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Introduction

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Value Added Tax (VAT) is a consumption tax that is applied to a wide range of goods and services. There are a wide range of rules and regulations both of a legal and compliance nature that organisations both large and small have to adhere to.

 

As such organisations whether large or small will require human capital to apply and comply with VAT legislation and file VAT returns to HMRC on a timely basis. 

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Working in Practice

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Accountancy practices come in different shapes and sizes and range from: 

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• The small self employed owner managed Practices that provide book keeping services (VAT, Payroll, Annual Accounts, Self Assessment, CIS) to small businesses 

• Franchised Practices such as Tax Assist or CerTax 

• Practices with 2-10 Partners that typically provide a range of accounting, Audit and Taxation services to small and medium sized businesses  

• Larger medium sized with 10 or more partners providing Taxation, Audit, Accounting and advisory services to medium sized entities

• Big 4 Accountancy Firms (Deloitte, EY, KPMG, PWC that provide services to large Private Companies, Public companies such as banks, Private Equity Houses etc and services can range from Consultancy, Technology, Audit, Taxation, Accounting and more. 

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Typically working in practice involves providing services as listed above to external businesses for fees. Therefore normally an individual will commence their career as a junior (Graduate, School or college leaver) learning the ropes from more senior staff until eventually they receive an allocation of clients to manage.  As their knowledge, experience and skills improve, juniors can typically move up the hierarchy to Manager, Senior Manager, Director, Associate Partner, Partner or their equivalent.  As the fees billed are per hours worked, most accountants, tax specialists, technology specialist, Partners etc that work in Practice will be required to maintain and record their hours on time sheets to support the charging out (billing) to clients.

 

 

Working in Industry

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Working in industry is basically the other side of the coin where Accountants and Tax Advisors will look after the internal VAT compliance, VAT Accounting and VAT legal Advisory aspects of the businesses.  Basically VAT roles are usually split between VAT Compliance and VAT Advisory or a combination of both.  Also roles can be focused on different internal segments or divisions within an organisation.  For Example in a transport company you may have the Train Division and Bus Division or in Banking you may have an Investment Banking and Retail Banking division and as such the VAT rules and their application can be different depending on which area is being covered. 

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Typically VAT Specialists will spend time working on the following:

       

• Preparing and or reviewing internal company VAT and other related returns for submission to HMRC

• Managing VAT Risk

• VAT Accounting and VAT Recovery Forecasting

• Managing VAT Projects 

• Maintaining and building VAT Systems

• Advising Management on VAT,

• Advising client facing departments on billing VAT

• Advising Finance with VAT reporting

• Providing advice on Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A)

• Advising on Intervention

• Reviewing Contracts

• Advising on Sourcing and Procurement to ensure VAT efficiency 

• Advising on Establishment & Fixed Establishment

• Advising on Securitisation

• Advising on Loan Syndication

• Registering and de-registering companies from VAT

• Creating VAT Groups 

• Advising on Business Disposals (TOGC) 

• Advising on international aspects of VAT

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Working in industry can mean working for Banks,  Food Companies, Retailers, Oil Companies, Car Manufacturers, Airport Operators, Train Companies, Energy providers and basically any corporate entity that's not Practice as described above. 

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As you can imagine from the duties and tasks typically performed above, VAT is a specialist area and requires a sound understanding and knowledge of UK VAT Law, EU VAT Law, Case Law, International VAT, compliance along with solid practical experience applying this to real life day to day transactions. The more knowledge you have and experience you gain in these areas, the more illuminated you will become in the VAT world which is actually a small specialist community.    

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