Accountant advice & Pay

[MythtoMeasure]

Hi guys!
Thank you MIYB for opening this forum.
I have set up my own company, Myth-to-Measure Ltd, and I need some advice:

• Do you guys have a good accountant to recommend in South London? Not too expensive, for a new business? Someone that could perhaps do a first meeting to answer some questions and give a good view of how things are working in the UK? I had my own company in France for 5 years, but I don't know much about accountancy, taxes, and employment in the UK....
• I'd like to pay myself (I'm the Director of the company), but I can't be sure how much I can pay myself every month, and that amount might change from one month to the other. Is it possible in the UK to pay yourself differently each month? We have a scheme in France that allows that, a sort of percentage on turnover/business brought in, but I don't know if anything like that exists in the UK.

Thank you very much for your help with this, looking forward to chatting with you!

I’m one of the MIYB entrepreneurs, but new to Mumsnet so forgive me as I get used to this!
In terms of paying yourself, the main aim would be to take account of annual tax allowances. Monthly payment doesn’t matter, it’s all about what the totals are within the tax year. Then there’s paying yourself a dividend which can attract less tax.
An accountant can help you with all this. Full disclosure; my brother runs an accountancy business. I could put you in touch but I’m aware Mumsnet is not a forum for selling particular brands so I’ll leave it there for now unless the moderators tell me otherwise! Good luck, you sound well on your way!

@BlondeMoney
Thank you for this answer which is a first step for me.
There's the tax part, but also the "i need money to live" part. Which is why I will need to start paying myself a bit of money every month and I can't wait the end of the year and dividends...
But you are right, I think I need, definitely, to get in touch with accountants, learn about their rates and what they can do for me and help me with. The truth is, I am not afraid of doing most of the accounting myself, but I will need help with my tax report for instance, and not knowing many of the laws, I might forget to pay something.
If you'd like to get in touch, my email is favirgileatgmail.com, send me infos about your brother, I'd happily get in touch with him, and I don't know what the rules are here so perhaps even my message wasn't correct as I was asking for referrals and tips to find a good accountant in South London....

A limited company has more compliance costs, and fines if you get stuff wrong, than being a sole trader.

Companies are generally not worth considering unless you will be making profits regularly in excess of £40,000.

Accountancy fees for a company are likely to be three times that for a sole trader - so around £1500 pa min, rather than nearer £500.

The basic rule will be to keep everything, and also keep it filed neatly, rather than in a shoe box.

Should help to keep costs down when the year end comes around

There are loads of rules and regulations about payroll. It is very easy to get it wrong: for instance the advice that "Monthly payment doesn’t matter, it’s all about what the totals are within the tax year." is right sometimes and wrong other times.

Go and see an Accountant. They can help you set up your systems correctly from the start and save you from any expensive errors. Your accountant will probably run a payroll bureau service and can process your wages cheaper than you can.

Payroll is really very, very easy to do yourself though. I use SageOne Payroll - costs me £11 / month as I've got more employees, but at the moment it's on offer for £3 / month +VAT for up to 5 people.

My view having talked to others who use book-keepers/accountants is that if you're moderately competent at admin and happy to spend a bit of time reading through HMRC information / doing their webinars then you can easily keep costs down plus be more immediately in touch with your outgoings by doing your own books & payroll.

We’re covering lots of the topics you’re asking about at our events - the next few are being held in Barnet, Central London, Wilmslow and Cardiff and we’ll be holding them around the country in the months ahead. If you’re interested in coming along or receiving our newsletters/info about our mentors, you can sign up here. Just to be clear, it’s free to register and we’re not-for-profit. Really hope you find it useful

Thank you all!
I made an appointment with an accountant. That will give me an idea. But I might just start doing things myself after that, as I am pretty good with admin in general. Thank you @Sadik for recommending SageOne payroll.

Good luck!