Playbook, accounting firm
Adjustments a practice can make, and the one it cannot
Most of the accessibility work at a practice is about documents rather than about the building. Accounts get approved through a portal, correspondence is dense and full of defined terms, and a client who can manage neither needs a paper set, a larger typeface or somebody sitting beside them. That last one is where an access request meets an identity requirement that does not bend for anybody.
Why this is not the general answer
The handling pattern for accessibility requests holds across every trade. What follows is the part that does not.
- Approval of a set of accounts normally happens electronically, so a client who cannot use the portal needs a different route to sign rather than help with the route they cannot use.
- Practice correspondence is dense by nature, thick with figures and defined terms, and the adjustment that helps is often a call to talk somebody through a document rather than anything to do with format.
- A client asking for a relative to deal with the practice on their behalf is making an access request and an authority request in the same sentence, and the identity requirements do not relax because the person is familiar to the office.
- Meetings here run long with paperwork spread across a table, so the adjustment worth offering is extra time or a visit at home, which is a scheduling decision rather than a question about the building.
How it arrives
- can you send me the accounts on paper to sign
- i cannot use the online approval thing
- can my daughter deal with you on my behalf
- can i have the letters in large print
- is there a lift up to your office
- can someone go through the figures with me on the phone
What has to be indexed for this to work
| How accounts can be approved other than through the portal | Whether you post a paper set, what you accept as a signature, and how much longer that route takes. This is the adjustment most often needed and least often written down anywhere. |
|---|---|
| What you can send differently, and in what form | Larger print, a plain summary, a posted copy rather than an emailed one. List only what you genuinely do, because an unmet promise here is worse than a plain no. |
| Your requirements where somebody acts for a client | What has to be in place before the practice takes instructions from a relative or a carer, and what identity evidence is still needed. Present it as a requirement with a reason, because it will be pushed against. |
| Who arranges an adjustment and how much notice it takes | The named role and the lead time. Without it the assistant has nowhere to hand the request, and it dies as a polite answer nobody acted on. |
The reply
Accounts are normally approved through our portal, and where that will not work we can look at posting a paper set instead, which takes longer, so it is worth raising early rather than at the deadline [1]. Larger print and posted copies of correspondence are on the list of what we can do [2]. Somebody else dealing with us for you is possible, but there are identity requirements either way and I cannot set those aside. Leave me your name, an email and what you need, and the office will arrange it.
It gives the paper route together with what it costs in time, because the delay is the part that matters near a filing date. It separates what can simply be arranged from what has requirements attached to it. And it states the identity point as a limit on the assistant rather than as a refusal to help, which is the accurate framing.
Where it stops
The trigger. Any request for the practice to do something differently for the person writing, and any mention of somebody else acting on a client's behalf.
That is something the office arranges rather than anything I can confirm. Leave me your name, an email and what you need, and somebody will come back to you before anything is due.
It stops answering before it guesses, says who will pick it up, and asks for the one thing that makes a reply possible. Nothing about it reads as a dead end.
Never say this here
Out of bounds
- Never confirm that a relative or a carer can deal with the practice, since identity requirements apply whoever is asking.
- Never promise a paper approval route, a posted copy or a longer meeting, because none of those are arranged from here.
- Never say the office is accessible without describing the entrance, the floor and whether there is a lift.
- Never suggest a deadline can be moved to accommodate an adjustment.
Questions
- Is the portal really an accessibility issue?
- It is the most common one a practice has. Approval is the step every client has to complete personally, so a client who cannot complete it is stuck at the last moment rather than at the start where there was time.
- Can it set a family member up on our systems?
- No. It cannot write anywhere, and here that limit is a feature. Authority for somebody to act has identity requirements behind it and the decision belongs with a person.
- How do we stop it inventing adjustments?
- Publish the list of what you genuinely offer, and set it to refuse below your match threshold rather than reach for a nearby page. An invented adjustment is remembered as a promise.
Keep reading
- Everything for a accounting firmDeadlines drive the volume. What an accountancy practice can automate, and why no answer may touch a caller's own numbers.
- Handling accessibility requests in generalTwo different things arrive as one message. A published accessibility statement answers the first. The second is a request, and it needs a person.
- When the security questionnaire is about somebody else's financial dataAssurance questions arriving from a client's own auditor or biggest customer, and why the assistant may only point at what is published.
- The monthly payment failed and nobody noticed until it matteredWhy a bounced monthly payment matters more near a filing date, and the confusion between paying the practice and paying the authority.
- A client cannot get in to approve their accountsPortal sign in, agent authority and a shared login are three different problems. What the assistant can explain and what needs a person.
Try it on your own material
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