Member News

TaxAssist Accountants has announced a strategic partnership with Receipt Bank, the award-winning bookkeeping automation platform. The software and services provided by Receipt Bank will ensure that TaxAssist franchisees and their clients are prepared for the latest advances in technology and legislative developments. The partnership comes as TaxAssist Accountants seeks to equip its franchisees with best-in-class software to ensure their services remain valuable, profitable and scalable. Receipt Bank offers a quick and easy way for clients to send their transaction data directly to their accountant’s operating system, via app or email, with no paper and no data entry required.

Alex Smith, from TaxAssist Accountants Plymouth, describes the effect Receipt Bank has had on his business: “The service we offer enables clients to submit expenses using the phone app and/or email-in. “With this high use of automation, I envisage my team being able to serve a much higher number of bookkeeping clients than our previous approach permitted, and without additional software costs, this means additional work at a high margin. “In six weeks, we have rolled ‘Real Time Bookkeeping’ out to around 10 clients who were not previously buying bookkeeping from us. Clients also value this service more than much of our routine compliance for them, presumably as it’s a way of taking away what has been a pain point for them.” This partnership will allow other TaxAssist franchisees to focus more on their clients’ business needs, instead of manual processing, explains Group Operations Director Sarah Robertson. “Our members are embracing new technologies at all levels in order to pass on the benefits of their experience and expertise to their clients,” she explained. “As practices prepare for the arrival of Making Tax Digital, tools like Receipt Bank will be essential for implementing digital processes and improving efficiency.” Receipt Bank CEO Alexis Prenn, added: “The role of an accountant in a business has never been more important, helping them understand new technology and processes. We’re excited to combine our best-in-class technology with TaxAssist Accountants expertise.”

May 2018

Start-Rite Shoes has appointed Kate Tansley as Product Director to provide leadership and direction for the strategic development of its product portfolio.

Kate has extensive experience in product environments; her last role was that of Brand Director at Multiyork where she was responsible for its creative and brand strategies, as well as the briefing of all product design and development.  Prior to this, Kate held positions with Harrods, Tesco’s, TK Maxx and British Home Stores.

Ian Watson, Chief Executive Officer, said: “Kate boasts a very strong, category focussed background and will be instrumental in bringing our strategic vision to life.  She will have overall responsibility for our Product, Technical and Design teams and we’re delighted to have her on board.”

Kate Tansley, Product Director, Start-Rite Shoes, said: “I am delighted to be joining the team at Start-Rite. I have a passion for product and design and I’m excited to be applying this to a new category. Children’s shoes are close to my heart and I’m looking forward to developing the product portfolio with our expert design and technical team. I’ve always been a Start-Rite customer, they are a brand that inspires trust through their great heritage and expertise. Our new brand positioning builds from this while refocusing on the pioneering spirit that was so central to Start-Rite in the past. We know kids and take a lot of time and care to understand what they need from their shoes as they grow and develop – that for me is what makes our design approach so refreshing.”

Staff at East Anglian accountancy firm, Aston Shaw, which has its head office in Norwich, have announced they will be fundraising for Norfolk and Waveney cancer charity, Big C, over the next 12 months.

Big C was chosen following a staff vote from four local charities and follows Aston Shaw’s support for EACH over the past three years.

Staff at Aston Shaw had already run a Big C biscuit appeal for a charity dress-down day. The biscuits were delivered to the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital (NNUH) Big C Centre for visitors to enjoy. The team will continue to fundraise via ‘Casual Fridays’ and hope to take on some sporting challenges.

Charlie Maylin, marketing executive at Aston Shaw said, “Big C is a fantastic local charity and we can’t wait to start fundraising through a variety of events and activities. As a team we feel it is so worthwhile to be contributing towards ground-breaking cancer research, state of the art equipment and Big C’s support and information centres across Norfolk.

Dr Chris Bushby, Chief Executive at Big C, said, “Our grateful thanks to Aston Shaw for voting for us as their named charity. It is this kind of support which makes such a significant difference to those in our community affected by cancer.

To learn more about the work Big C does to improve the lives of those affected by cancer in Norfolk and Waveney, please visit www.big-c.co.uk

The Big C story:

2018 is shaping up to be quite a year for Norfolk and Waveney’s cancer charity, Big C. This summer the charity looks set to hit a phenomenal fundraising total of £30 million since Big C was founded in 1980 by local men David Moar and Clive Bamford. Having been through their own cancer journeys and enduring lengthy journeys to receive treatment, the pair passionately wanted to ensure that local people had access to outstanding treatment and support, close to where they are.

