Working proactively with you and your business

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Hale Partnership Limited
Case study analysis- Examples of how we can help
you. The difference is planning! These
include- HR strategies Business
Strategies Tax and other strategies
All the case studies referred to below reflect
advice given to clients. There is reference to
business models which have been used to guide
discussion and analysis. No business model is
likely in itself, to provide a solution. They
simply provide tools to aid analysis. The case
studies have been kept as short as possible for
the purposes of demonstration. It has therefore
not been possible to highlight other tools that
may have been considered or used. You should not
use the solutions given here for your own
business. Each business is different. Thats
what makes doing this so much fun.
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Hale Partnership Limited

• Our Mission statement
• To be the lead advisor for our clients and to
  delight them whilst ensuring that our staffs
  objectives are met.

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• A word about Our Vision

We want to be more than just your accountants.
We have the in-house capability to offer a
diverse range of services to our clients. The
enhances our role as the lead advisor and
provides quality of life for our employees.
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• HR Strategy issues
• Introduction of a new employee induction
  programme and appraisal system.
• The challenge
• The company identified that it had a poor
  employee retention record.
• The solution
• Our firm has been awarded Investors in people
  (IIP) and we were one of the
• first firms of accountants that achieved the
  required standard. Based on our experience, we
  initially
• suggested that the company should adopt
  discussions with their employees as exit
  interviews to
• find our from the employees perspective, what was
  done well and what was done badly. On our
• advice the company implemented both induction
  programmes for new employees and a six monthly
• appraisal system for all employees.
• The result

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H R Strategy issues continued 2) Remuneration
planning The Challenge We have been involved in
a number of cases where clients wish to retain
their employees and have sought our advice. The
solution There are often a number of solutions
available. These include- Company car or cash
alternative Benefits in Kind such as Nursery
vouchers, pension schemes or private medical
care Share schemes to participate in dividends
and proceeds on sale Tax free relocation
packages The result We have helped literally
dozens of clients by actively planning the
retention of their key staff with great success.
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• Business Strategy issues
• Business Strategy-Acquiring a competitor
• The challenge
• Our client company received an order that would
  double their existing turnover from 1m to 2m.
• The clients did not have the internal capacity to
  cope with the work load!
• The solution
• Two solutions were considered. Both involved a
  detailed resource plan review.
• The easy option would have been to subcontract
  the work out to another provider but package it
  as if
• it came from the client. Many tools were used to
  consider these strategies including-
• SWOT
• PESTLE
• Resource capability
• Parenting Mix

