Accounting services planning template for England

Complete this accounting services planning template with named owners and source links. Use one version for each service and customer segment. A plan covering every kind of accounting work will conceal the choices that make delivery safe.

What to take away

1. Decision and evidence

Decision to make:
Decision owner:
Approval date:
Customer evidence reviewed:
Regulatory or deadline sources:
Assumptions still untested:

State whether the plan authorises research, a pilot or full launch. Link each numerical assumption to its calculation and date.

2. Customer and job

Entity and activity:
Trigger event:
Accounting task:
Record condition:
Buyer and approver:
Access or communication need:
Excluded and referral cases:

For an MTD-related offer, verify the customer and the date against HMRC's guide Use Making Tax Digital for Income Tax. A threshold is not a customer definition by itself.

3. Service promise

Included work:
Deliverable:
Completion evidence:
Client records and deadlines:
Client approvals and decisions:
Practice review standard:
Change and correction route:

Use precise verbs. "Support" and "manage" require explanation. Distinguish preparing information from approving or submitting it.

4. Authority and controls

HMRC supervises accountancy service providers where no professional body does; a practice supervised for anti-money laundering by ICAEW, ACCA, AAT, CIOT or ATT records that body instead. Agent registration runs through an HMRC Agent Services Account. Record the route that applies rather than marking a generic "registered" box.

Data protection belongs in the same table: the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018 govern client records, and the Information Commissioner's Office is the regulator to name when a breach or a subject access request is handled. Professional indemnity insurance, where the practice's professional body requires it, needs its own owner and renewal date.

5. Workflow and capacity

Intake and qualification:

Estimate ordinary, complex and corrective work separately. Show weekly reviewer capacity and deadline peaks. State when intake must pause.

6. Economics

Work unit:
Price and VAT treatment:
Onboarding or clean-up fee:
Software and supplier cost:
Expected review and correction:
Acquisition cost:
Contribution after full delivery:
Scope-change threshold:

7. Pilot scorecard

Record eligible enquiries, accepted cases, correct completion, review findings, reopened work, client effort, deadline margin, write-off and incidents. Include declined cases and reasons.

Continue if:
Change if:
Stop if:
Next review date:

8. Research and channel plan

Recruitment or lead source:
Evidence that the audience uses it:
Qualification questions:
Referral and sponsored-placement disclosure:
Maximum acquisition spend:
Poor-fit lead threshold:

Count discovery, eligible enquiry, accepted engagement and correctly completed work separately. A channel that appears cheap can consume senior time rejecting cases or repairing incomplete handovers.

9. Risk scenarios

Late or missing records:
Incorrect opening balance:
Client approval unavailable:
Software or bank feed failure:
Reviewer absence:
Confidentiality incident:
Complaint or disputed scope:

For each scenario, write detection, immediate containment, decision owner, customer communication, evidence and restart criteria. Run at least one exercise before live customer volume increases.

10. Decision record

Options considered:
Reasons for rejection:
Material uncertainties:
Qualified advice required:
Final approver:
Publication or launch hold:

Attach the supporting files rather than summarising a high-risk conclusion from memory. The person approving the plan should be able to trace customer need, legal or professional gate, price and capacity to dated evidence.

Ask an independent reviewer to sample those links and recalculate one commercial assumption before approval.

Do not fill blanks with "standard process" or "industry practice". Name the procedure and owner. If evidence is pending, keep the field open and preserve the hold.

Keep the approved version and record later changes separately. A planning template earns its place when it makes assumptions testable and exposes who must act.

Before you act

Common questions

How should a plan handle numerical assumptions?

Link each numerical assumption to its calculation and date. This makes assumptions testable and allows an independent reviewer to recalculate one commercial assumption before approval. Do not summarise a high-risk conclusion from memory; attach supporting files instead.

What must be recorded for authority and controls?

For each control, record the owner, evidence and review date. Name whether anti-money laundering supervision comes from a professional body or from HMRC, and whether the practice holds an HMRC Agent Services Account for agent registration. Record the route that applies rather than marking a generic registered box.

What should a pilot scorecard include?

Record eligible enquiries, accepted cases, correct completion and review findings. Also track reopened work, client effort, deadline margin, write-off and incidents. Include declined cases and reasons. Define continue, change and stop conditions, and set a next review date.