Salary too high? I think not

After last years aborted management buy out the proposed sale of the practice is still on, although it has to be said the initial torch beam of excitement seems to have dimmed a little and the seeking out of prospective suitors is not perhaps being undertaken with as much vim and vigour as it could be. That said we have had two positive enquiries and one has resulted in an interview/preliminary meeting at the end of this week - an accountancy practice from London.

We did have another local party interested but they cooled off when they saw what salaries we are paid. It seemed an unusual reason for declining an invitation to meet some of the most exciting people you could meet in an accountancy practice but there you go. It led, naturally, to a little online and dead wood research into salaries and the general market for accountancy practices. It is true that it one case the salary received by the individual concerned is not only about £6,000 over market rates but a similar level over what most of us think the person concerned is worth. My own salary is actually below market rates but I had the sense when negotiating my contract of employment to have a clause included for a performance related bonus which brings me up to what it should be.

The one thing that simple facts and figures don't reflect though is how we compare in terms of fees per person where we are well ahead of the game, looking at some practices for sale in the London area we are turning over more than two times the level of fees of some other firms. When practices have come on the market locally we been astonished and amused in equal measures at the relatively low level of work and income some of our competitors seem to generate - are we therefore overworked and overpaid?

Anyway the visitor from the east arrived early for his appointment and drove into our clients car park where the only car present was a Jaguar, the visitor himself was driving a Bentley - good start or what?