The Purrfect Bookkeeper

13/10/2026

When I was 16, we had a German Shepherd named Bea - short for Beatrice or Beatrix – I don’t recall her full name now. I adored her. Even though my dad had got her, I was the one spending all my time with her, taking her for walks after school, cleaning her outside house, and chilling with her in the lounge in the evenings. She was a great companion for me. ❤️
My mum didn’t really like her, and didn’t know how to handle such big dogs, so she was stuck in her outhouse while I was at school. As soon as I got home after school I would take her out for a walk in the park, which was just down the road from our house, and let her run and play out. Then after dinner I would let her into the house to chill with me.
One day I was in my room and heard some commotion outside. I looked out the window, and Bea was being put in a car of a stranger! I ran downstairs to find out what was happening, and my dad told me he’d sold her! It turned out my dad was leaving us, my parents were divorcing, and he couldn’t take the dog with him, so he sold her! I didn’t even get a chance to say goodbye 😢. I was heartbroken! And furious with my dad! And also my mum who refused to keep her if my dad wasn’t there anymore, even though I said I’d take care of her as I had been doing. It wasn’t enough.

I’ve had a few dogs of my own since then, but never one quite like Bea.

My son has Down’s Syndrome and he’s scared of dogs, especially when they bark unexpectedly, so I’ve not been able to get a dog since my son was born, so now we have 2 cats. It’s not quite the same, but it fits our current life.

And that is why I have cat on my logo instead of a dog 😁. www.thepurrfectbookkeeper.co.uk

22/08/2026

In 1977, I got hired because of World War 2.
Let me explain.
I'd just emigrated to New Zealand. Dutch girl, no experience in anything, nothing but a typing course under my belt.
I walked into a job interview for an "accounts clerk."
The man interviewing me heard my accent. His face changed.
Turned out he'd been stationed in the Netherlands during WW2 -- in a town right near where I grew up. He loved Dutch people. Said they were the hardest workers he'd ever met.
He took a chance on me.
I took to it like a duck to water.
Within 3 months I had the entire job under control. Finished my work at 3pm instead of the usual 5. They gave me a second person's workload. Few months later I was doing two people's
jobs and finishing at 4.
That pattern never stopped. Every place I worked, same reaction -- surprise at how fast I got things done. My last employer, the person who replaced me couldn't handle all the work I'd been doing on my own.
That was nearly 50 years ago. I still do this work. And I still love it.
When I started, there were no computers. Every entry, every ledger, every reconciliation -- all done by hand. That gave me something the newer bookkeepers don't have. I don't just operate
software. I understand what the numbers actually mean.
So when something doesn't add up, I find it. That's my favourite part. Troubleshooting. Digging through the figures until I find exactly where it went wrong and fixing it.
Years later I started my own business here in the UK. Needed to stand out. I remembered something from Les Dane -- Big League Sales Closing Techniques. He wrote that you have to
differentiate yourself from everyone else. Wear a special hat. Do something nobody in your field does.
So I put a cat on my letterhead.
This was before email. I'd send letters to people on that letterhead. And something happened I didn't expect.
They remembered me.
"Oh, you're the girl with the cat on the letterhead!"
In 2012 I wanted a proper company name. The old one didn't mean anything to people. A friend took me to a printer. The lady there chatted with me about what I wanted. I told her I wanted to
keep the cat.
She smiled and said: "The Purrfect Bookkeeper."
That's been the name ever since. But here's what it actually stands for.
Give me your cooperation and I guarantee your accounts will be 100% correct. No HMRC surprises. No guessing where the money went. Real figures you can use to make real business
decisions.
Nearly 50 years in, and I still find the source of the problem faster than anyone expects.
Some things don't change.
P.S. I've got room for 5 more clients -- that's my limit because I don't cut corners. If you know a small business owner who's stressed about their books, or dreading their next VAT return, or
just wants to finally trust their numbers -- tag them in the comments. No pitch, just a conversation to see if it's a fit.
-- Lisa

07/05/2026

wow, what a win! In my busiest VAT month, HMRC decided to delete my agent account, so that I couldn't submit any VAT returns! All of my clients rallied behind me, and made it happen! At 5:30pm tonight we filed the last VAT return! All on time!! Thank you all!

28/04/2026

Hi. For the first time in many years, I have now space to accept another client for my bookkeeping services: http://www.thepurrfectbookkeeper.co.uk. With over 48 years experience, I support small local business owners with dependable, no-nonsense bookkeeping. If you or anyone you know would like me to take your bookkeeping off your hands, then please get in touch.

Call now to connect with business.

