In my last post, I ended things promising that I would talk about the challenges in setting up the business side of things. Today I’ve decided to briefly talk about the process I have gone through in finding an accountant for my small business.

The Goal:

Find an accountant with experience in dealing with small businesses and some experience working with video game companies.

Sounds simple, right? That’s what I thought two weeks ago when I started looking. The first thing I did was call the Ontario Government to see if the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade might have some insight into how to find an accountant in my area of business. The Ministry directed me to the CGA’s referral service:

• Certified General Accountants of Ontario (www.cga-ontario.org) – The CGA website has a referral service that allows you to search for a CGA in your area by business type. Unfortunately for me, “Video Games Company” isn’t one of their options. However, I was able to search for accountants who specialize in small business accounting.

From the CGA referral list I started calling accountants who were easily accessible to me via public transit. While CGA’s are highly qualified, I discovered that the qualification comes at an increase in rates. I realized that I wasn’t going to be able to afford any of these accountants at this point in my business’s life.

While all of this was happening I started contacting friends who run their own businesses to see if any of them had any recommendations. I also started posting on forums asking for advice. I have an account with the IGDA, so I posted to the Toronto Chapter’s forum to see if anyone on there had any suggestions.

• IGDA (www.igda.org) – The International Game Developers Association has chapters all over the world. Look for one in your area.

I also looked on the CanDevs website and found contact information for a lot of local video games companies and started sending out polite emails asking for referrals from other like-minded business people.

• CanDevs (www.candevs.ca) – CanDevs is a website for Canadian game developers. They have lists of local games companies for regions across the country.

The Results:

From the IGDA forum post I received a response from someone pointing me to a GameSpot article about tax credits in Ontario for game development companies. I didn’t get any accountant referrals from it, but I got some valuable resources for doing my own research into tax credits for my business.

I received a few responses from local game companies I emailed, but no solid leads yet. One thing I’d note here: if you are going to do this, make sure that your emails are short, to the point, and polite. I emailed the companies once, explained what I wanted, and was as polite as I could be about it. If companies haven’t responded to me, I’m not going to keep spamming them with email.

The most success I’ve had is through friends. I’ve had a couple of good referrals through friends who are in somewhat similar business lines. With these referrals I’m not finding accountants who have games experience, but I am finding people who my friends trust with their finances. I had come to the realization that I would probably end up having to do my own research on tax credits, etc, so I’m not too upset that I haven’t found an accountant with games experience. Besides, who knows, maybe my new accountant will become an expert in video games and will be able to help out other new games companies.

Owen

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 23rd, 2008 at 7:50 am and is filed under Business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.