r/AccountingUK

Both the jobs are financial accountant

I have a job offer for really high salary 65k, 2 days to close month end. They said its intense, and work to USA colleagues timings so sometimes weekend work. 5 days in office too

Then I got a call for a first interview with another company which is pretty much remote with 1 or 2 days a month in office. Its 50k. Sounds chill for a first move out of audit. This is however still in interview stages and I would have to reply to the first offer this week.

It would be a gamble in my head to reject first offer. Idk what to do

I’ve been building a small AI tool for UK MTD workflows and I think I may have misunderstood the actual problem.

Initially I thought the pain point was:

• extracting invoice data
• VAT classification
• exporting into Xero/Sage

So I built a prototype that:

• extracts supplier/date/totals/VAT from invoices
• classifies VAT automatically
• matches invoices against bank CSV exports
• exports MTD-ready CSVs

But after showing it to a few people, I’m starting to think OCR/extraction is becoming commodity infrastructure.

The real pain might actually be:

• chasing clients for missing documents
• review/approval workflows
• handling exceptions
• knowing what’s ready for filing
• audit trails
• communication loops

Basically operational workflow rather than data extraction itself.

Would really love honest feedback from accountants/bookkeepers here because I don’t want to build founder fantasy software.

A few questions:

1. What’s actually the worst part of MTD compliance today?
2. Are tools like Dext/Xero “good enough” already?
3. Would you trust AI VAT classification if confidence scoring + human review existed?
4. Is local-first/privacy-first meaningful at all for accounting firms?
5. If you could remove ONE bottleneck from your workflow, what would it be?

Also curious whether smaller firms are underserved here, or whether this market is basically saturated already.

For context:

• solo founder
• built the prototype in a day
• rebuilt from Streamlit → FastAPI after hitting frontend limitations
• currently free/open source while validating

Not trying to pitch anything honestly; mostly trying to understand whether this is solving a real problem or just a technically interesting one.

like it’s so overwhelming cause never entered the industry before.Where to even find a job

Anyone else feel behind in life after setbacks in their career? Should I finish ACA or try pivoting into something completely different for better money?

28M, ACA finalist (12/15), ex-Big 4 audit. Had a rough period, left after missing an exam booking, ended up with a long gap, and recently got back into audit at a Top 30 firm.

Honestly feel really behind in life compared to other people my age financially and socially. The pay feels low for the workload, I’ve had to rent a Mon–Fri room in Surrey for work, and I’m questioning whether audit is even worth continuing long term.

Part of me thinks I should just finish ACA because I’m this close, but another part wonders whether I should pivot into something else entirely like sales or another higher-paying field while I’m still in my 20s.

Would appreciate honest advice from anyone who’s been through something similar.

and can you take holidays during

Hi Everyone,

When I became part qualified I was referred to an E-commerce business and they hired me as an accountant which involved doing their Bookkeeping and Final Year accounts with Tax Filing in UK.

I have been working with them for 4 years now and really want to switch to another division or domain, the current company is pretty limited and there is no way for me to further advance my career here.

I want to know what roles should I go for now, I am willing to start from 0 in that role if that is necessary.

Some roles are highlighted as Costing Officer, Payroll Accountant, Management Trainee, Cost Controller etc.

I want to be in a more Management Accounting related role and want to start from 0 so I can grow in this role as I move forward.

Please advise what job titles should I zero in on?

Not jinxing anything but when you get a second interview what typical questions would be asked? I know this time round it will be more serious as it’s people from that department rather than HR or Directors.

Hi everyone,
I’m hoping for some advice because I genuinely can’t afford an accountant at the moment.
This was my first year working self-employed in the UK, and I’m trying to understand what counts as tax deductible expenses.
For context, I work in healthcare, but I do not live in the UK — I live abroad and only came to the UK temporarily for work. During the 2025–26 tax year, I worked in the UK for around 2 months, working 5 days a week under a short-term contract.
The sole purpose of my travel to the UK was work. Because of this, I had some major expenses:
Flights to and from my home country → UK (only travelled for work)
A short-term let/accommodation for exactly the 2 months of my contract, purely because I needed somewhere to stay while working
Before expenses, I earned above the personal allowance. However, if these costs are allowable expenses, it would bring me below the personal allowance, meaning I may not owe tax.
My questions are:
Are flights and short-term accommodation for temporary work in the UK potentially tax deductible in this situation?
Is it acceptable if legitimate expenses reduce my taxable income below the personal allowance?
Do I need an accountant for this, or can I realistically self-report everything through Self Assessment?
I’d be so grateful for any advice or if anyone has been in a similar situation. Thank you so much!