From its first small, but important fundraising project providing chemotherapy equipment at the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital, Big C has grown into an impressive organisation which funds specialist life-saving equipment and internationally significant research projects based at the Norwich Research Park. These projects greatly benefit local people and have a global impact on our understanding and treatment of the many types of cancer.

The charity has also established three Big C centres located at the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, in Kings Lynn and Great Yarmouth and a hub at the Louise Hamilton Centre in Gorleston. These centres provide an oasis of specialist emotional and practical support for those with a cancer diagnosis and their loved ones away from a clinical environment.

ROTA are an innovative start-up and mobile application which helps those in the hospitality, catering and hotel industries find temporary staff for their needs. They also help those looking for hospitality jobs in London and other related part-time work in these industries acquire the perfect role. We are proud to be working closely with the great team at ROTA, helping them increase their positions online through clean, white hat search engine optimisation (SEO).

With an app as well as their website, there are some unique challenges. As is the case with other app-reliant businesses, getting users and customers to download and utilise the mobile application is paramount to the success of ROTA. Hence, as part of the strategy for the website, the app has remained at the forefront of our minds at all times and continues to do so.

Some of the Challenges

Upon starting our works with the team at ROTA, their website was not performing fast enough and was not responsive. This meant that many users upon landing upon the site were leaving before engaging with any aspect of the website. Moreover, those that reached the site and attempted to engage were often unable to do so at all times due to the slight lack in responsiveness. The website was also not optimised technically for SEO.

This manifested in the site ranking for some irrelevant keyword terms. It also did not satisfy some basic SEO best-practices and ranking criteria. This was as a result of a distinct lack of meta data (titles and descriptions) and content not being relevant enough to ensure accurate rankings. In addition, the backlink profile of the site (links pointing towards ROTA from other websites) was quite full of spammy and potentially toxic links, which were greatly holding back the performance and rankings of the entire website.

With regards to targeting and the strategy, there was previously only very sparse keyword and search term tracking set up. This means that as well as not performing as well as it should, the site’s progress was also not being tracked efficiently.

What We Are Doing

With a very aesthetically pleasing website, there was not much design-related work to be done on the ROTA website. However, we have been carrying out a number of other important tasks which are already paying dividends; getting the website up the rankings on Google and other search engines:

Website Performance – We removed a number of defunct functions and plugins from the website. This lead to almost immediate increases in website speed and responsiveness with various plugins having slowed down the site previously. We have also ensured wherever possible that a wide range of website files and media files have been sufficiently compressed to allow for much faster rendering and loading of the site

Website Crawlability – With numerous important factors missing from the site, the website was simply not being read properly by search engines. We therefore optimised the meta data, ensuring what Google reads and what users see in search engine results pages (SERPs) is fully optimised. As well as increasing positions online, this has also increased the click-throughs of users via search engines. We have also ensured that only relevant keywords and search terms are targeted and tracked to be able to accurately monitor progress over time

Links and Natural PR – Having previously been signed up to old-fashioned and spammy web directories as well as toxic ‘link farms,’ there was a great deal of negative link work which had been done upon the ROTA website in the past. Hence, we disavowed (disassociated) the spammy and toxic links, which numbered in the hundreds. We have also started to build ROTA a clean and natural backlink profile from strong and reputable sites. This is also working in ROTA’s favour as this acts as traditional PR in an online sphere, increasing the number of relevant users finding the ROTA brand through other naturally associated websites.

Professional recruitment specialists Pure has been awarded an Investors in People Gold Award. Described as an achievement of ‘world class best practice’, IIP Gold is only given to organisations who can demonstrate excellence in developing and supporting staff to achieve high performance.

Investors in People is an internationally recognised accreditation held by more than 30,000 organisations across the world, but only 1.5% of these achieve the prestigious Gold award. Pure was first awarded the Gold standard in 2016 and following another assessment it has been awarded the top accolade for another three years.

The leading recruitment organisation, which has offices in Cambridge, Norwich, Ipswich and Chelmsford, was described as a ‘growing, forward-thinking company that prides itself on being a values-led organisation in a market where by far the majority are financially led’. The assessors described how people choose to work for Pure because of this approach and enjoyed the working environment created by the Executive team, and original founders, Gill Buchanan, Ian Walters and Lynn Walters.

