Carol and Paul Rodgers bought the existing TaxAssist Accountants business in Sidcup in April 2012. In July 2025 they sold their practice to new franchisee Mohamed Feroz. Here they look back on their experience with TaxAssist Accountants.
"Both of our Discovery Days went well. We thought about starting from scratch but needed an income straight away – so a large bank loan was the result. Within a few weeks of Paul taking over the practice we realised that he couldn’t run it solo – the choice was either I joined or he recruited a manager. It seemed silly not to keep it in the family so I joined less than five months after Paul took over having had to give three months’ notice.
"Taking on an existing business is difficult and building it further is very hard work. Not everything has gone to plan, but, within four years, we exceeded our own expectations by nearly doubling our client numbers, more than doubling the fee base that we bought and increasing profitability.
"From a franchise point of view, the franchisor has delivered everything promised, lead generation is good, support is good, training is there when needed but not forced upon us when not. Also, the autonomy to run our practice as we want to, is the right thing for us. Norwich is a support not a restriction.
"We have grown the business by doing a good job, being proactive and showing we really care. We have improved the quality of the work carried out here and make sure that our clients are well supported. Paul networked and we had one monthly advert in a local A5 booklet, otherwise we didn’t need to advertise.
"We opened a second office in a new territory, increased our staff numbers to 12 and increased our annual turnover by a further 50%, despite the challenges of the COVID years. We had reached a size that was manageable for us and our staff, knowing that if we grew further we would have to take on managers to support us. We achieved this by treating our staff well and providing our clients with a good service, resulting in a large number of referrals. Staff and clients alike felt supported by us, they know that we have a vast well of knowledge and experience that we can make available to them. But, knowing that we were getting older and wanted to have more time to pursue other interests, we did take on a manager only to receive an offer three months later for our practice from someone who we felt would be able to continue the good work and further grow the business. We are leaving our clients and staff reluctantly as we have made great friendships during our time with TaxAssist."
July 2025
