Do I have to tell my old accountant I am leaving?

You do not have to have a difficult conversation, although a short email is courteous. The formal step is your new accountant writing for professional clearance, which notifies the outgoing firm of the change as a matter of course. Check your engagement letter for a notice period, since some firms ask for 30 days, and for anything about fees for work in progress. If you would rather not make contact at all, say so at the outset and the incoming firm handles it. What you should not do is disappear without settling an outstanding account, because unpaid fees are the single most common reason a handover stalls.

Will I lose access to my records or my software?

No, though it is worth being deliberate about it. Records belonging to you and your company are yours. Where bookkeeping software is involved, control is reassigned rather than rebuilt, so on Xero or FreeAgent you keep the full history and the new firm takes adviser access. The wrinkle is subscription ownership: if the licence sits with your old accountant, agree who holds it going forward before anything is transferred. Outstanding fees can complicate the release of certain documents, so settle the account or agree terms early. Ask your incoming accountant to list exactly what they are requesting, so you can see what should be arriving.

Is there a best time of year to switch accountants?

No. The process works the same in any month and a mid-year switch is completely routine. Two practical points. If you are within about three weeks of a hard filing deadline, expect the incoming firm to deal with that filing first and complete the handover afterwards, which is the right order rather than a delay. And if you are inside Making Tax Digital for Income Tax, the handover has to include digital records and software access, so allow a little more time. Waiting for a year end is the most common reason a switch gets postponed by twelve months and then never happens at all.

How long does switching actually take?

A clean handover, with a responsive outgoing firm and records in reasonable order, typically takes two to three weeks from signing to the new accountant being fully in place with HMRC authorisations. Your own involvement is roughly half an hour: signing an engagement letter, completing identification, and approving the HMRC authorisation. It takes longer where there are years of unfiled work to unpick, where the outgoing firm does not reply, or where fees are in dispute. Ask for a timescale up front and expect a specific answer. A firm that will not commit to one at the start is unlikely to be quicker later.

What if my old accountant will not respond?

It happens, and it should not hold your year hostage. A good incoming accountant chases, and after a reasonable period proceeds on the information available from HMRC, Companies House and your last filed accounts, rebuilding what is missing rather than waiting indefinitely. That costs a little more time, and occasionally a little more money, but it is far cheaper than missing a filing deadline while a letter goes unanswered. Ask any prospective firm how they handle a non-responsive predecessor before you appoint them. The answer tells you whether they have done this often, and whether they will chase without being chased.

Will switching trigger an HMRC enquiry?

No. Changing accountant is not a trigger in itself, and HMRC processes agent changes constantly as a routine administrative update. What can attract attention is what a new accountant sometimes finds: errors, omissions or unfiled returns from earlier years. If that happens, correcting it voluntarily is materially better than waiting to be found, because unprompted disclosures attract lower penalties than prompted ones. A firm that spots a historic problem and tells you plainly is doing its job. One that quietly carries a known error forward is storing up a larger bill for you later.

Switching accountants without the hassle

Most business owners who stay with an accountant they have outgrown are not happy. They are avoiding the hassle they assume comes with switching. It is one of those jobs that sits on the "someday" list for years, because it feels like it will mean weeks of admin, an awkward conversation and something important falling through a crack. In practice it is rarely that dramatic, and the parts that are genuinely fiddly are the new accountant's job, not yours.

The irony is that the businesses putting off a switch are usually the ones who would benefit most. The longer an underperforming relationship runs, the more small frustrations pile up, and the longer the business goes without advice and visibility it should have had years ago.

Why people actually switch

It is rarely one big thing. It is a slow accumulation: slow replies, unclear advice, too much chasing, no real visibility of the numbers between one year end and the next. Everything is reactive. None of it is a crisis on its own, but add it up over two years and it is easy to see why an owner eventually decides enough is enough.

The honest question to ask is whether the relationship is helping you run the business better or just processing the paperwork. There is a real difference between an accountant who files your returns on time and one who tells you, in January, what your tax bill is going to be in the following January — and what you could still do about it.

The five steps of a handover, and who does each one

Here is the whole process. You are involved in two of the five steps, and neither takes long.

