General Terms and Conditions
Including responsibilities, privacy, and general compliance obligations, under which Benkorp provides services.
Where necessary special Ts&Cs, pertinent to an individual project or service, will be included in the particular Agreement with the client.
These terms and conditions enable the Benkorp team to maintain our values as well as ensure compliance with professional standards and applicable government regulations
Benkorp Responsibilities
- To provide suitably qualified people to complete tasks
- To commit to work through and resolve issues as they arise.
- Work efficiently and with timely results
Client Responsibilities
- All people involved to participate fully in the process
- Provide required information in a timely basis
- Provide one contact person for decisions & to discuss issues
- Unless otherwise agreed, use the forms provided by Benkorp to supply required information for transactions and reference data.
- To pay agreed fees within the terms
Training provided by Benkorp: is the detailed steps on how to complete a particular function in Xero and/or a related procedure. For example:
- How to invoice a customer
- How do we create all the reports to send to our Parish Council
- How do I set up Payroll
- How do I pay the bills
Note: it is expected that the user will practice the training by their ongoing use of Xero
Support provided for Benkorp Clients
Support is, a followup to training, reminding the user of where to get (or go back to) the basic information. The user is responsible for learning how to do what is required to perform the functions of the Xero system and related procedures.
- Email Support, with 1 business day reply guarantee
- Phone Support for urgent assistance only, 1 business day reply guarantee if the phone is not answered
- Frequently Asked Questions published and maintained on the Benkorp website
- Updates to church accounting general and compliance issues, through the “Church Accounting by Benkorp”, Facebook Group. Membership is open to all church finance people on request.
Note: Support is not training
Fees Terms & Conditions
Fees for ongoing services will be invoiced monthly and are payable within 14 days.
Fees for set-up projects are payable in advance per invoice.
To cater for some variations additional fees maybe payable, and agreed in advance.
Hours quoted are ordinary business hours, Sydney NSW time, unless specifically varied
Annual Increase for ongoing service fees
Fees are subject to annual increases from 1st Jan or Jul each year by the corresponding increase in the Consumer Price Index or as per agreement.
Additional Fees
Additional Fees are chargeable for services provided outside the scope of the agreement and for changes in staff, increases in staff, properties and bank/investment & credit card accounts.
Our ongoing bookkeeping & accounting agreements are generally fixed monthly fees for agreed services. These additional fees allow for some flexibility for increases in volume without the need to develop new agreements.
Additional Fees Schedule (inc GST)
| Service | Hourly | Once Off | Monthly |
|
Online Consulting/Training/Procedure improvements – min 1 hour |
$215 | ||
|
Accounting, Payroll |
$192 | ||
|
Bookkeeping catchup/fixup work/Basic Accounting/ Analysis work |
$135 | ||
| Payroll | |||
| Staff Additions & Standard Terminations | $165 | ||
|
Ministry/NFP staff with Fringe Benefit arrangements – additions/terminations |
$220 | ||
| Payroll catch up calculations as a result of late receipt of employee details | $135 | ||
|
Terminations – Redundancy and more complicated Terminations |
$195 | ||
|
Processing of Paid Parental Leave including – set up in payroll, reconcilling transactions and payments. |
$195 | ||
| Additional staff – standard | $38 | ||
| Additional staff with MEAs or Fringe Benefits | $60 | ||
| Additional Credit Cards/Bank/Investment Accounts | $30 | ||
| Additional Properties/Buildings | $50 |
Fees for travel
Fees to provide our onsite services compromise of 3 Components:
- Per Kilometre Rate – currently 75c per kilometre from home/office of the person providing the service.
- Accomodation & Meals if required are based on the ATO’s Reasonable Travel Allowance
- Hourly Rate for Travel = half the consulting charge rate
Period of Engagement
The start date of the engagement is to be agreed. We will not deal with earlier periods unless you have specifically agreed. Additional fees are chargeable for prior period work.
The engagement document will be effective for future years unless:
- Benkorp issues an amended Agreement to you (and you agree to such amendments in writing). Such changes may be for example due to:
- there seems to be a misunderstanding of the objectives/scope of the engagement;
- any significant changes in the professional services to be provided
- a significant change in the nature or size of the client’s organisation;
- any significant changes to professional standards, legal or regulatory requirements
- either party wishes to terminate for any reason with 60 days written notice
Termination
Either party can terminate this agreement for any reason with 90 days written notice or less if stated in your current agreeement. At no time does Benkorp hold any original documents or hard copies of documents belonging to the client. At termination Benkorp will make available any client specific files (usually via shared online folder service called Dropbox) for transfer to the Client. At termination Benkorp can provide Training Services for new staff or volunteers of the client and Benkorp can transfer the Xero Subscription to the client on request.