Gill Buchanan, Chief Operating Officer at Pure, said: “This is a fantastic achievement and a highly desirable accreditation for businesses to hold. We’re extremely proud of this external recognition of the fact we like to do things differently and our ongoing focus on our company values, which are all based around making Pure a rewarding and positive place to work. We have created a supportive environment where people work flexibly, a culture of teamwork is fostered, and we are passionate about ensuring all our team are fully engaged to go the extra mile for our clients and candidates alike. Our focus is on establishing long-term relationships as trusted advisors and our targets are focused on outcomes rather than making a quick return.”

Organisations are only awarded with the Gold status following assessments in all aspects of people development, communications and engagement, through employee surveys, interviews and observations.

Pure was founded in 2002 and specialises in Accountancy, Financial Services, IT, Human Resources, Marketing and Office Support recruitment solutions at all levels, including board level appointments through its specialist Executive division. As well as its values led approach, the Investors in People assessors highlighted Pure’s strengths in open and transparent communication, the encouragement of innovation and its reward and recognition schemes which ensure everyone feels appreciated and valued for their hard work.

The Eastern Landlords Association (ELA) has formed a strategic partnership with Abate Pest Management to support its members with pest control services. The ELA has 1,400 members located throughout the Eastern region and Abate is perfectly located to support them on a proactive contract basis, making regular visits to properties or on an ad-hoc emergency call out service. Abate is already responsible for servicing more than 25,000 residential properties for private landlords, letting agents and housing associations.

ELA members will receive qualified discounts from Abate Pest management for work carried out by quoting their membership number.

Abate Pest Management are experts in domestic and commercial pest control and have been controlling and eliminating pests throughout the Eastern region for over 19 years. They are accredited with ISO 9001, 18001, 14001, CHAS, Safecontractor and are full servicing members of the BPCA (British Pest Control Association).

From their operations centre near Wymondham in Norfolk they manage a team of Technicians and Field Surveyors covering Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire.

Services include:

• Rodent Control
• Bird Control
• Insect Control
• Woodworm Control
• Specialist Hygiene Services

Details of the partnership can be found at https://www.abateltd.co.uk/eastern-landlords-association-pest-control or call 0800 980 9767.

KLM UK Engineering Limited 2018 Charity Golf Day was a great success & we would like to thank all the attendees and generous sponsors, who helped us raise £1,500 for East Anglian Air Ambulance! 

Book a place on our next two day video training course running in Norwich on 8th and 15th June, 9-5.

Our courses and bespoke training packages will help your business/organisation to utilise the power of video marketing, developing your skills and teaching you to produce quality videos for your business.

Email: janine@eyefilm.co.uk to book your place on our next two day course: 8th/15th June 2018, 9-5, in Norwich.

The cost of the two day course is £500+VAT.

Two Day Course:

On day one, you will learn how video can be used as a powerful tool for your business or organisation, what types of videos can be produced within your timeframes, what works and what doesn’t, and the basics of camera work, sound, editing, and equipment. You’ll get hands-on with equipment as to practice these techniques and begin editing the footage as well.

We usually offer the two days with a weeks break to allow you time to capture footage that will be useful for your final film, using the knowledge you gained from day one.

Day two is the chance to edit and upload your very own video for your business or organisation to use. We will guide you through the editing process, from cutting interviews to building a story and adding titles and graphics. 

At the end of the two days, you’ll have a finished film and the skills and confidence to keep on producing.

If you or your organisation would like to talk to us about creating bespoke training to meet your needs contact janine@eyefilm.co.uk or call 01603 727750, we would love to hear from you.

“A great course! Charlie and his team were able to patiently show the basics of how to create a short video. A fabulous day. I can’t recommend Eye Film for their video training highly enough.”

Simon Hiscox, Simon Hiscox Web Design

Freebridge unveil new homes in Gayton

Freebridge Community Housing were delighted to unveil a number of new homes at their most recent development in Gayton yesterday.

The development, on the site of the former Rampant Horse public house, sees two 1 bedroom properties and two 2 bedroom properties brought to the village, with new tenants due to move in next month.

The development was given an official opening by Freebridge Community Housing Chief Executive, Tony Hall, who was accompanied by Freebridge Chairman Andy Walder, Director of Assets and Development Alex Dixon and Andrew Mowbray from building firm Smiths of Honingham.

Tony Hall, said: “This new development is a great addition to the village of Gayton, it’s been really good to hear some of the very positive feedback we have received for the work we’ve done bringing these new homes to life.

