Time to see if I was right!

At the moment we have a full-time role for a bookkeeper / accountant that may suit a graduate and we are going about the recruitment process in two ways. Make or buy.

Firstly (“buy”) we have posted the job with a recruitment agency where we are looking for someone who already knows their way around the world of bookkeeping, payroll, Excel etc and can hit the ground running.

Secondly (“make”) we are using social media to try to find a recent graduate. If this works then we would train the successful candidate in bookkeeping, accounting, financial management, office administration etc. from scratch.

So, if you are (or know of) a graduate in London interested in a financial career, please download the job description attached to this blog and send your CV to apply@bluedotconsulting.co.uk and have “June Application” as the subject. The deadline for applying is July 5.

A couple of other points to make:

• Although we are chartered accountants are NOT set up to run training contracts with ICAEW so this is not a role that gets you a professional qualification. However, the previous employee who travelled this path with us has just started a new job in which he can sit the ICAEW exams.

• Please only express your interest in this role by email, we will not consider anyone who contacts us in any other way.

It is my belief that there is a large pool of bright, able graduates out there and I hope that we see some high quality applications in the next three weeks.

Michael Austin

Bookkeeper job description

It turns out our contract is a rolling twelve month contract that renews annually and in order to cancel it you have to give at least three months notice prior to the renewal date.

Our renewal date is early August and because we did not give notice early in May we are now on the hook for a further fourteen months of costs.

This is a contract that has been in place since 2007, so we have been loyal customers who pay by direct debit, buy regularly, never kick up a fuss and do not give a second thought to something that works very well.

They have been a reliable source of water, we have been a reliable source of profit.

So I’m slightly disappointed by the “screw you, you should have checked what you signed six years ago” attitude.

When I asked the customer services agent if her company could send an email to all customers a month or so before the annual notice period came to an end she said they did not have the resources to do that.

Sounds a bit economical with the truth to me.

The message is clear. Some companies will treat you as a loyal customer until they think you are not and then they will whip out a contract with one hand and put customer loyalty in the shredder with the other.

Legally, I’m sure they are in the right, but is it any way to run a business?

Do you have any similar war stories? Let us know.