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2) Business Strategy - Business expansion
(Horizontal integration) The challenge In a
fairly mature industry showing signs of decline,
our client company decided that it was imperative
to both protect their market share but also look
for new markets or products. The
solution Using tools such as Ansoffs box ,
Grieners business growth and the Product Life
Cycle model, we spent time listening to our
client and assisted in evaluating their strategy.
It was clear that the focus was too much on what
their industry was doing so it seemed to us that
in a declining industry, looking outside that
industry had to be the main focus of future
strategy. After two days of strategic thinking,
a 12 month detailed strategy plan was developed
with a further 3 year plan being completed with
slightly less detail. The plan included
potential target companies, patents and other
intellectual property that may benefit the
clients organisation. The result Eight
months after the initial strategy meeting, the
client and a target company had agreed heads of
agreement and within a further 6 months, the
client had acquired 100 of the share capital of
the target company.
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3) Business Strategy-Business Closure The
challenge Our client, an international airline,
operated a holiday package company as an
ancillary business to its main core competency of
passenger and cargo flights. The holiday company
offered a package which included flights,
accommodation, hotel transfers and events such as
opera or theatre. The business was loss making
and heavily financed by the parent company. The
solution It was clear from the outset that given
the limited sales opportunities without
substantial investment, that the business would
never offer a return on the investment. The
issue then became what is the benefit of keeping
this going? Several tools were used along with
discussion- Cost benefit analysis SWOT Parent
Matrix Bowmans clock The result The holiday
package company was a classic value trap
exhibiting a good fit with the parent but not
fitting in with the parents strategy or true
core competencies. It was a waste of resources!
The holiday company was disposed of to an
alliance partner. Significant cost savings were
made.
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4) Business Strategy-Location location
location The challenge The clients long-term
lease was about to end. Three options were
considered- Stay where they are - prime location
in W1 London Move to a cheaper rent area Move
to other offices close to existing offices The
Solution This challenge was tackled from a
finance and an HR point of view. The cheaper
rent area was well outside London and the
implications had to be considered as employee
retention was clearly going to be an issue
despite attractive tax free relocation
allowances. We also used scenario planning to
ensure that the properties being considered would
fit in with the organisations strategy and
expected development. We also used cost benefit
analysis The result Option 3 was chosen as it
seemed the best fit for the company and there
have been no regrets. Three years into the new
lease in W1, the property is still ideal and is
expected to be so for the remaining two years of
the lease.
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5) Business Strategy-Strategy for sale. The
Challenge A professional firm had moved offices
and had increased its overheads quite
significantly. The firm was quite reliant on a
handful of high fee earners. The firm could
easily be placed on Grieners model. The
solution A retreat was arranged where problems
and options were considered. Several strategies
were considered possible to include growth,
focussed differentiation and even further
diversification. Finally a strategy to sell was
considered. The result Within a short period of
time after the retreat, the business had entered
into an agreement to sell to a firm considerably
larger thereby securing its future and
eliminating the worries of the partners.
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Other planning issues 1) Management Information
systems The Challenge The client had not
reviewed its accounting system or its processes
and procedures for a number of years and the
owners of the business felt their time was spent
doing too much administrative accounting issues.
More importantly the quality of the information
used to run the business was poor. The
solution We undertook a project within a fixed
fee quote to- Provide quality information
generated internally for the owners Reduce the
time the owners spent on unnecessary
matters Recommend an accounting package suitable
for MIS and train the staff Develop processes
and procedures for all accounting matters. The
result A very happy client!
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2)Incorporation planning Taxation strategy The
Challenge Clients were massively profitable as a
partnership and retained significant profits and
were paying an enormous amount of tax at higher
rates because their previous unqualified
accountant had failed to consider whether
incorporation would be beneficial. The
solution We spent time with the client
discussing the pros and cons of incorporation.
Risk was not an issue it was really a tax
planning exercise. The result Tax savings of
87,000.00. A goodwill calculation agreed by the
Inland Revenue which resulted in us assisting
the Directors in getting 1.5 million out to the
three Directors tax free!!!! 3) New sources of
finance We have had a number of clients who have
been unhappy with their banking facilities, the
approach of their bank manager or issues with
security. We have also facilitated deals where
clients have needed to raise up to 3m through
either bank funds or assisted clients in putting
together a prospectus to raise venture
capital. On the smaller scale of things, we saved
a client 12,000 interest by placing an HP
agreement for three Range Rovers with a finance
provider, a less well known bank. The cost to
the client,150 plus VAT!
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Hale Partnership LtdClient CharterThis Client
Charter informs you of the service level you can
expect from our organisation and what we expect
from you to be able to meet it.

• Our commitment to you
• your interests will come first at all times
• to develop a close, long-term working
  relationship with you
• to add value to your business by being pro-active
  and responsive
• to maintain high standards of integrity,
  reliability and confidentiality
• to respect and meet your deadlines and reporting
  requirements
• to give realistic fee quotes with a flexible
  charging structure
• to allocate a team of professional staff best
  suited to the skills required by youand
  maintaining/enhancing this team throughout our
  relationship
• to give you a friendly, caring, courteous and
  professional service

• What we expect from you
• you will be open, frank and honest with us at all
  times
• you will provide all information we need to do
  our work to the agreed timescales
• you will make time available to work on the items
  you have agreed to work on
• you agree to listen to any advice we offer (and
  we acknowledge your right to reject and debate
  that advice)
• you will pay your account with us in accordance
  with our terms
• you will give consideration to referring us to at
  least one other person you believe would benefit
  from an association with us
• you will let us know immediately of any concerns
  you have about our work together

In order to help us maintain and exceed our
commitment, we welcome at any time any comments
regarding our service