, who are talking about Making Tax Digital and Research and Development Tax Credits. Anyone interested in attending this event, please let me know.
Thereafter, it’s a quick coffee followed by another internal course on the new General Data Protection Regulations, which come into force on 25 May 2018. This will bring significant changes for all businesses with far larger financial penalties in relation to data privacy. It is important that I am aware of these regulations to ensure our clients are up to speed. It is not all about tax.

Finish strong.

I catch up with a couple clients today. This helps to build strong client relationships and can sometimes highlight potential tax planning opportunities. Today’s conversation was with one of my landlord clients who has recently renovated a property. We discussed the potential to reclaim VAT on some of the renovation costs. The client is interested in speaking with one of our VAT specialist and it transpires that there is the potential to reclaim £10k of VAT. It was definitely worth having that conversation.
Outside my office window the sky is blue and the sun continues to shine. Johnston Carmichael recognises that there is a mutual benefit to be gained from achieving a good work/life balance and offers flexible working arrangements. Having worked a few extra hours earlier in the week, I take the opportunity to leave the office and start my weekend a little bit earlier than usual.