How to switch accountants mid year without missing a deadline
Most owners wait for the year end because they think a mid-year move will drop a VAT return or a payroll run. It will not, as long as one date is agreed and one list is written down. Here is how we handle it.
How to switch accountants mid year without missing a deadline comes up in almost every first conversation we have with an owner who is unhappy. They know the service has stopped being worth the fee. They also have a VAT return due in six weeks, payroll on the 25th and a nagging feeling that moving now means something falls through the gap.
Our view is straightforward. Waiting for your year end usually costs you more than moving does. Another nine or twelve months of filing-only service is another year of decisions made on guesswork: the hire you did not cost properly, the premises you walked away from because nobody could tell you whether it worked.
The mid-year switch is safe when you treat it as a handover with a date on it, rather than an email saying you are leaving. Below is what that looks like in practice, who does which bit, and the two or three places where returns actually go missing.
Pick the cutover date before anything else
The single thing that protects your deadlines is a date that both firms agree on, written down, with each task sitting on one side of it or the other.
Good cutover points are the ones your obligations already create. The first day of a new VAT quarter. The start of a payroll month. The week after a set of accounts has been filed. Pick one of those and the split is obvious to everybody.
A worked example. Say payroll runs on the 25th and your VAT quarter starts on 1 April. Your outgoing accountant finishes the March payroll, files the Full Payment Submission and hands over the year-to-date figures. Your new accountant takes the April payroll onwards and prepares the whole April to June VAT return, using the earlier records from the old software. Nothing sits in the middle unclaimed.
What we would avoid is moving in the last few weeks before a filing. If your corporation tax return is due in three weeks, let the current firm finish it and move the day after. The same goes for the second half of January, when every accountant in the country is on Self Assessment and nobody has time to do a handover properly.
Write down who files what, by when
An engagement letter says what your new accountant is responsible for going forward. It does not, on its own, settle who is submitting the VAT return that is already half done. That has to be agreed separately and in writing.
We put together a short handover record at the start of every switch. For each piece of work it says: the period it covers, who prepares it, who reviews it, the filing deadline, the payment deadline, and what records are needed to get it done.
- VAT returns for the current and next quarter
- Monthly payroll, pension submissions and the pension re-enrolment date if one is near
- CIS returns and subcontractor verifications, if you are in construction
- Year-end accounts and the corporation tax return
- The confirmation statement at Companies House
- The director’s Self Assessment
Two lines per item and the whole risk of a mid-year move disappears. It also exposes anything your old accountant has quietly not done, which is often the real reason the switch is happening.
Worth saying plainly: as a director you stay legally responsible for the company’s filings whoever does the work. That is exactly why the list matters.
Waiting for your year end usually costs more than moving does. Another twelve months of filing-only service is another twelve months of decisions made without a number behind them.
HMRC authorisations are separate from software access
You do not need to write to HMRC yourself. Your new accountant requests agent authorisation and you approve it through your Government Gateway account.
Three things trip people up here. First, authorisation is granted per tax. Corporation tax, VAT, PAYE and Self Assessment are four separate permissions, and being authorised for one does not cover the others. Second, your old accountant’s authority does not drop off when the new one is added. It has to be actively removed, either by them or by you in the manage your tax agents section of your HMRC account. Third, software access is a different job entirely. Adding your new accountant to Xero or QuickBooks does nothing at HMRC, and vice versa.
One rule we will not bend on: never hand over your Government Gateway sign-in details. HMRC’s own guidance says to use the proper agent authorisation route instead, and any firm that asks you for your credentials is telling you something about how it works.
While you are in the software, check the subscription is in your company’s name and that you are the administrator. If the licence belongs to the outgoing firm, you can lose the history on the day they switch it off.
What to ask the outgoing firm for
Professional clearance is routine. Your new accountant writes to the old one, asks whether there is any professional reason not to act, and requests the records. Under the ACCA code, a member firm cannot hold your records hostage, though it can wait for unpaid fees to be settled. Clear the final bill and the argument goes away.
Clearance is a professional enquiry, not an audit of the books. It does not tell your new accountant that the figures are right, which is why the handover pack matters more than the letter.
The list we ask for:
- Trial balance and general ledger up to the cutover date
- Bank reconciliations, and customer and supplier balances
- The last filed accounts, the corporation tax computation and the submission receipts
- Any HMRC correspondence, open enquiries or payment plans
- Payroll year-to-date figures, employee records and the last submission confirmation
- The director’s loan account balance
- The Companies House authentication code, or a new one sent to your registered office
If the old firm provides your registered office address, sort out a replacement before the handover completes, or official post starts going somewhere you no longer have access to.
What changing mid year is actually worth
A construction company came to us just after its first year, turning over under £100,000, with an accountant who filed and said nothing. The owner told Crosby he did not really know what was going on in his own business.
We took over the bookkeeping, VAT, payroll and CIS and kept them current every month. Then we spent a period building job costing, so he could see the margin on each project before he quoted the next one. Monthly reporting and regular calls replaced the one annual meeting. He is now past £500,000 and running the business from his own figures.
None of that needed a year end to start. It needed a cutover date and a handover done properly.
On our side, the move works the same way every time. We write to your previous accountant, collect the records, bring everything up to date with a discount on the catch-up work, and set one fixed monthly fee agreed before any work starts. No timesheets, no invoice you did not expect. The point of switching mid year is that the next decision you make, the hire, the van, the bigger unit, gets made on current numbers instead of accounts filed nine months after the fact.
Common questions
Do I need to tell HMRC myself when I change accountants?
No. Your new accountant requests agent authorisation and you approve it through your Government Gateway account. HMRC’s records update from that process. What does need attention is removing the previous agent, because the old authority stays in place until someone takes it off, and each tax has its own authorisation.
Can my old accountant refuse to hand over my records?
Not permanently. An ACCA or similar member firm is professionally obliged to pass on the records that belong to you. It can hold back work until outstanding fees are paid, which is fair enough, but it cannot use your books as a bargaining chip. Settling the final invoice usually clears the whole thing in a few days.
Is it more expensive to move part way through the year?
Not as a rule. The ongoing fee is the same whenever you join. Where a one-off cost appears is when records need bringing up to date before anyone can file from them. We discount that catch-up work, and the monthly fee is fixed and agreed before any work starts, so there is nothing to discover on an invoice later.
When is the worst time to switch accountants?
The last few weeks before a filing deadline, and the second half of January. In January every practice is deep in Self Assessment and a handover will not get the attention it needs. If a return is almost due, let your current firm finish that job and start the move the day after it is submitted.
How long does a mid-year handover usually take?
A few weeks for most owner-managed companies, rather than months. The online agent authorisation is quick once you approve it; the longer part is collecting records and bringing anything behind up to date. Nothing waits on that, though. The cutover date decides who files what, so returns keep going out while the handover finishes.
Related reading
Our take
You can switch accountants mid year without missing a deadline, and in most cases you should stop waiting. Agree a cutover date on a natural boundary, write down who files what by when, get the HMRC authorisations done per tax and remove the old agent, and collect a proper handover pack rather than relying on the clearance letter alone.
The one exception is a filing that is nearly due. Let the current firm finish it, then move the week after.
If your accountant files the forms and never calls, and you are putting off the move because of the VAT return sitting in the diary, that is the situation we handle most often. Answer a few quick questions and Crosby will come back with a recommendation, then a free growth review if there is a fit.