Intake note · Records for the 31 January self assessment round are accepted until 12 December
Start an enquiryAccountancy practice
Accounts · Tax · Payroll
Correspondence answered
Mon–Thu, same working week
For owner-managed companies, sole traders and landlords
A small practice that keeps one deadline list per client, tells you what is due before it is late, and prices the whole year before any work starts.
Where we are most useful
Invoices, receipts and bank feeds have stopped reconciling neatly, and the year-end has become a weekend job you keep postponing.
First accounting period, first corporation tax return, first payroll for yourself. We set the dates up once and run them from there.
Returns were filed but nothing was explained. We ask for professional clearance, collect the records and carry on from where they stopped.
Taking on a first employee, buying a van, changing how you draw money out. Those answers are cheaper before the fact than after it.
Services
Five lanes. Take one, or let the whole compliance year sit with us. Everything below is quoted as a fixed fee once we have seen the shape of your records.
Statutory accounts prepared from your bookkeeping, filed at Companies House, with the CT600 and tax computation submitted alongside. You get a plain-language summary of what the year did before anything is filed.
Suits limited companies with a settled trading year.
Sole trade, rental, dividend and side-income returns prepared from whatever you keep, with the tax and any payments on account explained in a short note rather than a bare figure.
Suits sole traders, landlords and company directors.
We keep the ledgers current, chase the gaps while they are still recent, and file VAT under Making Tax Digital on your scheme — standard, flat rate or cash accounting.
Suits businesses issuing more than a handful of invoices a month.
RTI submissions, payslips, starters and leavers, pension assessment and the year-end forms. For director-only companies we set a salary and dividend pattern and review it each spring.
Suits anyone paying themselves or a small team through PAYE.
An hour on one question, with the working shown afterwards: whether to incorporate, how to fund a purchase, what a first hire really costs, or how much can sensibly be drawn before April.
Suits a decision with a date attached to it.
The rhythm
Nothing here is a surprise. This is the shape of a full year for a typical limited company client, so you can see when we will need something from you.
Payroll rolled forward, codes and thresholds updated, salary and dividend pattern agreed for the year ahead.
We ask for anything missing two weeks before the filing date, reconcile, then send the return figure for you to approve.
Payslips out on your chosen date, ledgers reconciled, and a one-page note if something in the numbers looks worth a conversation.
For a March year end: records requested, accounts drafted, and a review call held well before the filing deadline rather than beside it.
Personal returns prepared early so the January tax figure is known while there is still time to plan for it.
A look at profit to date, pending purchases and remaining allowances before the year closes and the options narrow.
How we work
Hollow Lane takes on a limited number of clients each year because the useful part of this job is not the filing — it is knowing a business well enough to notice when something has changed.
Work starts with a conversation about what you already have: the software, the shoebox, the spreadsheet that mostly works. We quote against that reality, not against an ideal set of records, and the fee is agreed in writing before anything begins. If the scope changes mid-year, we say so and re-quote rather than adding a line to an invoice.
In practice you deal with the same person throughout. Questions get an answer in the same working week, and if the answer is long, you get it written down so you can read it twice. We would rather explain a figure once properly than file it quietly and leave you guessing.
We are equally direct about limits. We do not take on audits, large groups or anything requiring regulated investment advice, and we will tell you plainly when a question belongs with a solicitor or an independent financial adviser instead.
Questions
By scope, not by hour. We look at transaction volume, how tidy the records are, the payroll headcount and which lanes you want, then quote one figure for the year and split it monthly if you prefer. The quote holds unless the scope itself changes, in which case we re-quote before doing the extra work.
No. Most clients send records digitally and have two or three calls a year — the year-end review, the spring planning check and whatever comes up in between. If you would rather talk things through in person for the first conversation, that can be arranged.
The common cloud packages, and we are not precious about which one. If you already have a subscription you like, we work inside it. If you are starting from scratch, we will recommend the cheapest thing that covers your VAT position and invoicing habits rather than the most featured.
Yes, and it is a routine move. We write to them for professional clearance and your records, reconcile the position to the date you changed, and pick up the remaining deadlines. You do not need to have a difficult conversation with them first — a short note saying you are moving is enough.
Bank statements or an open bank feed, purchase invoices and receipts, sales invoices if you raise them outside the software, and a note of anything unusual — a new loan, an asset bought, a staff change. Five or ten minutes, if it is sent as it happens.
Once authorised as your agent, yes. Routine notices, coding queries and payment arrangements are handled on your behalf, and you are copied in on anything that affects what you owe. Compliance checks are handled too, though they sit outside the standard fee and are quoted separately.
Enquiry
A few details are enough for a sensible first reply. If the fit is wrong, we will say so and point you somewhere better.