CIPFA - Practice Assurance

Practice Assurance scheme review

CIPFA recently surveyed our Members in Practice, and we are very grateful to all members who responded. We achieved a response rate of more than 50%, and this has helped us to understand more about the professional activities of CPFAs in this group. The results of the survey have been published on the Practice Assurance website.

Members were also invited to let us know their view about how the scheme is working. As a result of members’ responses, some adjustments to the scheme will be considered by CIPFA Council, with a view to making processes more efficient. These centre on the review visit process, and during the remainder of 2009 we will be piloting some alternatives to the present requirement for a full day review. Further updates will appear in Spreadsheet.

Several members also offered to help us to develop a virtual network for members in practice. We will be looking at the possibilities here, and will be in touch with some of these volunteers in due course.

Additionally, members raised a very wide range of issues, and we felt that it would be helpful to let all members in practice have access to our responses. As always, we are happy to hear from any particular issues that an individual member would like to raise – it helps us to deal with these efficiently if these can be emailed to practiceassurance@cipfa.org

CIPFA Practice Assurance Survey 2009 [PDF 32KB]

The issues raised fell into the following groups

Fees
Practice Assurance is not, and has never been intended to be a revenue raiser for the Institute. The fees charged are intended to cover the direct costs of the scheme, largely represented by the review visit, servicing the Practice Assurance Committee, and dealing with applications and renewals.

Some members asked whether lower fees could be agreed for those with lower turnover figures. We will look at whether at the streamlined methods of assurance review mentioned above may justify any adjustment, but on the whole, the costs of the scheme do not vary with a member’s turnover. We will also specifically consider the current threshold limits for charitable and voluntary work.

Partners in firms
Members whose activities are supervised by other bodies such as the ICAEW or the FSA (either individually, or via their firms) do need to register with the CIPFA scheme. As a responsible institute, we feel that we must take steps to make ourselves aware of members in this group. Provided that we have recognised the other supervisory scheme, we will not ask for another fee.

Money Laundering regulations
The law of the UK requires anyone who provides accountancy services to clients to register with an approved scheme, irrespective of whether they handle client money. Joining the CIPFA scheme enables compliance with the Money Laundering Regulations. The content of those regulations reflects the UK’s compliance with European requirements.

Interim placements
The Institute believes that people who work in interim placements should be included in the scheme, and this view was supported both by the original members’ focus group, and by the Practice Assurance Committee. We do recognise that the assurance review process needs to be adapted to a member’s individual circumstances, and the plan to pilot alternative methods was mentioned above.

Support Resources
There is a dedicated email helpline, and we have also made available the suite of ICAEW helpsheets on private practice, which we hope will prove to be a valuable resource for members. These are available only to practising certificate holders, and can be accessed via the CIPFA Learning Centre.

CPD
There is some crossover between the Practice Assurance Scheme and our CPD requirements. We recognize that members will discuss their CPD activity as part of a Quality Assurance Visit. Therefore Members in Practice will be exempted from the random selection to provide their Portfolio of Evidence to the CPD section while they hold a Practising Certificate.

Employment Status
The scheme is intended to include members who provide accountancy services to clients. Unless a member is are employed directly by the organisation that receives those services, it is likely that he or she will be required to hold a practising certificate.

The group of certificate holders includes a wide range of legal status – self employed/client, services provided via a member’s own company, working via an agency (whether or not employed by that agency), working in an umbrella company etc. Practising certificates are required by all members of these kinds.

If the member is a partner in a firm, or a director of a company, he or she will need a practising certificate (unless the firm or company is supervised by another approved scheme).