Are all accountants....?

When you start searching in Google you may have noticed that it often offers to complete your search string. 

In effect the system recognises and offers you the rest of what other people have searched for even if the words are in a different order. 

Here are some of the suggestions Google offered me recently by reference to the few words I typed in each case: 

Are all accountants.... 

.... the same?

.... boring?

..... alcoholics?

Why are most accountants.... 

.....female? (a surprisingly common question it seems, possibly related to the film industry where the accountants named in the credits are indeed invariably female)

....quitting?

Why don't accountants....

....make much money?

....have unions?

....get paid overtime?

Can accountants....

....certify documents?

....sign passports?

....get rich?

....work from home?

....be replaced by AI?

....have tattoos?

10 pop bands featuring accountants - or do they?

• Ledger Zeppelin 
• The Rolling Balances 
• Fleetwood Macroeconomics 
• The Balance Sheetles 
• The Fiscal Fighters 
• The Profit Margin Boys
• The Doublie Entry Bothers 
• The Black Eyed P&Ls 
• Cashabian
• ABBA (Accountants Balancing Books Always)

HOW strong is HMRC's case?

Years ago a senior official was talking about HMRC prosecution policy. He mentioned an occasion when he had lost a case and went back to his legal advisers to find out what had gone wrong.

"I thought you'd told me you thought we had a very strong case" he said. "So why did we lose?"

"Aha" said the lawyer, "You asked me what I thought and I told you that I felt that we had a very strong case. That was all you wanted to know.

Had you asked I'd have told you that I also thought the other side had a very strong case too."

Money, Money, Money - fun quotes

 "There's money. And then there's MY money"

- Anonymous client to accountant about funding a forthcoming tax bill

"Money is better than poverty, if only for financial reasons"
- Woody Allen

"I can't afford to die; I'd lose too much money"
- George Burns

"One of the mysteries of human conduct is why adult men and women are ready to sign documents they have not read, at the behest of salesmen they don't know, binding them to pay for articles they do not want, with money they do not have."
- Gerald Hurst,  

"Nothing is as irritating as the fellow who chats pleasantly to you while he's overcharging you."
- Kin Hubbard

"I haven't reported my missing credit card to the police because whoever stole it is spending less than my wife."
- Ilie Nastase

Accountants are so annoying (in rhyme)

He sits at his desk 

With his horn-rimmed specs 

Doing sums on a calculator 

And come rain or shine 

You know bloody fine 

There's a bill to pay sooner or later. 

He adds and subtracts 

And works out your tax 

Messing about with the figures. 

You've done fairly well 

So how in the hell 

Is that overdraft still gettin' bigger? 

Those accounts are too much 

It's all double dutch 

So you 'phone up for him to explain. 

But his office PA says 'haven't you heard' 

He's away in his office in Spain." 

Henry Brewis in the Farming Press. As reported in 'The Bottom line' by Vaines and Nuttall