February 2007 newsletter

DUCKETT

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Tax Return special. No more for a while.

Forthcoming events

Thursday (21 Feb) evening at Belmont Golf: Nick Rumney talking about the Adventures of Shackleton. Still a couple of places left.

After that, the next event will be in late April (after Easter) and there are currently 2 contenders:

I haven't asked him yet, but (allegedly) Martin Telling does a good talk about Nelson (the guy who died at Trafalgar, not the town in Lancashire). Apparently he's been seen practising his "I see no ships" delivery for weeks. Or was he just using a telescope to spot the next big idea?

Business speed dating. You don't often get the chance to try out different sales pitches on different people within a one hour time frame. And then indulge in some objection handling.

Which would you prefer? Or maybe we should run both?

Whiplash does compliant

Just to prove that we really are proper accountants, we usually produce a summary, at this time of the year, of the rising tax issues. So, Whiplash has been busy trawling through the paperwork looking for obscure changes in the rules to worry you with. However, even she looked a bit jaded after wading through the two 150 page documents relating to Planning Gains Supplement (PGS). This is the new tax that Gordon has invented to clobber people who get planning permission to develop property. 300 pages later, we still donāt know when this is going to take effect (April 2009 maybe?), what the rate is going to be (10/20/30%??) and whether there will be any deminimus provisions.

Damned if you do

It's very rare that I feel sorry for the big accountancy firms, but Ernst & Young is being sued (for £300k) by hedge fund Ferox for filing the company's accounts too early. Apparently hedge funds file their accounts at about the same time. The Ferox accounts went in before the rest and the media got hold of the fact that the company's boss was paid £11.4m and a circus ensued. Were the accounts wrong? => No. Were they filed outside the statutory limits? => No. Where's the problem?

You may not be surprised to learn that the Boyscout is forever nagging me to file accounts as early as possible. I rest my case.

www.ey.com/uk

You might want to look at the Item Club whilst you're there

www.ey.com/global/content.nsf/UK/Economic_Outlook

Electronic overkill

The traffic wardens amongst us have leapt onto the requirements in the new Companies Act to have company details (name/number/address) on all electronic communication. [It doesn't say how big the details need to be.] This is in addition to the endless dire warnings about what you should do if you happen to get an e-mail by mistake. Should sort the spam problem too, then?

Entrepreneurial attitudes

One recent view that I've come across is that there are 2 types of people in business:

• Opportunity takers
• Problem solvers

It's the opportunity takers that become entrepreneurs. If you take this basic idea and turn it into a product you get:

"The Personal Enterprise Profiler will help you to identify what type of wealth creator you have the potential to become. This will help you to focus on a route to success that is most likely to work for you.

In 10 minutes, and for the special offer price of £10* the Profiler can identify whether you are most suited to developing value through your professional expertise, your corporate skills, your enterprising attitude, or your entrepreneurial flair."

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/enterprise/article1364181.ece

www.humanfactors.co.uk/pep.htm

Corporate collapse

Companies tend to fear the post Christmas cash famine just as much as individuals. However, a company collapse tends to affect a lot of people; customers, suppliers and employees as well as the shareholders. Whilst those in charge are generally aware of the position, it frequently comes as a surprise to the world at large. Given the huge amount of data that gets filed at Companies House, you would think that the analysts would have a good idea: well they do and it's called the "H" score. This is the single figure (out of 100) that is condensed from 7 key ratios. The writing is on the wall if H falls below 25 and is accurate to 90%. A good example is the Marconi fiasco. In the good old days under Lord Weinstock, the H score was rock solid at 100. Then the effect of the US acquisitions came through in the 1999 interim accounts and the H score nose-dived, even though the share price was still rising. It took a full 2 years before the market caught on, by which time the company was all but worthless. Marks & Spencer did the opposite. This came from an article in The Sunday Times, but I can't find the link (I've got a clipping). The company that does the analysis is to be found at

www.companywatch.net

Useful phrase: PoD - probability of distress.

Microsoft launches Vista

I'm sure everybody is now aware that MS has rolled out its new system to replace Windows XP. I've read various reviews on the subject and I'm none the wiser. The experts seem to think that it will be fine to move to Vista as you rotate out old PCs. Mind you, it's not unusual to find Windows 98 PCs working quite happily. Hurry slowly?

Disclaimer

Management: the ability to get angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose. To paraphrase Aristotle.

An English breakfast: the chicken is involved, but the pig's committed. Which would you rather be?

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