E-commerce Accountants · South East
E-commerce accountants in Brighton
If your Brighton business sells through marketplaces, your own store or both, the hard part is not the bookkeeping, it is the VAT: when the marketplace accounts for it, when you do, how imports are treated, what happens with EU customers. We handle this for sellers across South East and the £149 health check finds the errors before HMRC does.
from £79/mo · fixed, per month
Next deadlines
- VAT return and payment for the quarter that ended last month
- VAT return and payment for the quarter that ended last month
- VAT return and payment for the quarter that ended last month
- Online Self Assessment filing deadline and balancing payment due
Who this is for
E-commerce Accountants for Brighton
Online sellers in Brighton: marketplace traders on one or several platforms, brands selling through their own store, dropshippers, subscription box businesses, sellers importing stock from overseas, UK sellers with EU or international customers, and businesses approaching or past the £90,000 VAT threshold who need the registration and returns handled correctly.
What is included
Everything inside the fixed fee
- Sales, fees, refunds and payouts reconciled per channel from marketplace and payment-processor reports
- VAT handled correctly for UK sales, marketplace-collected VAT, imports, EU and overseas customers
- Inventory accounting with cost of sales and stock valuation in the top package
- Cloud software integrated with your channels so transactions post automatically
- Annual accounts and Corporation Tax or Self Assessment, with the figures tying back to channel reports
- Marketplace VAT health check: a one-off review of your registrations and settings against the rules
How it works
E-commerce Accountants from Brighton, step by step
Tell us your situation
A short message or call about what you do and what needs filing. We ask the questions that determine the right package and nothing more.
Fixed fee in writing
You receive one price for the work, confirmed by email before anything starts. It does not change if the job takes longer than we expected.
Send records, review the draft
Records come by WhatsApp or email. We prepare the draft, explain the figures in plain English and answer your questions.
We file, you get the receipts
Once you approve and the fee is settled, we submit electronically and forward the HMRC or Companies House acknowledgement the same day.
Why IGI
What you get in Brighton
One fixed fee for e-commerce accountants in Brighton, agreed in writing before any work starts and never changed part-way through the job, however long it takes us.
Nothing for Brighton is left to the last week. Each deadline relevant to e-commerce accountants is tracked from the day you join, with the next four shown on every page we send you.
No appointments, no travel across South East, no parking. Everything for e-commerce accountants in Brighton happens online, with a real person on the other end during UK working hours.
You get one contact for e-commerce accountants, not a queue. Brighton clients message the same person throughout and get an answer in working hours, usually within a few hours.
We explain e-commerce accountants in the words Brighton business owners use, not in accountant's shorthand, and we show our working so you can check it.
Nothing is filed for Brighton until you have reviewed and approved it. You see the draft, you ask questions, you sign off, then we submit and send you the receipt.
Local facts
About Brighton
Brighton is in South East, in the BN1 postcode district, England. Income tax in England follows the UK rates: 20% basic to £50,270, 40% higher to £125,140 and 45% additional, with the personal allowance of £12,570 tapered away above £100,000. National Insurance, VAT and Corporation Tax are UK-wide, and Stamp Duty Land Tax applies to property purchases.
| Place | Distance | Direction |
|---|---|---|
| Brighton and Hove | 0.2 mi | NW |
| Montpelier, South East | 0.6 mi | NW |
| Queens Park, Brighton and Hove | 0.7 mi | E |
| Brunswick | 0.8 mi | W |
| Roundhill | 1 mi | N |
| Whitehawk | 1 mi | E |
| Kemp Town | 1 mi | E |
| Hove | 1 mi | NW |
Worth knowing
Rules that come up in this work
Switching accountants
You can switch accountant at any point in the year. The new firm requests clearance and your records from the old one, which cannot withhold your own documents though it may hold its own working papers until its fees are settled. Agent authorisations with HMRC and Companies House are transferred, and the next deadline is picked up without a gap.
Closing a company
Voluntary strike-off is available only to solvent companies. One that owes money it cannot pay needs a creditors' voluntary liquidation through a licensed insolvency practitioner, and directors who dissolve an insolvent company face personal consequences. For a solvent company the process takes three to four months from filing the DS01, with notice to creditors and shareholders within seven days.
