Tax advisor vs. tax accountant vs. tax lawyer: when to contact whom?

In this article, we will explain the differences in practical terms: when to call whom, what to expect from each service, how to keep track of your responsibilities, and why sometimes a whole team of accountant + tax advisor + tax law attorney makes sense.

Tax accountant: bookkeeping or tax accounting

The content of an accountant’s job is more than just transcribing invoices into a program. It also includes advising on bookkeeping and tax record keeping matters within the framework of the law, typically accounting methods issues, working with accounting documents, preparing the chart of accounts, bookkeeping, closing the books and working with supporting documents that are based on the accounts.

An accountant can be someone who has a high school degree in economics, typically a business academy. A college or university degree in economics with a focus on accounting or finance is also common. It is also possible to enter the field through retraining or accounting courses, usually combined with compulsory work experience.

When an accountant can typically help you the most

In day-to-day operations, an accountant is usually the most effective choice when you need to manage day-to-day administration in a stable way. The accountant sets your rhythm: when and how you give her documents, what needs to be on the invoice received, what needs to be on the invoice issued, how payments are matched, how to record cash, assets and liabilities. For companies (especially LLCs), the accountant keeps extra continuity – she knows your invoicing, bank, warehouse if applicable, and payroll follow-up. This is a huge advantage in practice, as many mistakes are made not through ignorance of the law, but by losing context in the data. For employers, it is also usually in charge of payroll and statutory deductions.

Accountants also often deal with VAT, returns and reporting. For VAT payers, the typical example is the control report. In practice, this means that the accountant is not just looking after one submission, but several obligations that build on each other.

Remember, however, that even if your accountant handles everything perfectly, the responsibility to the state remains with you (in the case of an LLC, typically with the statutory body). What does this mean in practice? That the accountant is your key support, but you have to ensure co-operation: hand over the documents on time, supply the right information (for example, what is private and what is business, what is the purpose of the purchase, to whom did you perform, what was actually delivered) and set up reasonable controls.

Accounting contract

Once you have outsourced the bookkeeping, you should be interested in the bookkeeping contract. Not because you don’t trust yourself, but because you need to keep your bookkeeping in order: receipts come in continuously, deadlines are fixed and any minor ambiguity multiplies over time. Even a decent collaboration can break down on a triviality – typically, you send the documents late, the accountant books something based on incomplete information, and then everyone is surprised that it doesn’t work out.

The first thing a contract must do is clearly describe the scope of services. In practice, there is a huge difference between an accountant just doing the accounts and preparing the outputs, and an accountant who also does VAT, audit reports, payroll, annual accounts, communication with the authorities or even publishing the accounts.

It is equally important to clarify deadlines and synergies. A well-written contract will usually describe in practical terms when you have to deliver the documents (and in what quality), what happens if you deliver them late, and what will be done about disputed documents (e.g. an expense without a clear purpose, an unclear VAT rate, a document without details). This is where conflicts often arise: you expect the accountant to sort it out for you, the accountant expects you to supply information that she has no way of finding out herself. If the contract names it up front, it saves you the most nerves.

Communication with the tax office is also a big issue. In practice, people often assume that the accountant will sort it out for them, but that doesn’t work without a clear agreement (and often a power of attorney). It’s therefore a good idea to be explicit in the contract about whether the accountant is allowed to take action against the tax authority, who takes on the calls, who monitors deadlines and who approves the responses.

Then comes the “most sensitive” part: liability and damages. The contract should reasonably distinguish between what is an accountant’s error and what is an error caused by your documents or your direction. Typically: if the accountant charges what you gave her, but you supplied the wrong document or concealed that the performance was also related to private use, you can hardly hold her liable for any damages. At the same time, the contract should address how to proceed when there is a demonstrable professional error by the accountant (e.g., an omitted filing, incorrectly transferred data, confusion of mode). But always remember the basic reality that you cannot override with a contract: the responsibility for bookkeeping rests with the entity and you cannot get rid of it even by entrusting another person with bookkeeping.

A very underestimated chapter is the handover of data and the termination of cooperation. As long as it’s going well, no-one is bothered. But as soon as you want to change accountants, you need to quickly and completely take over the accounting data, accounting documents, program settings, access rights, and possibly work in progress (unassigned payments, disputed items, unresolved stock differences). Therefore, it makes sense to have the contract describe in what form the accounting data will be handed over to you, by when, and whether this is included in the price or is a separately chargeable task.

Finally: confidentiality and personal data. Accountants often work with sensitive information (invoices, bank statements, contracts, sometimes payroll). If an accountant handles personal data of your employees or clients, he or she typically acts as a “processor” and you as a “controller.” The rule is that the processor may only process the data on the instructions of the controller and that the relationship must be supported by a contract (or legislation) that sets out the subject matter, duration, purpose, types of data and obligations of the parties. In practice, this is addressed either directly in the accounting contract or in a separate processing contract.

Tax advisor: when you want tax and accounting without errors fines and penalties

A tax adviser is a regulated profession – the law defines it as providing legal assistance and financial advice on tax and tax-related matters. So with a tax adviser, you can be sure that they have passed a qualification screen, are subject to professional rules and are traceable on an official list.

