Giving information to accountant about clients

umop-apisdn

Hi,

I've got a question that I'm hoping someone can answer for me.

My accountant is in the process of doing a voluntary unprompted disclosure on my behalf and they have asked me to provide the names of clients I have provided services to (incase the Revenue seek this information for further clarification).

I have no problem supplying this information to the Revenue, but feel a little bit reluctant to give it to my accountants unless I really have to.
- I am a therapist and confidentiality is very important to most of my clients. Considering my accountants firm is in the same small town as where a number of my clients live, there's a good chance that names would be recognised.
- Also, I would hate for it to somehow get back to former clients that I didn't pay tax when I should have and am doing a voluntary disclosure to try and get things back on track - not exactly one of my finest moments, and certainly one I'd rather keep to myself.

So my question is... Do I have to give this information to my accountants, or would it be possible for me to hold off and give it direct to Revenue if/when they look for it?

Thanks

The_Bot

I wouldn't think you have to give this information to your accountant if you do not wish to.

While an accountant is working on behalf of his clients, and provides professional advice to that effect, ultimately he acts on his client's instructions when carrying out his work for them.

The unprompted disclosure is made by him on a client's behalf but is a unprompted disclosure made by the client. If a client does not want to include something in the disclosure, then that is the client's decision. The accountant can only advise what should be included in the disclosure but cannot ignore/overrule the client's explicit instructions.

Note that, in order to be qualifying, an unprompted disclosure must contain all information relevant to the disclosure. If not, there is the potential that Revenue will not accept the disclosure as qualifying. Whether or not the specific identities of your clients (or something more generic like a profile of client's private individuals, Irish companies, foreign companies etc) is necessary in the context of the disclosure is something you should discuss with you accountant.

Alan Shore

I've never done an unprompted voluntary disclosure but in prompted and revenue audits I would ask the client for everything.

If you were to say I can't give names then I would say you need to go through your appointment book, records and be 100% sure everything is accounted for. I would not have an issue with a medical professional not giving me names if I thought that the info being provided was 100% right. You will only get 1 chance to make a complete disclosure and your accountant is trying to ensure that everything is covered.

umop-apisdn

Thanks for your replies.

I took on board your comments about the disclosure being complete and decided to give the client's names to the Accountant, but I did include a note asking them to ensure that my client's details are kept confidential... or something to that effect.

Thanks again