Crypto records and reporting
Crypto tax splits into capital gains on disposals and income on rewards, with different rates and different reporting. The £3,000 annual exempt amount and the 18% and 24% rates apply to gains; staking, mining and airdrop income is taxed at marginal income tax rates. HMRC's nudge letters to holders have increased sharply, and a voluntary disclosure before one arrives is treated far more leniently.
The 60-day property CGT return
The 60-day Capital Gains Tax return on residential property is the deadline landlords most often miss, because it falls outside the Self Assessment cycle and runs from completion, not exchange. Private residence relief for periods you lived in the property, plus the final nine months, reduces the gain. Penalties for a late return mirror Self Assessment, starting at £100.
Record keeping
Record keeping is a legal obligation with a penalty of up to £3,000 for failure, but its real value is in making every other filing cheaper and more defensible. Keep invoices, receipts, bank statements, mileage logs and any HMRC correspondence, digitally if you like, for five years after the relevant filing deadline for individuals and six years for companies and VAT.
Allowable expenses
Expense claims are where a return is won or lost in an enquiry. The test is wholly and exclusively for the trade; where a cost is mixed, the business proportion can be claimed if it can be identified. Capital items such as equipment and vans are relieved through capital allowances rather than as expenses, except under the cash basis where they are simply deducted when paid.
Employer National Insurance
The cost of an employee is more than the salary. Employer National Insurance at 15% above £5,000 a year, the 3% minimum pension contribution, holiday pay, equipment and management time all come on top. The Employment Allowance of £10,500 reduces the National Insurance for most employers with more than one person on the payroll.
Questions
E-commerce Accountants questions from Brighton
Do I need to register for VAT if the marketplace collects it?
Marketplace-collected VAT does not count towards your registration threshold, but your other sales do. Many sellers have a mix and cross the £90,000 threshold without realising. We monitor your rolling 12-month taxable turnover monthly and tell you when registration is approaching.
Should I trade as a sole trader or a company?
Many sellers start as sole traders and incorporate as profits grow. A company protects personal assets from supplier and platform disputes, and can be more tax efficient at higher profits, but adds compliance. Marketplaces also treat business accounts differently. We run the comparison for your numbers.
What is the marketplace VAT health check?
A one-off £149 review of your VAT registration, your marketplace tax settings, your treatment of imports and overseas sales, and a sample of recent returns against the rules. It produces a written report of errors found and what to do about them. Most sellers who have set things up themselves have at least one.
Can you reconcile my payment processor as well as the marketplace?
Yes. Card processors and payment gateways on your own store are integrated so that gross sales, fees and payouts post and reconcile automatically. The fee treatment, including VAT on processor fees, is configured at setup, which is where most self-built integrations go wrong.
I sell to EU customers. What VAT applies?
Since 2021 sales of goods to EU consumers are exports from the UK, zero-rated here, with EU VAT due in the customer's country. The EU's Import One Stop Shop lets you account for consignments under €150 through one registration. Above that, local registration or the customer paying on delivery. We advise on the right route for your volumes.
When do I need the inventory package?
When you hold meaningful stock. Without inventory accounting, the cost of goods purchased is expensed when bought, which distorts profit between periods and misstates the balance sheet. The £179 package tracks stock, calculates cost of sales and values closing stock, which lenders, investors and HMRC all expect from a stock-holding business.
Do you have an office in Brighton?
No. IGI Accounting is an online-only firm. We serve Brighton and every other UK postcode remotely, with records sent by WhatsApp or email and everything filed electronically. The absence of local premises is why the fee for e-commerce accountants is the same in Brighton as anywhere else in the country, and why there is nothing to visit and nothing to print.
Is e-commerce accountants in Brighton really the same price as elsewhere?
Yes. The fee published on this page is what a client in Brighton pays and what a client in any other part of England pays. It is confirmed in writing before work starts and the invoice matches the quote. Where a higher package applies because your situation is more complex, we say so at the quote stage, never afterwards.
Ready to fix your fee in Brighton?
Tell us what you need. You get one fixed fee in writing, and nothing is filed until you approve it.