Hewitt Warin Chartered Accountants

"We decided to outsource our whole payroll function to Adrian at Payroll Services. Adrian and his team had served my old firm well and we wanted to continue this relationship..."

When Jeff Warin & Luisa Hewitt of Hewitt Warin Chartered Accountants set up their new practice it was important to them that overheads and back-office costs were kept to an absolute minimum.

The practice was established from a management buy-out of all of the charity and not for profit clients from the successful firm Connor Warin where Jeff had been a partner for 20 years. Jeff says that “it was time for a change. Charities need specialist support which the high street practitioner is just unable to give. The sector is facing major challenges and we know that niche firms like ours can serve them well and profitably if we get our focus right”.

Designing the firm with a blank sheet meant that Jeff & Luisa could embrace the most up to date technology, focus on client value and choose who they worked with and how they worked with them. Payroll always seems to be a problem for practitioners, says Jeff, whether it is the constant management resource in ensuring that there is adequate staff back-up, the enormous amount of time dealing with queries and the hidden costs of I.T resources or cost of lost opportunity.

We decided to outsource our whole payroll function to Adrian at Payroll Services. Adrian and his team had served my old firm well and we wanted to continue this relationship. The setting up of Hewitt Warin with Payroll Services was easy; they were able to take on our branding so that clients still understood that we were involved in payroll process. They very quickly made contact with clients, introduced themselves, and made that whole transition very comfortable for our clients.

What it means for us is that payroll just happens. We no longer have those panics (which always seem to happen at the wrong time) and Payroll Services just get on with it, they even copy us in on emails if we so choose. We get invoiced monthly and we invoice our clients monthly, we use the recommended mark-up which still sits our payroll charges well within mid-market: something that is important when dealing with our sector.

Payroll is a profit centre. It means that we do not have to carry payroll overhead, we are freed up to work on the higher margin work and clients get a great service from a dedicated team.

Asked, would I do it again? Yes, every time!

Jeff Warin
The Charity Specialists
Hewitt Warin Specialise in Charities and the Not for Profit and specifically work with organisations who need independent examination or audit.