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Terms of Engagement

Liability limited by a scheme approved under Professional Standards Legislation.

 

These terms and conditions (the “Terms”), expressly declare and outline the rules and regulations of the business. The Terms are conditions precedent for the use. By accessing/using/recommending/signing up/referring to someone or engaging with us, we assume you accept these Terms, and you declare that you expressly accept the Terms without any force and coercion. You are hereby warned and made clear without any kind of ambiguity that if you do not accept these Terms you may not proceed further. You are also being made aware that if you sign up/move forward/access/recommend to someone without accepting the Terms, you would keep us, our owners/affiliates/employees and all person affiliated with us, harmless and you waive off all your rights to sue us, our owners and all affiliates.

 

Confirming our discussions to date I am pleased to accept appointment as your Accountant/ Tax Agent. I/We will act in your best interest at all times and provide the highest level of professional service. This document sets out the terms of the engagement. Any additions will be by the written agreement of both parties.

 

As your Accountant/Tax Agent I/we will:

a) analyse, discuss and prepare recommendations regarding your accounting records and financial affairs;

b) prepare financial and other statements as requested;

c) prepare and lodge taxation returns, review assessments and advise on appeal procedures where necessary; and.

d) undertake other work as agreed.

 

You are reminded that:

performance of tasks is limited exclusively to those set out in this engagement letter;

I/We do not (unless otherwise engaged to do so) undertake an audit or review, and as such no assurance will be expressed; and unless I am/we are otherwise engaged to do so, this engagement cannot be relied upon to detect or otherwise disclose irregularities (such as fraud, illegalities or the errors of other parties).

 

Previous Accountant

As a matter of professional courtesy, and in line with requirements of the IPA, we/I will need to inform your previous accountant that we/I have been engaged by you as your new accountant and to receive from them any outstanding matters and files. You may refuse to provide this information but in doing it may cause problems in the efficient transfer of your files.

 

Your obligations

This Agreement requires you to meet certain conditions. You must:

• At all times tell Ideal Business Group openly and honestly everything relevant to your matter;

• Fully co-operate with Ideal Business Group and do everything that

Ideal Business Group reasonably asks;

• Accept and follow all reasonable advice that Ideal Business Group gives you;

• Make payment of any fees or disbursements as required by this

Agreement.

 

In cases where Ideal Business Group is requested to provide professional guidance or advice, unless these guidance and advice are formerly engaged with terms and payment, Ideal Business Group will not be held responsible and/or liable for the result nor consequence of the unengaged guidance and advice.

If you fail to comply with any of these conditions, Ideal Business Group has the right to terminate this Agreement.

 

Termination of this Agreement

If this Agreement is terminated either by your failure to comply with any of your obligations or by you exercising your right to terminate, then Ideal Business Group will charge you for your service costs incurred up to an as at the date of termination.

 

You may terminate this Agreement at any time by providing Ideal Business Group with notice in writing. Ideal Business Group reserves the right to terminate the services at any time with seven (7) days’ notice of intention to terminate this Agreement, and the grounds on which the notice is based. On termination, Ideal Business Group will provide you with a bill for the service costs for which you are liable. When Ideal Business Group does transfer your file it will only include official and original documents that relate to your matter, in particular, it will not include any documents relating to the general knowledge, expertise, paperwork, or other resources held by Ideal Business Group.

 

Service and Price Guarantee

Ideal Business Group will always stand behind the quality and professional nature of the services that we offer. If at any point you are not completely satisfied with the services we have performed, we encourage you to bring this to our attention immediately. We’d love the opportunity to correctly address your concerns and allow us a chance to win your trust back and prevent similar problems from happening in the future.

If you are still not satisfied with the outcome of our services, we will work towards a mutual agreement regarding the payment for services completed. As an example, we may agree to either forgive the related payment or accept a portion of the originally agreed price that reflects your level of satisfaction.

 

PRIVACY – COLLECTION AND USE OF PERSONAL INFORMATION

Ideal Business Group collects personal information from you in a variety of ways, including when you interact with us electronically or in person, when you access our services and when we provide our services to you. We may receive personal information from third parties. If we do, we will protect it as set out in this Privacy Policy. 

 

Compliance

To assist with processing of bookkeeping, preparation of financial statements, income tax returns for all entity types.  These contractors, if engaged, will work on our systems and/or secured server environment. Your information shall always be confined to our systems and/or on a secured server environment. 

 

Contractors we use include: -

Zanida Nominees Pty Limited (Sydney) and its subsidiary AccSource Knowledge Process Outsourcing Private Limited (Chennai).

We engage in third-party external IT providers to provide IT services to ensure the integrity and security of our IT systems.  With increased complexities and everchanging Information Technology necessitates engaging an IT specialist.

 

Data Storage

Dependant on the type of data, client data is hosted on various cloud-based platforms.  Secure portals in which clients can login and transfer data are currently being implementing within the practice.  Current storage facilities include: -

  • One Drive for Business

  • Outlook – (Office 365 for Business)

  • Sage Handisoft Client Portal

  • BGL 360 (superannuation)

  • Myob Account Right Live

 

External Advice

Seeking an opinion or advice from a third party, such as another registered tax practitioner, financial advisor, or legal practitioner e.g. National Tax and Accountants Association.  In all instances, other than with explicit authorisation, your identity is kept confidential from the external advisor.