Location of Service
Benkorp’s services will primarily be provided offsite unless otherwise agreed.
Benkorp will provide its own superannuation & equipment and has Worker’s Compensation for its employees & contractors as required
Confidentiality & Privacy
In conducting this engagement, information acquired by us in the course of the engagement, including any information relating to your affairs whether it belongs to you or not or is provided by you or not, is subject to strict confidentiality requirements. That information will not be disclosed by us to other parties except as required or allowed for by law, to third party firms (as disclosed in the Involvement of Others section below) or with your express consent.
We may collect Personal Information about you, your representatives, your clients and others when we provide services to you. If we do, you agree to work with us to assist in meeting the obligations that we each may have under the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (as amended) (Privacy Act). The obligations may include notifying the relevant person to whom the personal information relates who we are and how we propose to use their personal information. Where you have collected personal information, you confirm that you have collected the personal information in accordance with the Privacy Act, that you are entitled to provide this personal information to us and that we may use and disclose the personal information for the purpose/s we provide our services to you. We will handle personal information in accordance with the Privacy Act.
You are required to arrange for reasonable access by us to relevant individuals, documents and bank accounts, and shall be responsible for both the completeness and accuracy of the information supplied to us. Any advice given to you is only an opinion based on our knowledge of your particular circumstances. You or your staff are responsible for the maintenance of your internal controls and to store the relevant documentation for five (5) years.
Involvement of Others
Benkorp reserves the right to engage the services of an external accounting firm to perform these services if required. This includes the use of outsourced services by suitably qualified staff working in other countries in a secure, controlled and professional environment for bookkeeping, accounting and administrative services. For some clients Benkorp engages the services of qualified bookkeepers/accountants based in Philippines. The Philippine accounting company is owned and controlled by an Australian chartered accounting firm. Acceptance of our services in conjunction with this engagement document indicates your acceptance of the use of outsourced services if required. Where the outsourced service requires the disclosure of personal information, Benkorp shall take reasonable steps to ensure that the confidentiality obligations and/or Australian Privacy Principles outlined in the Confidentiality & Privacy section above are complied with by third party firms providing outsourcing services in connection with this engagement. Notwithstanding the engagement by Benkorp of third party firms to perform services under this engagement, Benkorp shall be responsible for delivery of services and its obligations under this engagement.
Benkorp from time to time utilise the resources of QAccounting Pty Ltd for accounting, taxation and general advice. QAccounting Pty Ltd is a Fully Registered Tax Agent in its own right; all staff members are qualified accountants; and the company and its resources are at the sole direction of Director Que Jones.
When setting-up a new Xero datafile which requires migrating data from an exisiting MYOB datafile, Benkorp uses the services of a specialist service provider. We will use the Xero partner, JetConvert to migrate the data. (We have successfully used JetConvert for many migrations.) See the Jetconvert website for more details: https://jetconvert.com/faq-data-conversion/
Limitation of Liability
Benkorp’s liability is limited by a scheme approved under Professional Standards Legislation. Further information on the scheme is available from the Professional Standards Councils’ website: http://www.professionalstandardscouncil.gov.au.
Ownership of Documents
All original documents obtained from you arising from the engagement shall remain your property. However, we reserve the right to make a reasonable number of copies of the original documents for our records. Our engagement will result in the production of documents including, electronic documents or files. Ownership of these documents will vest in you and will be supplied to you upon request and upon termination of the engagement (as outlined in the Termination section above). All other documents produced by us in respect of this engagement will remain the property of our firm, subject to any statutory obligations.
Confirmation of Terms & agreement to the selected service
Acceptance of our services in conjunction with commencing the engagement indicates that you understand and accept the arrangements. This information will be effective for future engagements unless we advise you of any change and you expressly agree to such change.
Website disclaimer
The information on this website is for general informational purposes only. Benkorp makes no representation or warranty, express or implied. Your use of the site is solely at your own risk. This site may contain links to third party content, which we do not warrant, endorse, or assume liability for.