08/05/2025

I recently fell victim to a cyber-attack, and want to warn you all to be wary:
I first discovered this when I tried to log into my agent account for self-assessment and CIS (Construction Industry Scheme) - I couldn't log in, and when I called HMRC (His Majesty's Revenue & Customs) I was told my account was suspended due to suspicious activity. Two weeks later my account was back online. Of course, the first thing I did was change my password. Then I checked the account, and an unknown person had been added into my self-assessment area, and a client had been deleted from my CIS area. I immediately deleted the extra person and changed my password again. I reported the breach to ICO (Information Commissioner's Office) and ICB (Institute of Certified Bookkeepers) and contacted all my clients and all the subcontractors who were recorded in the CIS, probably about 90 people in total. I ran a total scan of my computer and found some trojans (malware disguised as a legitimate file or software).
Now, I'm quite cyber aware and keep up to date with the latest scams, so couldn't figure out what had happened. I have a password manager where all my passwords are encrypted. How could someone possibly get a hold of any? How could a trojan get past my security software?
Today I received a newsletter from AccountingWeb entitled Agent accounts under attack in new cybercrime wave
By Tom Herbert
Cybercriminals are targeting access to accounting firm agent services accounts to file bogus repayment claims for clients, with the illicit funds funnelled into bank accounts controlled by the scammers. Two AccountingWEB readers share their stories.
This gave me my first clue: the purpose of why my account was breached.
Reading the report itself then finally gave me the clue on where to search for the breach: I looked and found that on 24/3 I was approached by a possible new client who needed her self-assessment tax return doing. She emailed me the following day with a pdf supposed to be her last tax return! Of course it wasn't! It ended up being a “pdf.exe” file, which I didn’t run, but just downloading it must have done enough damage. Oh yes, it was sent to me as a zip-file, and I unzipped it!
I now feel better knowing what happened. For the last few weeks, I've felt lost, violated, not sure who or what to trust anymore online or on/in emails. I wish I hadn’t had to learn this, but now I have, I will definitely be sooo much more careful about what files I open!
I hope that none of you have to learn this lesson. Be careful out there!

14/04/2025

As you may or may not know, the Self-Assessments are changing for Sole Traders and Rental Property owners. As of 1 April 2026, the new regulations for MTD IT (=Making Tax Digital for Income Tax), require that regular quarterly digital reports are sent in to HMRC. This means that you need to do at least quarterly bookkeeping in a digital software which is MTD-ready to enable you to send these quarterly updates to HMRC. The end-of-year annual return is also then submitted digitally.

If you have several streams of income, these need to be reported separately in separate quarterly updates. I still need to clarify exactly what this means, as it would not be cost-effective to have several subscriptions for software for each income stream.

The level of total income for the financial year of 2024/25, determines the mandation date as follows:
Total income over £50,000, start date 6 April 2026
Total income between £30,000 and £50,000, start date 6 April 2027
Total income between £20,000 and £30,000, start date 6 April 2028
Total income less than £20,000, start date to be advised.
Note: the total income is considered to be the total turnover for the Sole Trader activities + the rental property income; NOT the profit, but the income!
The financial year remains as 6th of April to the following year 5th of April. You can request this to be changed to the calendar months of 1 April to the following year 31 March, which works easier with some software and I will be doing this for most of my customers.

Once you’ve been mandated, you will remain in the scheme for a minimum of 3 years, even if your total income changes during that time.

HMRC will be sending out letters to all taxpayers who fall within these categories, to advise you of your mandation date.

The following are the quarters return dates:
Quarterly update April-June, due 7 August
Quarterly update July-September, due 7 November
Quarterly update October-December, due 7 February
Quarterly update January-March, due 7 May
Annual return still due by 31 January the following year, same as it is now, but it’s now going to be submitted in a digital form.

I will keep you updated with any news about this. If you have any questions, please do ask.

Lisa 🙂

05/03/2025

Good afternoon.

I attended a webinar this morning, about e-invoicing: E-invoicing is the digital exchange of invoice information directly between buyers’ and suppliers’ financial systems, even if these systems are different.
There are countries who already use this system, in some countries it is mandatory, and in some it’s voluntary. The UK government is considering adopting this system, either mandatory, or voluntary. They are doing this for 2 reasons: 1) is to close the VAT/tax gap: the VAT compliance gap is an estimate of overall non-compliance. It is a proxy for VAT revenues lost due to VAT fraud, evasion and avoidance, non-fraudulent bankruptcies and financial insolvencies, or miscalculations, among other drivers. And 2) to help businesses with efficiency, cost savings and improved cash flow. HMRC is doing a public consultation about this, which closes on 7 May: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/promoting-electronic-invoicing-across-uk-businesses-and-the-public-sector/electronic-invoicing-promoting-e-invoicing-across-uk-businesses-and-the-public-sector -consultation-process . If you’re interested to let them know what you think about this, you can complete the form on that page.

This is my understanding of e-invoicing: all UK businesses, who sell to other businesses (or the government or the NHS), will send an e-invoice from their software directly into their client’s software, from where it can be processed and paid. Even if you don’t send invoices to other businesses, you’re most likely to be in a position to receive such bills from other businesses, so you need to have software in place that can receive e-invoices. For that purpose, there is already a software on the market called Apron, from which I’ve heard very good reports although I’ve not tested it myself. You can receive and pay your bills through Apron. Of course you can receive those e-invoices into QuickBooks, but if you don’t use that system yourself, then you won’t have access to those bills! Whichever way it might happen, it does seem to create a need for businesses to become more digital.
It's not likely to happen before 2030 in any case. But if you want to have a say in it, I recommend that you take part in the consultation.
Keep it simple.
Lisa @ The Purrfect Bookkeeper

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11/12/2024

In the last year or so, I frequently have contacts with training companies, who promote that I shouldn't be spending all my time with compliance work, but instead should become an advisor/consultant. Why? What's wrong with being a bookkeeper?