To become a tax adviser, a person must have at least a bachelor’s degree , regardless of discipline, and pass a qualifying exam. For you, the conclusion is simple: it is a good idea to check the list for a tax advisor.

The Chamber maintains a publicly accessible list of tax advisors where you can search for a particular person or company. You can also see the status (e.g. active, suspended, etc.) of the list.

Compulsory insurance: why it’s more than a formality

Responsibility plays a huge role in tax consultancy. Tax advisers are obliged to be insured for liability arising from the provision of tax advice. For you, it’s insurance for situations where professional misconduct would have a financial impact.

When a tax adviser will typically help you most

An accountant is usually in charge of the document system and day-to-day processes. A tax advisor typically steps in where it is no longer business as usual, but where you need to choose the right tax regime and set up a process that will stand up in the long term.

The law directly provides that tax advice is provided on the basis of a contract and the adviser is entitled to a fee agreed by the parties. And it adds an interesting detail that is good for clients to know: an agreement where the fee would be negotiated as a share of the tax savings or tax reduction achieved is invalid under the law.

In a good collaborative setup, it often works so that the accountant handles the day-to-day agenda and the tax advisor oversees the risky moments: changes in the VAT regime, cross-border transactions, major investments, asset sales, remuneration settings, transactions between related parties or situations where you are “on the edge” (for example, what is still a tax deductible expense and what is no longer).

A tax lawyer: when you need a legal shield, a strategy and a trial

A lawyer is a profession defined by the Advocacy Act. The provision of legal services includes, but is not limited to, representation before courts and other authorities, drafting submissions, legal advice and legal analysis. This is why an attorney typically steps in where it is no longer just a matter of filing returns correctly, but of legal position and procedural defense.

When an attorney will typically help you the most

For example, imagine these situations:

You receive a notice to file, then an audit, then a tax assessment with penalties. The tax advisor will help you with the substance (calculations, evidence, arguments on the tax base), but the attorney will also focus on whether the authority acted legally, whether it met the deadlines, whether it conducted the evidence correctly, and how to construct the appeal and possible lawsuit so that it will stand up in court.

The attorney will also help you prepare and review contracts so that the tax implications match what you actually want (typically for collaborations, licenses, commissions, leases, transfers of shares or asset sales). It also makes a lot of sense when you are making changes in the company – when you are bringing in an investor, selling a stake, setting up shareholder relationships, dealing with executive remuneration or want to have a “clean” set of responsibilities and processes.

And finally: a lawyer is also useful as an insurance policy in communication with the authorities – for example, when you don’t want to escalate anything, but you need your submission to be legally accurate, consistent and someone to make sure that you don’t cause unnecessary problems with what you write or sign.

And if something should accidentally turn into a suspected criminal offence (typically large sums, purposive chains, VAT fraud etc.), you often can’t do without a lawyer just for the sake of defending yourself and your procedural rights.

Free accounting advice vs. paid service: when you save and when you lose

It’s natural that many people look for free accounting advice in the first place. Most of us don’t want to pay an hourly fee right away just to make sure our returns are filed by a certain date, where to find which form, or how to log into the tax box. In these situations, free resources can really save you time and money, but only if you stick to general information and don’t try to extract a case-specific solution.

After all, a free internet answer is always a “no context” answer. And with taxes, context is everything. Two situations may look the same (“I have income from my business and some extra”) but differ in details in a way that changes the correct course of action and the risk. The moment you are dealing with a particular combination of income, VAT regimes, cross-border services, sale of assets, a change in business structure or even communication after an audit has started, advice from the internet can give you false peace of mind for which you will pay later. In fact, the wrong course of action will often trigger challenges, evidence, interference and penalties and you will then invest many times more time and money in rectification.

Free resources will typically help you figure out the “where and when” (where to file, how to file, what form), while a paid service (accountant, tax advisor, or attorney) addresses the “why and how” (why this is the right thing to do in your case, how to prove it with documents, how to set it up for the future, and who is responsible).

Summary

If you are dealing with the day-to-day (documents, accounting, closures, VAT, payroll), most often an accountant will help you – they will set up a system of handing over documents and maintain continuity, but the responsibility to the state remains with you. When outsourcing bookkeeping, it pays to have a well-written contract for bookkeeping: a clear scope of services (what is included), deadlines and cooperation, procedure for disputed documents, rules for communication with the tax office (including power of attorney), responsibility for errors vs. errors from the client’s documents, and most importantly, the handover of data at the end of cooperation. Don’t forget about confidentiality and GDPR – accountants often work with sensitive data and it’s a good idea to have the controller/processor relationship contractually addressed.

However, once it comes to getting the tax set-up right and minimising risks (VAT changes, cross-border transactions, investments, asset sales, related party transactions), a tax advisor makes sense – it’s a regulated profession, with a qualifying exam, verifiable listing and compulsory insurance; at the same time, remuneration must not be negotiated as a share of tax savings. When dealing with procedural defenses, litigation, appeals, lawsuits, contracts with tax implications, or the threat of criminal charges, the tax law attorney steps in. Free accounting advice is fine for general where/when/how questions, but for specific cases, context is critical and bad advice can result in challenges, caveats and penalties. So sometimes a combination of accountant + tax adviser + solicitor is ideal depending on what you are dealing with.