Terms of Engagement

At Holzworth Partners, our goal is to provide personalised, professional accounting and advisory services tailored to your individual or business needs. This engagement outlines the basis on which we will work together, ensuring clear expectations, responsibilities, and a shared understanding of how we’ll help you meet your financial goals.

Objective and Scope of Services

Depending on your needs, our services may include:

  • Preparation and lodgement of individual and business tax returns

  • BAS, GST and PAYG reporting and lodgements

  • Business and company financial statements

  • Superannuation and SMSF administration and advice

  • Tax planning and structuring

  • Payroll and bookkeeping services

  • Corporate compliance and ASIC reporting

All services are delivered in accordance with professional and ethical standards, and will be tailored to your specific circumstances. Unless otherwise agreed, our engagement does not include an audit or review and no formal assurance will be provided.

Please be aware that we will not conduct an audit or review unless specified above as a service to be performed for you and accordingly, no assurance will be expressed.

Unless specified above as a service to be performed for you, this engagement cannot be relied upon to disclose irregularities including fraud, other illegal acts and errors that may occur, however we will inform you of such matters if they come to our attention.

We will perform the requested services in accordance with professional and ethical standards as required by the Accounting Professional & Ethical Standards Board (APESB).  These standards required that, in undertaking this engagement, we comply with the relevant ethical requirements of APES 110 Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants (including Independence Standards).

The Accountant is bound by the APES 110, and pursuant to the Responding to Non-Compliance with Laws and Regulations (NOCLAR) requirements, the Accountant is required to report any non-compliance with laws and regulations or acts of omission or commission, intentional or unintentional by a client or by those charged with governance, by management or by other individuals working for or under the direction of a client which are contrary to the prevailing laws or regulations.

Use of Consumer Data Right Data

We acknowledge that you may consent for an Accredited Data Recipient under the Consumer Data Right (CDR) to disclose your CDR data to us.  We confirm that for this purpose you may nominate Holzworth Partners as your Trusted Adviser and that as your trusted adviser, we will only access the data necessary to provide the services in this engagement letter.

Scope

The engagement period commences on the agreed date and will continue until all quoted work is complete.

Output

Any reports including Financial Statements and Income Tax Returns will be prepared for distribution to the specific organisation, client or entity for the purpose specified in the report.  There is no assumption of responsibility for any reliance on our report by any person or entity other than you and those parties indicated in the report.  The report shall not be inferred or used for any purpose other than for which it was specifically prepared.  Accordingly, our report may include a disclaimer to this effect.

Professional Standards Scheme

As a member of the IPA, we are part of the IPA Professional Standards Scheme, and our liability is limited by a Scheme approved under Professional Standards Legislation.  For more information on the IPA Professional Standards Scheme or Professional Standards Schemes generally, please refer to: www.psc.gov.au.

Relative responsibilities

As a member of the IPA, we are subject to the IPA’s Quality Review Program (QRP) mandated by the International Federation of Accountants.  QRP assesses member compliance with the professional and ethical standards and by accepting our engagement you acknowledge that, if requested by the IPA, our files relating to this engagement may be made available for QRP review.  Unless otherwise advised, you are consenting to your files being part of a QRP.

You are required by law to keep full and accurate records relating to your tax affairs.  It is your obligation to provide us with all information that are reasonably expected as necessary to allow us to perform the services for you under this engagement as requested.  This includes you providing accurate and complete responses to questions asked of you by us.  Inaccurate, incomplete, or late information may have a material effect on our services or reports.

The Taxation Administration Act 1953 contains specific provisions that may provide you with “safe harbour” from administrative penalties for incorrect or late lodgement of returns.  These safe harbour provisions will only be available to you if, amongst other things, you provide “all relevant taxation information” to us in a timely manner.  Accordingly, it is to your advantage that all relevant information is disclosed to us as any failure by you to provide this information may affect your ability to rely on the “safe harbour” provisions and will be considered in determining the extent to which tax practitioners have discharged their obligations to clients.  It is your responsibility to show that you have brought all matters to our attention if you want to take advantage of the safe harbours created under the new regime.

If we require any documents or information from a third party, we will contact you first to seek your approval to contact the third party.

In conducting this engagement, information acquired by us during the engagement is subject to confidentiality requirements.  That information will not be disclosed by us to other parties except as required or allowed for by law, or with your express consent.

We are bound by the provisions of the Privacy Act 1988 to maintain all records securely and in accordance with the provisions of that Act.  Any breach of these requirements should be notified to the Privacy Commissioner.  However, as noted above if we are subject to a QRP review, your file may be reviewed as part of that process unless you specifically forbid it.