 

FEE CALCULATION METHOD

 

Professional Fees

Professional fees are our charges for performing accounting work on your behalf. Ideal Business Group may charge fees by reference to time spent, as a fixed fee or a combination of both. Please refer to Part A of this Agreement for a description of the professional fee arrangement for your matter. If this Agreement provides for fees charged by reference to time spent, Ideal Business Group will charge a fee per hour or proportion of an hour, depending upon the time spent on the matter, by reference to a minimum unit of 15 minutes.  Fees will be charged for all work carried out including file work, meetings and travelling. Ideal Business Group will not increase hourly fees more often than once each year.

If this Agreement provides for a fixed fee, Ideal Business Group will charge a fixed fee as specified in Part A for various stages of the work.

Throughout the course of your matter Ideal Business Group is entitled to increase its fees in line with inflationary pressures, additional service(s) and/or service(s) complexity.

 

Part A – Fixed Fee

Why do we offer a fixed price agreement for ongoing services?

Because, you don’t have to worry about paying for more hours than you thought it would take. We have to focus on being more efficient to ensure our relationship is mutually profitable. This means we can leverage the best in breed technology to constantly improve the quality of the services we deliver to you.

 

It opens the lines of communication. You don’t have to be afraid to contact us with questions and be worried about receiving a bill for your time. All of our fixed price agreements include support and regularly scheduled review sessions. In fact, we encourage constant communication between Sample and Ideal Business Group. Becoming your trusted advisor is our mission and open communication is the key.

The parties have agreed and authorised that fees will be deducted directly from any tax refund and/or grants. In accordance with the requirements of the Institute of Professional Accountants, your refund and/or grant will be deposited into a Trust Account with fees and charges deducted and any balance forwarded as agreed.

If any work is required to be undertaken under direction of Responsible Person for a company, a Trust, a Partnership, a joint venture, a superannuation Fund or any other entity with which Relevant Person may be associated then notwithstanding that the work may be undertaken on behalf of that company, Trust, Partnership, joint venture, Superannuation Fund or any other entity then Relevant Person agrees to accept absolute liability for the professional fees of Relevant Entity, and he/she shall be personally responsible for all debts arising there from.

Where possible, we will give you an estimate of our fees in the Client Services Agreement (or Proposal). Any fee estimate is based on our current understanding of the circumstances and scope of work required, and therefore is not binding on us.

 

We may revise our fee scale from time to time. Rates quoted to you remain in force until the next 31 December or 30 June (whichever is sooner). We may increase our fees for any work performed after these dates. We reserve the right to change our rates outside these dates and will communicate any such change directly to you. Your obligation to pay us the fees and expenses arises at the commencement of the Contract after which you will be issued an invoice(s). Fees and expenses will be invoiced monthly and are payable within 14 days of the invoice date. Where an amount for GST is stated to be a component of the fees and expenses, our invoice will be a compliant “tax invoice” for GST purposes.

Any estimates for the cost of service are only an estimate and the actual cost may vary due to unforeseeable problems and delays that occur through third persons or deficiencies in documentation.

Our terms of payment are strictly 30 days from the date of each invoice.  We will provide you with an itemised account of professional fees, costs and disbursements on all invoices.  Where accounts are outside our normal trading terms, an account management fee is charged with overdraft interest rates per month.  This charge will only occur where arrangements for time payment have been made and not adhered to, or where accounts are outside our normal trading terms.

If we are instructed by the client to complete work on their behalf ‘after the receipt of our letter of appointment’ then we will concur that the client has accepted our terms of engagement and is responsible for all accounts rendered from the date of this letter of appointment.

 

If we receive any legally enforceable notice or demand issued by any third party (including but not limited to ASIC, the ATO, the Australian Securities Exchange, any court or tribunal) in relation to or in connection with the services, you agree to pay our reasonable professional costs and expenses (including solicitor/client expenses) in complying with or challenging any such notice or demand to the extent that our costs and expenses are not recovered or recoverable from the party issuing the notice or demand. We will notify you as soon as practicable (unless restricted by law) where we receive any such legally enforceable notice or demand.

 

We may charge interest on amounts which are overdue by more than a month at a rate capped at 10%, except for any Audit, Review or Other Assurance engagement. If your account remains unpaid and there is no satisfactory explanation for non-payment we may:

 

(a) start proceedings to recover the amount owed, plus default interest (if applicable) and any collection costs incurred; and/or

 

(b) do no further work for you, and will not release your papers and files until all overdue amounts and any interest are paid (if applicable).

 

If a Bill of Costs is not paid within fourteen (30) days of your receiving it, Ideal Business Group is entitled to charge interest on the amount outstanding provided Ideal Business Group notifies you in the Bill of Costs of our intention to charge interest. Ideal Business Group may charge interest of as per ATO Benchmark Rate per annum for all late payments.

 

Disclosure of Documents and Material

The client must provide all information and documents relevant to the proper performance of the work at the outset of the engagement and during the engagement.  This is included, but not limited to, promptly advising us of anything that occurs subsequent to rendering information where circumstances have made this information incorrect, misleading or unreliable. The client must provide all relevant material and information that impinges on accuracy of the work undertaken in respect to taxation returns and financial reports or any other material or reports made available to any authority, private sector firm or any organisation.

 

Documents

Before lodging documents to any statutory body, we seek clients’ approval. This may come in the form via the internet, in writing. Furthermore, we shall endeavour to lodge documents by the due dates, provided all information and documentation signed are received within 30 working days prior to date to allow adequate time for the preparation and lodgement of the documentation.

On the receipt of all relevant tax file number, date of birth, address and other personal information provided in the course of registering our tax agency with the ATO is taken as providing the client’s digital signature to us.

Thank you for the opportunity to provide professional accounting and taxation services.

 

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