Audit & Assurance

Understanding your business model and to apply a practical risk-based approach on all assurance engagements

Our Audit Approach

Our aim is to fully understand your business model and to apply a practical risk-based approach on all assurance engagements. This allows us to focus our audit testing on the areas that matter and eliminates over auditing, saving both management time and fee cost.

We understand the costs of compliance can be high, and whilst we are able to provide cost effective services, we also believe we are able to provide real insight and value to clients, rather than just compliance engagements.

We work closely with our clients to ensure any potential audit issues are identified and resolved in a collaborative and timely manner rather than waiting until the end to highlight any issues.

We identify control points and identify opportunities to improve the efficiency and/or effectiveness of controls and business processes providing insight and value to clients through this process on the control environment.

Who we Work With

Our expertise extends across a variety of industries, including venture capital-backed firms, large multinationals, private companies, FCA regulated bodies, and not-for-profit entities.

Apart from statutory and non-statutory audits, our services include review opinions, agreed-upon
procedures, grant acquittal audits and related assurance offerings.

Real Partner Involvement

It is the personal attention by Partners coupled with access to our approachable experts, who cooperate across all service areas, which clients value.

Our partners are always your key day to day contacts. The Partners are focused on supporting clients proactively and will directly guide them through any process, offering advice not only at the end of the audit but also during the planning and fieldwork stage.

Importance of the right team

It is imperative that our teams truly understand your business and your team’s needs and we strive to build long term, effective and efficient working relationships with our clients.

To help achieve this we will ensure as far as possible you have the same team, year on year.

The size and experience of our assurance team allows us to individually tailor quality assurance services to our clients cost effectively. For clients, this means that they have access to experts for all their personal and business accounting needs.

Timeline and Communication

Our approach to communicating with our clients is based on proactive, timely discussion with a practical focus to ensure the right people are kept informed. The emphasis is to act upon any issues arising as early as possible to avoid “surprises” and resolve any contentious or judgemental matters as they arise.

We discuss the best approach to communicating, taking into account your business/working hours, critical time periods (month end, payroll runs etc), and any personnel who may not work full time etc. We would aim to provide timely updates on our progress as the audit is undertaken, to allow any remediation or matters to be addressed on a timely basis.

Our audit will likely be a mixture of on-site and remote work to achieve the most efficient and effective audit.

Any matters that would ultimately be reported to Management and/or the Board would always have been discussed and agreed with the finance team.

The MGroup Partnership

Where are we Located?

Our audit and assurance team operates across two Oxfordshire offices; one in Witney and one in Oxford.

Although we are based in Oxford and Oxfordshire, we have many clients across England, and work with UK companies that have subsidiaries across the globe.

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Ollie Squire

Partner

Chris Denton

Partner

Jordan Lyne

Partner

Jordan has worked with various client’s over his ten years at The MGroup. The services provided range from bookkeeping, VAT returns, annual accounts and management accounts. He has been involved in recruitment of new staff members and helped move the firm on with it’s systems by creating and improving internal controls and procedures.

Jordan manages his resources efficiently to meet deadlines and where clients have specific requirements, he works closely with them to ensure these are both feasible and met in a timely manner. Jordan has clients in various sectors, ranging from international companies to smaller locally based businesses.

Wendy Tatham

Partner

Wendy joined the firm in 2015, after starting in finance for the NHS and then qualifying with another local firm of accountants. She brought with her experience across all areas, having previously managed payroll support, corporate and personal tax compliance and planning alongside other general practice elements.

Wendy works with clients across a range of sectors and enjoys supporting them with their statutory reporting, internal financial processes, corporate and personal tax planning and business advisory services. A key area of interest is working closely with her clients to support them with growing and restructuring their businesses to align with their long term goals.

In her spare time Wendy is the lead volunteer for Oxfordshire Scouts, supporting 95 Scouts groups across the county to deliver a fun programme of activities to young people aged 4 to 24.

Geoff Pinder

Corporate Finance Partner

Geoff has operated in the Mergers & Acquisitions and the corporate finance arena since 2004. He has held Executive roles leading and managing the performance and productivity of cross functional teams focused on delivering a high quality service to clients across complex portfolios.

Selling a business is a life changing event, and Geoff’s passion is working with businesses owners to help them explore the various exit options and strategies available to achieve their objectives, leading to excellent results for all stakeholders.

Geoff has been involved in over 500 deals across multiple industry sectors, working predominantly on the sell side of transactions, including sales to strategic buyers, private equity, and MBO’s.

Darren Green

Partner

Having grown up in North Oxfordshire, Darren joined The MGroup in 1999 as a trainee, qualified in 2003, and became a partner in 2010. Darren is best known for his ability to ‘go the extra mile’ for clients; even changing a flat tyre outside the office when it was discovered after a meeting, helping his clients to safely make their way home.

Aside from changing tyres, Darren enjoys helping clients to grow their varied and interesting businesses, and gaining insights into a wide range of sectors. In particular, he likes working within the corporate finance team, assisting with financial projections and due diligence for prospective buyers. Darren enjoys the challenging and pressurized nature of this type of work. Many of his clients are from manufacturing, technology or start-up backgrounds.

In his spare time Darren is a family man and he also enjoys sport, including football, skiing and running. He has taken part in a 26 mile walk for a cancer charity with colleague Geoff.

Peter Smith

Partner

Peter joined The MGroup in 1990 and became a partner in 1996. Originally from Wiltshire, Peter is a member of the Oxford Chamber of Commerce where he has been a Chamber council member for over 20 years.

Helping to provide a complete finance solution to companies is one of Peter’s key focus areas. He believes this to be a service that sets the partnership aside from its competitors, alongside The MGroup values and employees.

Peter provides financial mentoring, support with strategy and planning, solutions to increase profitability and improve cash flow, and help with expansion/diversification plans. His specialist interest areas include not-for-profit, healthcare and international organisations.

Peter enjoys the opportunities and challenges he is faced with every day at The MGroup and making a difference to clients’ lives. He is also a keen local charity supporter, regularly helping to raise funds and awareness for SeeSaw and SpecialEffect where he is an ambassador.

Outside of work, Peter is a Chelsea Football Club season ticket holder. He likes walking in the local area, especially if there is a pub or café at the end of the walk, and enjoys holidays in Devon, in particular to a secret escape in Dartmouth.

Richard Clayton

Partner

In 1984 Richard became the youngest ever partner at The MGroup at the age of 27 and is now the longest serving partner. Richard is a true team player, having been a prominent local footballer in his early years. He very much brings the team ethos to The MGroup who like to work as an integral part of their client teams.

Richard qualified in 1982 and has worked with many of his clients for decades, evidence of the excellent service provided by both Richard and the firm. Richard is proud of the firm’s exceptional reputation. He continues to develop new strategies and explore improvements to the services they provide and remains highly ambitious and committed. Outside of work Richard enjoys golf, football, spending time with his family and the very occasional glass of wine (normally accompanied by too much food!).

Richard has a depth of knowledge and experience in all areas of the construction industry and also deals with most of the firms agricultural clients. He also deals with a wide range of other clients which include a substantial number of UK subsidiaries of overseas companies together with a number of high profile local businesses. Richard is a firm believer that the role of a trusted accountant is to provide clients with the best possible advice and support. The client does not always have to follow advice but he believes they must have all options on the table to form a meaningful decision.