Tag: Finance

Open Letter to the Prime Minister on the revision of the concept of valuations for CPOs


Dear Prime Minister Starmer,

I hope this letter finds you well. I am writing to express my concerns regarding the recent changes to compulsory purchase orders (CPOs) and the concept of “hope value” in land valuation.

While I understand the government’s intention to manage public project costs effectively, I believe that excluding hope value from CPO compensation creates inconsistencies in land valuation practices. If hope value is excluded for CPOs, it should also be excluded from the valuation of land for business rates and council taxes. This would ensure a fair and transparent system, where landowners are not disadvantaged by contradictory valuation methods. If a business’s rateable value of land is low, then owners cannot complain if that becomes the basis for compensation on a CPO, and by the same token, the state should not be giving back a lower value than the one they themselves set for the purposes of council taxes. Government should be consistent, and I am not sure that provision for this has been included in the legislation.

Furthermore, I propose that a moral payment be considered to cover the costs of rearranging investments around the affected property. This would acknowledge the broader impact on landowners beyond the immediate land value.

The term “hope value” is a neologism and not one found in any accounting standards, national or international. Moreover, it seems designed to be used exclusively by the government in their own favor against private investors. If private investors were to insist that the aspirational aspect of value be removed from market values, no deal would ever be made. As such, this is a fresh case of state exceptionalism in an area where state exceptionalism is not warranted.

Consistency in valuation practices across different governmental processes is crucial to ensure fairness and maintain public trust. I urge you to consider these points and advocate for a more balanced approach to land valuation and compensation.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Sincerely,

David of Quoracy

It pays to avoid the BBBs (Bargain Basement Bookkeepers)


Violent Storm Strikes Western Europe
Is a storm brewing over your books and records?

I am writing to relate a story based on true events which came to light last week when one gentleman came into one of our offices and spoke to me. To keep matters confidential, I won’t say the country – the same can happen in any country – or identify anything about this company the gentleman had – even the sector. It can happen to many sectors.

This gentleman had given his company bookkeeping and tax affairs to an outsourced book-keeper for his business in that particular country. He used outsourcing back home in his own country (I’m not saying where that is either) and he appreciated the benefit of being able to have his bookkeeping professionally handled by experts without needing to employ anyone, worry about holiday cover, etc etc.

Some time ago this gentleman had included our firm in his search, and we gave him a price entirely fair for a company with our niche in the market, that is, internationally trained people, with English, with proper quality assurance, supervision and back-up.  In other words,  a peer-reviewed, branded service tailored absolutely to the needs of West European businesses in the middle tier coming to start up in East Europe, and also very good for businesses not exactly in the middle tier and from places outside West Europe.

That means that the fee offered was not nearly as high as a Big Four service would cost, but certainly higher than a purely local service.

Now I’m not knocking the purely local services – many of them are very good, but for purely local clients as they don’t tend to be claiming proficiency in foreign languages or have the ability to engage cross-culturally with the client (a source of just as many miscommunications as the language barrier on its own). They are not a great fit with the international client, and often their cheaper price becomes a false economy as frustrations rise on both sides of the desk.

The problem in this case wasn’t lack of English – this gentleman’s chosen bookkeeper spoke English, apparently.

But she was in business just on her own. With no back-up employees, probably very little insurance, probably very few resources to turn to, and very few overheads hence enabling a price no quality firm could ever compete with. That was the price that tempted this gentleman to take her bid over mine.

But since then, it became apparent that this bookkeeper was not entirely what she seemed to be.

Neither this gentleman nor myself are qualified psychiatrists, and we could only speculate on what might have gone wrong, or been wrong all along with this person. The fact is, though, that mental illness happens in the human population. We’ve probably all had employees or acquaintances who have had a mental illness, and in a larger company they quickly get noticed by colleagues, and steps taken to look after them and safeguard the clients’ affairs. When they are on their own, no such controls exist.

Suffice it to say this lady no longer was answering emails or picking up the telephone when he was calling, and when he rang from another number she didn’t know, she put the phone down when she heard his voice – the person entrusted with his company’s books and records and processing a VAT reclaim for more money than she would normally earn in many years. As you can see, the situation is now much harder – and therefore more costly – for us to repair than if he had simply given us the work in the first place.

It simply doesn’t pay to use these Bargain Basement Bookkeepers. You know what you get if you pay peanuts, and if a price looks too good to be true, it probably is.

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