KRW Accountants to rebrand to Affinia

Following our news in April that we have joined the Affinia Group, we will be adopting the Affinia branding from next month onwards.

Our business combination with Affinia all happened quite quickly.  We first met in January to explore the potential sale of the practice, which is something we’d always planned to do in the future, so we thought it made sense to start to understand what that might look like.  Typically, we really liked the guys at Affinia and their approach, and they quickly allayed our fears around being swallowed up by a ‘big firm’, as Affinia aren’t like the big accountancy firms.  They’re essentially a collection of smaller firms, focused on small and medium sized business clients like we are.  We liked everyone we met and it felt like a good fit; they made us an offer, there was a bit of negotiation, and then we reached an agreement in February.  Some due diligence followed, and we completed the deal in early April.

Almost six months on, and I’m pleased to say that things are going well.  We’ve changed some of our practice software, and some of our administrative functions have been centralised, but otherwise it has been business as usual, only with added support and expertise to better support our clients.

Our team remain largely the same, although our superstar Practice Manager Sandra Franklin has retired, and we bid her a fond farewell last month, after 17 years at the helm!  We’re also sad to report that Alice Burt will be leaving us at the end of this month.  However, the rest of the team remain the same.

Next month will see us rebrand from KRW to Affinia.  Affinia’s Head of People joked that I would need to change my numberplate, until I pointed out that they would still be my initials!!  I have no plans to change my name, although I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t contemplated it many times over the years…!!

Our website will be updated with the Affinia branding, and we’ll have new office signage, plus accounts and other documents will say Affinia instead of KRW Accountants.  We’ll all have new email addresses too, although the existing ones will continue to work, to ensure seamless continuity.

Credit control will also be centralised, and will become more automated.

Apart from this though, it’s very much business as usual, but with access to additional expertise within the group, such as Corporate Finance to support clients selling or refinancing their businesses, specialist VAT and international tax, and links to accountancy firms outside the UK, such as UHY in Ireland and the USA in particular.  We’ve already seen the benefit of these additional resources, which will allow us to better support our clients moving forwards.

So please be ready for future communications from us from next month onwards to be from Affinia.  Different name, but the same great service!

Please contact your Client Manager or myself or Alex Beattie if you have any questions about these changes; we’re very happy to help.