You appoint the new firm. You sign an engagement letter setting out scope and fees, and complete anti-money-laundering identification. Every accountancy practice is required to verify your identity before acting, so photo ID and proof of address are not bureaucracy for its own sake. Your job. Twenty minutes.
The new firm writes for professional clearance. This is a letter from your incoming accountant to your outgoing one asking whether there is any professional reason not to accept the appointment, and requesting handover information. It is standard practice under the professional codes of ethics, it happens between the two firms, and it is not a confrontation. You do not referee it. Their job.
You authorise the new firm with HMRC. Either you sign a form 64-8, or you approve a digital request from the agent's HMRC agent services account with a couple of clicks from your own Government Gateway login. Authorisation is per tax — Corporation Tax, Self Assessment, VAT, PAYE — so check every service you use is covered rather than assuming one authorisation carries the lot. Your job. Ten minutes.
The records move. Last filed accounts and the tax computations behind them, the trial balance and closing balances, payroll records and pension data, VAT history, capital allowances and fixed asset schedules, and control of the bookkeeping software. If you are on Xero or FreeAgent, the subscription and the adviser access get reassigned rather than rebuilt. Their job.
The new firm reconciles and takes over the calendar. The first real test of a handover is whether the new accountant reconstructs your deadline list — year end, Corporation Tax, confirmation statement, VAT quarters, payroll RTI, Self Assessment — and tells you what is due before you have to ask. Their job.

The one thing that genuinely holds handovers up

Unpaid fees. If there is money outstanding with your current accountant, that is far and away the most common reason a handover stalls, because a firm is entitled to take a view on releasing certain documents while its account is unsettled. Nothing else in this process is contentious, so it is worth establishing early whether anything is owed and settling it or agreeing terms.

The second most common delay is quieter: an outgoing firm that simply does not reply. A good incoming accountant chases, and after a reasonable period proceeds on the information available from HMRC, Companies House and the last filed accounts rather than letting your year drift. Ask how they handle a non-responsive predecessor. The answer tells you something.

Worked example: a September switch, and what waiting would have cost

Illustrative, but the penalties and interest rates are the real ones.

A Ballymena limited company with a 31 March year end decides on Monday 7 September 2026 that it has had enough. Accounts for the year ended 31 March 2026 are not started. The Corporation Tax for that year is payable on 1 January 2027 and the CT600 is due by 31 March 2027. Estimated Corporation Tax: £20,000.

Day 1 — engagement letter signed, ID completed.
Day 2 — professional clearance letter goes to the outgoing firm.
Day 3 — 64-8 signed, or the digital authorisation approved online.
Day 12 — clearance response and records received.
Day 19 — records reconciled, deadline calendar rebuilt, draft accounts underway.
Mid-November — accounts and CT600 finalised, six weeks before the tax is due to be paid.

Roughly three weeks of elapsed time, of which the owner spent half an hour. Now price the alternative — drifting for another year with a firm that files late.

CT600 one day late: £200
Still late at three months: a further £200
Still late at six months: HMRC determines the tax and adds 10% of the unpaid tax — on £20,000 that is £2,000
Interest on £20,000 unpaid for six months at the current HMRC late payment rate of 7.75% (Bank of England base rate plus four percentage points, in force since 9 January 2026): about £775

That is £3,175 for one year handled badly, and it compounds: a third consecutive late return turns those £200 penalties into £1,000 each. Set against half an hour of your time, the arithmetic of switching is not close.

Timing: there is no wrong month, but two dates matter

You do not need to wait for a year end, a filing deadline, or the start of a tax year. The process works the same whenever you start it, and a mid-year switch is completely routine.

Two dates are worth having in mind. If you are within about three weeks of a hard filing deadline, expect the incoming firm to deal with that filing first and tidy the handover afterwards — that is the right order, not a delay. And if you are a sole trader or landlord inside Making Tax Digital for Income Tax, which began on 6 April 2026 for qualifying income over £50,000 and extends to over £30,000 from April 2027 and over £20,000 from April 2028, the handover now has to include the digital records and software access, not just a set of accounts. Our Making Tax Digital page sets out what that actually requires.

What to ask before you sign with anyone

Seven questions that separate firms quickly:

Who will actually do my work, and who do I email when something is urgent?
What is included in the fee, and what triggers an extra bill?
What will I get between year ends, and how often?
When will I know my tax bill — the month it is due, or the year before?
How do you handle it if my previous accountant does not respond?
Which software will I be on, and who owns the subscription?
Are you licensed and supervised, and by whom?

On the last one, for the record: Buzz Accounting is an AAT licensed practice, licence number 1001556, and is supervised for anti-money-laundering purposes by HMRC. It is a fair question to ask anyone, and a firm that is vague about the answer has told you something.

How Buzz makes it painless

We manage the handover end to end: writing for clearance, chasing it, getting the authorisations in place, pulling the records across, and rebuilding your deadline calendar so nothing is dropped in the gap. You sign two things and answer the odd question.

We will also give you a straight answer on timescale before anything starts. A clean handover with responsive predecessors runs in two to three weeks. One involving several years of unfiled work or a firm that has gone quiet takes longer, and we will say so at the outset rather than let you discover it.

If any of this sounds like your current situation, it is worth a conversation. See how we work with businesses like yours on our small business accounting page, work through the switching accountants checklist, or look at what is covered in our accountancy packages. Then get in touch and we will talk you through exactly what switching would look like for you.