TO PAY OR NOT TO PAY?

[Wendy]

Thanks Will. We run a largish hotel. The OH's french is degree level but he is not that secure with accountancy in French, which is why we decided to hire an accountant. For our affairs here and in the UK. And yes, she was versant in both UK and French accountancy and fluent in English. She signed us up knowing that we chose her SPECIFICALLY because of this. We quoted the personal references we got about her and she agreed to sort out our affairs.

I just think it was totally unethical of her. She worked for a firm but had her own client base - english speaking. So, in effect, we signed a contract with her firm but 'she' was our accountant.  The annoying thing is, she accepted our work knowing she was not going to be around for too much longer. And, also, had no intention of coming back from maternity leave. If she had stated this we would have looked elsewhere.  It was 6 months later when we realised she had left and nothing at all had been done with our file. And I mean NOTHING. It is not possible to just 'change' accountants here during the tax year when all your paperwork is with one firm. Plus, if you move to another firm here that firm has to OK it with the previous firm you are moving from. From what I know, 'pinching' other firms clients is looked down on here.

What would have been the correct thing to do for that firm was to contact us and release us from our contract with them on the grounds that they could not deal with our paperwork because that lady had resigned and we were specific to her. But they didn't. They just did not bother to file our returns at all. They put our file to one side and ignored it until we got on their case.

I have suggested to the OH that we try to contact her personally as I suspected she 'took' some of her clients with her after she left her firm. But he is of the opinion that it is against the law to do that here.

Anyway, they aint getting one cent from us. And as soon as we are able, we are changing.

 

 

[Danny]

Hello Wen,

I don't understand why you would want to contact her - to confront her about abandoning you or to continue as private clients? What could you hope to gain by pursuing her, and why would you want to stick with her if you felt so betrayed by her previously?

Basically, you signed a contract with a company who have failed to provide the service they should and, above all, appear to have been incompetent enough to not make your tax declarations when, I presume, you have provided all necessary means for them to do so and paid them for it. Why feel tied to them? Write to them, cancel the contract, get your paperwork back, and then approach another company with all the information you have. Surely in this context that is not 'pinching' clients?

Jane