Hi all, sincerely looking for some career advice/help here. I live in London and my girlfriend lives in Czechia, where she works as an Accountant - I believe more of an AP Accountant. She is very career motivated and has 4-5 years of competent experience at both full-time and freelance positions, including her latest job at a global Tech Startup (based out of Prague) as a Junior Accountant. She has also just started her ACCAs.

I was hoping to understand whether she would be able to get a job in London. She is worried that she doesn't have experience with the accounting rules and so wouldn't be able to get a job, or would have to start completely at the bottom again. I feel like surely there are transferable skill - but realistically, I have no idea about Accounting rules 🤦‍♂️

I'd hugely appreciate any advice here 🙏 thank you.

I just recently qualified in October last year and have found a Client Manager role in practice for £35k in London. I am thinking of accepting it now given the job market hasn’t been that good.

I know it’s low, but I am thinking of using this as a stepping stone for a better job. How much are you guys on newly qualified and should I later transfer to industry? I’ve heard they pay better

My partner (32M) is currently a teacher and wanting to switch to accounting.

Just wanting to figure out what his next steps should be as he’s in a bit of a weird situation.

Just for context, he has really good GCSE grades, but never went on to do A-levels or any other qualifications due to having a troublesome and poor family background and needing to get into work immediately. He has a background in volunteering in social care roles and has been working for a local independent school as a geography teacher (with no teaching qualifications) ever since.

However, for obvious reasons, he now regrets not having any qualifications past his GCSEs as he genuinely enjoyed studying and wanted to go into accountancy when he was younger but just simply didn’t have the right guidance and means at that point in time.

He’s burnt out as a teacher and doesn’t feel comfortable working at his school with no further qualifications (management at his current school are problematic and simply won’t help him gain any further qualifications) and no opportunity to move on to anything or anywhere else.

We are in a position where I (30F) have gotten enough pay raises in my own role over the past few years where we can afford for him to take a short-term pay cut if he needs to do something else and maybe retrain.

We are thinking he could maybe look into accountancy again. There are a couple of local accountancy firms offering work and Level 3 AAT qualification.

Would this be a good start? Not 100% sure what the route for this might look like? We’re very early days trying to explore this, so any guidance or knowledge would be helpful for us to be more realistic.

EDIT:

Thanks everyone for the informative replies! This is all such helpful advice so really appreciate it!

I just started a cyber security consulting business mainly targeting accountants. But where do accountants even need cyber security? How important is it for them? I basically need info on cyber security for accountants mostly for small accountnats business. I want to do cyber audits for accountants, put my degree in good use. But idk if accountants are constantly looking for these kinds of things. What else would accountants need except for cyber security audit and how much will they be willing to pay for it?

I am a bookkeeper with experience across 10+ industries, including real estate, dental, grocery, and construction. I am seeking partnerships with CPAs, Enrolled Agents, and Certified Financial Planners.

You refer clients who need bookkeeping, and in return, you earn ongoing monthly referral income. The goal is a long term, mutually beneficial partnership built on consistent, high quality service.

Open to collaborations. Feel free to reach out.

Might seem a silly question, I’m probably overthinking it, but I have an interview for an entry level AP role this week, it will be my first interview for over 10 years and my first ‘corporate’ish style interview, obviously wear full suit and tie? I see a lot of people nowadays seem to be wearing jumpers and smart trainers, I don’t want to look like the fool looking like I’m going to a wedding but also would rather over dress than under dress. Any interview tips appreciated also. TIA

hi, I run a small UK accounting practice working mostly with small businesses.

With MTD ITSA now rolled out, I’m trying to figure out the cleanest setup without adding too many expensive tools. currently looking at Xero + Dext + Zoho, but it feels a bit fragmented 🤔

wondering what are other small practices using for: receipt/document collection, chasing clients, tracking quarterly submissions.

are you using spreadsheets, WhatsApp, etc, or is there any recommendations please?

Many thanks

Edit: I probably worded this badly. I’m not asking what to use for the actual tax/accounting side. Xero is fine for that. What I’m trying to figure out is the admin/workflow layer around it for smaller clients: collecting receipts, nudging people before quarter end, and seeing who is actually ready without living in spreadsheets/WhatsApp

Has anyone here used Dext Solo for this? Heard about it recently and wondering if it’s enough for small practice workflows, or whether people still end up needing something else

Can we get a bachelors after completing CIMA exams? Any good universities if possible?

So I will be studying history at UCL in September and I enjoy studying the subject, but I'm also thinking of doing some other options right now because the jobs directly linked with history are....a bit financially repulsive at the moment. I've heard that accounting is subject agnostic and that it doesn't matter what I studied as long as the uni and degree class is good. Can a history degree from UCL get me an accounting job at the Big 4? Will I be disadvantaged in any way compared to accounting grads?