Horse 274 - Client Species

There are several kinds of clients that exist if you are an accountant.

1. Meticulous Record Keepers
These are the bozos who keep everything no matter how irrelevant of petty it is. These people will keep every receipt right down to the pack of Tic Tacs they bought at 12:37am on September the 17th.
These people mean well but unfortunately generally have the expectation that if they are that ordered then so should the accountants be. Accounts are to be generated and reports created by magic. They gave us literally everything they could think of, the answer has to be in there surely.

2. She'll be Right
In stark contrast are those people who save nothing. Every single bit of paper they posess gets turfed, or if they are hippies, recycled. The problem here is what do you do with no information? Sometimes they keep bank statements and things can sort of be worked out from there.
Their philosophy is that it's the accountant's job to do "the accountant's job" therefore at the point that their one piece of paper gets slipped under the door, they out like a shot leaving us to do yet more magic.

3. I've Just Found This
These people would keep immaculate records if they could remember not to leave everything behind the TV. They can do their own magic, and it's rather like producing rabbits from hats. Rabbits have this amazing habit of burgeoning populations from only 1, I'm utterly convinced that the people who keep records like this must magic them up sheet by sheet.
The whole downside to this is that although you may start work for them in July, in can in some cases be next May before the first draft accounts are ready.

4. But I Sent In the Form
This one was quite new to me. There are people who understand all about tax. They can fill in every form brilliantly but then it all seems to go horribly wrong. For although they can do every single calculation to a T, they neglect one very simple procedure... to actually pay tax.
The two sides to filling in a tax form are filling in correctly and then sending a cheque to go along with that form. Give unto Caesar what is Caesar's. The problem is that they get all these nasty bills and then complain that they did send the forms in. In order to pay tax, first you have to pay tax.

5. Do You Know a Good...?
I am not Sensis Pty Ltd. I know that I use a lawyer, banker, financial planner etc but I am not one, do not have a trading certificate in same and am not connected to one. The notion that the accountant is somehow connected to the world because he sees all sorts of documents is really a furphy.
I can not have a chat to the Judge, I can not represent you in court and I do not know which shares, property or bonds to buy.

People are thick.