Privacy

We understand the importance of protecting the privacy of your personal information.  In handling personal information, we comply with the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (Privacy Act), as amended from time to time, and with the 13 Australian Privacy Principles in the Privacy Act and other applicable privacy-related legislation.

We collect, use, disclose and store your personal information in accordance with our privacy policy, a copy of which can be found on our website or otherwise made available to you upon request.

We may collect your personal information directly from you or your authorised representatives, from third parties where you have provided your consent, or where the collection of your personal information is permitted by law.

The types of personal information we collect includes general identification information such as names, occupation, date of birth, contact details such as address, email address, mobile phone number, government-issued identification numbers such as tax file numbers, financial information, and information regarding your superannuation and/or insurance arrangements.

Generally, we collect, use and disclose your personal information for the purposes of providing you with the requested services.

If you do not provide your personal information to us, this may affect our ability to assist you.

We may also use your information for the purpose of providing marketing information to you.  Please let us know if you do not want this information to be sent to you.

To provide our services, we may disclose your information to third parties engaged to perform administrative or other business management services.  We may also disclose your personal information to third parties engaged to undertake specific processes, functions or activities and/or provide services for us.

Any disclosure is always on a confidential basis.  We may also disclose your personal information if required or authorised by law.

We may disclose personal information to overseas recipients in order to provide necessary services and for administrative or other business management purposes.  Before disclosing any personal information to an overseas recipient, we take steps reasonable in the circumstances to ensure the overseas recipient complies with the Australian Privacy Principles or is bound by a substantially similar privacy scheme unless you consent to the overseas disclosure or it is otherwise required or permitted by law.

If you would like to access, or seek correction of, the personal information we collect and hold about you, or otherwise enquire or complain about our approach to privacy, please contact our privacy compliance officer.  Our privacy policy contains further information about these processes.

Third Party Involvement

In addition to using third party software (cloud) solutions in delivering services, we may outsource some of our work which involves us entering into an agreement with a third party to provide specific processes, functions, services or activities for us. By signing this engagement, you approve of us engaging with these other parties on this basis. The cloud computing systems we use are listed here.

This engagement is a contract between you and Holzworth Partners Pty Ltd, and you agree that none of the third parties we use will have any liability to you and you will not bring any claim or proceedings of any nature in connection with this engagement against any third party that we may use to provide the services.  This exclusion will not apply to any liability, claim or proceeding founded on an allegation of fraud or other liability that cannot be excluded under law.

Fees and billing arrangements

The estimated fees for the services we agreed to provide you with in this engagement letter are outlined in the quote above.  If the actual time or costs vary due to unforeseen problems, delays, the cooperation of third parties or deficiencies in documentation, we may provide you with an additional engagement letter detailing the reasons for any variation.

Any services we provide that do not fall inside the scope of an agreed quote and engagement letter we will charge you as per the hourly rates below.  These charges will be in addition to any quote or engagement letter.  All professional fees for the services we provide you are based on the time and skill required to complete the agreed services.  Our professional fees are (subject to notification of changes):

Principal- $300 per hour

Senior Accountant- $170 per hour

Junior Accountant- $125 per hour

Bookkeeping & Admin- $ 60 per hour

For work undertaken for periods of less than an hour, the rate shall be charged in 6-minute blocks or part thereof (including GST).

At times, we may incur additional out of pocket expenses and statutory charges.  We attempt to anticipate and incorporate these expenses in our estimated costs; however, we will charge you for any additional out-of-pocket expenses and statutory charges as we incur them.

Unless other terms have been agreed to, our terms are strictly 14 days from the date of invoice.  We will provide an itemised account of professional fees, costs and disbursements upon request.  If you do not pay your account by that date, we reserve the right to use a debt collection agency or any other legal means to recover any outstanding fees.

Ownership of Documents

The final documents which we specifically engaged to prepare, together with any other original documents given to us, shall remain your property.  Documents brought into existence by us, including our working papers, remain our property at all times.  However, we will provide you with copies of any documents you require from time to time.

Lien over Documents

If permitted by law, we may exercise a lien over all materials or records in our possession to all engagements for you until all outstanding fees and disbursements are paid in full.

Mark Holzworth
Principal | Holzworth Partners
M.Com, AdvDipBus, FIPA, FFA (UK)
Registered Tax Agent | SMSF Auditor & Specialist Adviser
Authorised Financial Adviser (No. 479263) under Continental Wealth Pty Ltd AFSL 479263