“At Freebridge we want to support the many rural communities that we have here in West Norfolk, we understand that as well as providing much needed housing for the area, developments like this can also have a very positive impact on keeping rural communities alive and thriving.”

Alex Dixon said: “Projects like these always present us with a number of challenges given that we have to work around the existing framework of the old buildings, however we’re really pleased with what we’ve been able to achieve and think that we’ve ended up with four very special new homes in a great setting, which in turn fit right into the village as a whole.”

Freebridge seek Board member for new development company

Freebridge Community Housing are looking to recruit a Board member for their new subsidiary development company, Bridgegate Homes.

Bridgegate Homes has been set up by Freebridge in order to develop and acquire new homes in and around West Norfolk -­ with plans to build 150 properties each year, with 40 of those being for sale on the open market.

The Board of this new company will be made up of the Freebridge Board Chairman, two non-­executive Freebridge Board members and the Freebridge Director of Finance and Resources. It is also anticipated that the person being recruited will be appointed as Chairman of Bridgegate Homes.

Tony Hall said “This is an exciting opportunity for someone with experience at a senior level in the commercial house-­building sector. We’re looking for an individual who can provide strategic thinking,clear direction and good quality leadership to the Board of Bridgegate Homes.

Application packs for the role are available on Freebridge’s website at https://www.freebridge.org.uk/Work-­for-­us.html or by telephoning 01553 667792.

If anyone has questions or wishes to discuss the opportunity further they can contact Freebridge’s Company Secretary Angus MacQueen on 01553 667754 or e-­mail angus.macqueen@freebridge.org.uk

Introduction

An issue that has recently received increased coverage in the press and on social media is the incidence of vans being broken into for the contents they’re carrying, rather than the vehicles themselves.  Thieves appear to be targeting in particular tools, equipment and goods, the presumption being that they’re easily disposed of and aren’t readily traced or recognised as stolen property by innocent purchasers.

Vulnerabilities

The majority of the thefts appear to be taking place when vehicles are parked away from their home locations; hotel car parks are prime sites for many of the incidents we’re currently dealing with.  Methods of entry are often violent as there is no interest in preserving the appearance of the vehicle being targeted, panels have been ripped, rear doors levered open, as the goal is the theft of the contents.

Precautions / Prevention

Prevention of these incidents is not straightforward, obvious factors like comprehensive vehicle security and alarms are essential, but the accidental triggering of such precautions has negated them as a guaranteed form of security. Parking in a well-lit secure car park or locked compound, monitored by CCTV, will minimise the likelihood of a theft being attempted. If feasible the removal of the high value items is also advisable, particularly if you believe you may be vulnerable to an incident of this nature.

Claims Management

Insurance cover for theft of goods from your vehicle shouldn’t be assumed, and even where cover is stated, there may be restrictions that you need to be aware of. The key factors you should look for are:

• Method of entry to the vehicle. Most policies will require the entry to have been ‘forcible and violent’ for the cover to apply
• Time of day. Some policies will restrict cover to exclude incidents occurring overnight (typically between 9pm-6am)
• Location of the vehicle. Some policies will offer cover providing the vehicle is secured in a locked compound/garage overnight.
• Value. Every policy will state the financial limit of your cover. The value of your goods should not exceed your insured limit.

If you’re unfortunate enough to be a victim of one of these incidents and your insurers confirm that you have cover, for what has happened, they’ll almost certainly request an inventory of the stolen items. It will aid the speed with which they deal with your claim, if you provide the age and purchase price of the stolen items. Therefore keeping a track on what items are carried on a specific vehicle is an advantage if you have to present a claim.

Conclusion

In conclusion, to minimise your exposure to this type of incident, park, whether at a home location or away on site, in a well-lit, secure car park or compound and remove valuable items. None of these measures will prevent a determined criminal, but they could discourage them and make the effect to you and your business as minimal as possible. If you would like to discuss anything raised in this article or to assist in a no-obligation review of the insurance cover you have in place, please contact a member of the Hugh J Boswell team on 01603 626155.

KLM UK Engineering visited Catton Grove STEM Club earlier this week and presented the team with ‘Supported By KLM UK Engineering’ racing overalls and goodie bags to go with their already amazing go kart. The team are taking the go kart apart and learning to build it from scratch while improving aerodynamics, the steering column and engine performance. KLM UK Engineering will be offering engineering knowledge to assist the children develop their STEM skills during this project – regular updates will follow with their progress.