Construction and engineering businesses have some of the most complicated financial arrangements of any sector. You are managing costs across multiple live projects at once, paying a mix of employed staff and subcontractors, dealing with the Construction Industry Scheme, handling VAT on a reverse charge basis for certain jobs, and trying to make sure each project makes the margin you priced it at. Most general accountants are not set up to handle this properly. We are, and we work with contractors, builders, engineers and specialist trades across the UK who need an accountant that understands how construction businesses work.
We cover all the financial and compliance tasks that are specific to construction and engineering businesses.
We handle all your CIS obligations each month verifying subcontractors, calculating the correct deduction rates, filing your monthly return to HMRC, and issuing payment and deduction statements to your subbies. Nothing gets missed.
We track all costs against each project separately materials, labour, plant hire, subcontractor payments so you can see at any point how each job is performing against the price you quoted and whether your margin is holding up.
We run your weekly or monthly payroll for employed staff, manage all HMRC submissions, and make sure CIS deductions for subbies are processed correctly alongside your payroll each period.
We help you keep on top of your billing, making sure invoices go out promptly at each stage of a project, that applications for payment are tracked, and that you always know which clients owe you money and how long it has been outstanding.
Construction VAT is more complicated than most sectors because of the domestic reverse charge that applies to certain supplies between VAT registered businesses in the construction chain. We make sure your VAT returns handle this correctly every quarter.
We give you regular reports showing the profitability of your business overall and by project type, helping you understand which jobs are worth taking, which customers are most profitable, and how to price future work to protect your margins.
We work alongside your business throughout the year, so the financial side never gets in the way of running your projects.
Reverse charge VAT handled correctly so your returns are accurate and compliant every quarter
A live view of costs and profit on each project so margins do not disappear without you noticing
Someone to call when a project throws up a financial question or a decision needs to be made quickly
CIS managed correctly every month, so subcontractors are paid right and HMRC never comes knocking
The Construction Industry Scheme requires contractors to deduct tax from payments made to subcontractors and pass it to HMRC each month. It sounds straightforward but in practice there are several ways it can go wrong. Paying a subcontractor at the wrong deduction rate because their verification has not been done correctly. Missing the monthly CIS return deadline. Failing to give subcontractors a payment and deduction statement. Each of these can result in a penalty from HMRC, and they are all avoidable with the right processes in place.
If you are a subcontractor rather than a contractor, CIS affects you differently. Tax is being deducted from your payments by the people who pay you, and you need to make sure it is being accounted for correctly in your own tax return so that you reclaim what you are owed and do not end up paying tax twice on the same income.
Something we see regularly: construction business owners who have been running CIS themselves without realising they have been verifying subcontractors incorrectly, applying the wrong deduction rate, or missing the requirement to file a nil return in months where no payments were made. By the time it comes to light, there can be a string of late filing penalties sitting on their account.
Getting CIS sorted properly from the start is considerably cheaper than fixing historic errors later.
A lot of construction businesses are consistently busy but not as profitable as they should be. Costs creep up during a project. Additional work gets done without being priced and invoiced. Materials come in over budget. Labour takes longer than estimated. By the time the final account is settled, the margin that looked healthy when you priced the job has been quietly eaten away.
We help you track your costs against your revenue on each project in real time so that if something is going wrong with the numbers you know about it while there is still time to do something about it, not six months later when the accounts are done and the job is long finished.
Expert Chartered Certified Accountants helping UK businesses protect and grow their income.
Friendly support from a local team that understands your business. Book your free consultation today and take the first step towards financial clarity and peace of mind.
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74 St James Road, Blackburn, BB1 8ET
We work with clients across the UK, so you can get support wherever you are
