This month we shout for joy to our new parents Tomoka and Anthony Kawamoto!
Wishing you much happiness as you welcome baby Kei Kawamoto into your family.
Congratulations from your Harris Black Team!
Author: Harris Black
Meet Gerald Simeon
Gerald joined the Harris Black team in 2012 as an Administration Assistant. Gerald went to university in the Philippines and completed his MBA at CQUniversity in December 2009.
Some interesting facts about Gerald – born in Mandaluyong, Philippines, Gerald speaks fluent Filipino and Tagalog. One of Gerald’s hobbies is photography and a skill he would like to master is drawing. If Gerald could live anywhere, he would live in Seoul, Korea because of the friendly people and great food, but the most relaxing place he’s visited is Boracay in the Philippines. If he could eat any food for the rest of his life, it would be Korean BBQ, but for breakfast Gerald enjoys peanut butter toast – with sugar!
An excerpt of the interview with Gerald is below.
To view the full interview, please click here.
2019 Melbourne Cup Day
Another great HB function to celebrate Melbourne Cup was held on 5 November with the entire office jumping on a City Cat and spending the afternoon at the Regatta Hotel’s Courtyard and The Walrus Club. Needless to say, plenty of fun was had by all.. great food consumed, champagne sipped and a few wallets made a little lighter with a few misplaced bets!
Brentnalls Affiliation Conference
On Wednesday 23 October 2019, Harris Black’s Directors, Practice Manager (Kimberley Schluter) and Workflow Manager (Kath Healy) headed to the Sofitel Hotel in Darling Harbour, Sydney for another of the firm’s bi-annual Brentnalls Conferences.
As many of you will already know, the Brentnalls affiliation is a network of like-minded, independent Chartered Accounting firms across Australia with members in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Hamilton VIC, Perth and Auckland NZ. Harris Black has been part of this dynamic group of professionals for over 20 years. Each of our firms have a similar passion for improving client service and striving for best practice in all areas of business. In particular we are all very focused on helping our clients achieve their goals, develop their businesses and ultimately grow their wealth.
Our Brentnalls Conferences are generally held in October and April/May of each year and run across 2-3 days. They provide us with the valuable opportunity to share our ideas, further develop our capabilities through collaboration with our colleagues from other firms and ultimately improve our ability to better support and provide exceptional service to our own clients.
The focus topics for this conference were well received and considered by all. They included the following:
Compliance issues associated with the use of Electronic Signatures – guest speaker, solicitor David Reid;
Audit protection insurance and the increasing number of ATO Audits conducted by governing bodies – guest speaker, Michael Sexton from “Accountancy Insurance”
Innovation – what stifles innovation in the workplace and ways to create an innovative culture within your firm – guest speaker James O’Loghlin
Additionally, as is the norm for our October conferences, each firm provided an update on their internal practices which in turn generates further collaboration within the group to identify and implement best practices.
The Brentnalls group enjoys a great camaraderie given many of the participating professionals have known each other for a significant period of time. Whilst the days are hectic and packed with information and discussion, we do tend to enjoy our evenings with a few relaxing drinks, great dinners and plenty of laughter.
Australian Financial Review – Top 100 Accounting Firms 2019
Harris Black is proud to be a founding member of the Brentnalls National Affiliation, which has just been ranked 28th in the Australian Financial Review Top 100 Accounting Firms of 2019.
The growth of Harris Black and all firms in the affiliation is a testament to the collaborative model and culture of the group, where the focus is on being better positioned to help our clients achieve their goals.
“The AFR 100 result is a recognition of the strong trans-Tasman brand that is Brentnalls. It continues the trend of recognition by the market that holistic and complex advisory and accounting services are not served just by the Big 4 and 2nd tier firms; a recognition that a strong trans-Tasman affiliation can provide “A” grade solutions whilst continuing to provide a strong client relationship that mid-sized firms have traditionally provided”
Geoff Fitzgerald
Brentnalls National Affiliation Chairman
Unpaid Super: Important Amnesty Update For Employers
The launch of Single Touch Payroll (STP) will dramatically improve the ATO’s ability to monitor employers’ compliance with compulsory super laws moving forward. This electronic reporting standard is now mandatory for all Australian businesses and gives the ATO fast access to income and superannuation information for all employees.
The government is getting tough on unpaid compulsory super guarantee (SG) contributions, but fortunately for businesses it has recently announced a revised “grace period” to rectify past non-compliance. All businesses should review their super compliance to consider what action they may need to take.
The timing of your disclosure is important. The proposed new amnesty will cover both previous disclosures made since 24 May 2018 (under the old amnesty scheme that the government failed to officially implement) and, importantly, disclosures made up until six months after the proposed legislation passes parliament.