About

I'm Dewald Theron, and I'm the one who does the work

There's no call centre here, and nobody standing between us. When you phone The Tax Shop Riebeek Kasteel, you get me — the same person who prepares your financial statements, files your returns and deals with SARS on your behalf.

For a business owner, that matters more than it sounds. You're not explaining your business again to whoever picked up. You're not waiting for someone to check with someone else. You ask a question and you get an answer.

Before the practice

Most accountants have only ever been accountants.

I spent a substantial part of my career on the other side of the desk, as Financial Manager at Thomas Pipe Products — a manufacturer of pipe repair clamps and couplings employing around a hundred people across facilities in Johannesburg and Cape Town, and since acquired by the international KLINGER group.

That shapes how I work more than any qualification does. I know what it's like to need a number before the meeting rather than a month after it. To manage cash flow through a quarter that didn't go to plan. To carry a payroll that people are depending on, and to sign it off knowing exactly what it means for the bank balance on the 26th.

So when a client tells me things are tight this month, I'm not hearing an accounting problem. I'm hearing something I've sat with myself.

Eighteen years in the profession, across industry and practice. Six of them running this practice.

I've been through a sale from the inside

I was the financial manager who took that business through its acquisition — the due diligence, the disclosure schedules, and an acquirer's advisors working back through years of records looking for the thing we'd missed. When the transaction closed, the finance function was absorbed into the group, as it usually is. That's how I came to be sitting in Riebeek Kasteel.

The experience turned out to be worth more to my clients than the job ever was to me.

If you intend to sell your business one day — or take on a partner, or apply for finance that actually matters — the state of your records three years beforehand determines what you get for it. I've watched from the inside which books survive that kind of scrutiny and which ones quietly cost the seller money at the negotiating table. It's the difference between a buyer accepting your numbers and a buyer discounting them.

Most accountants have only ever read about that process. I've sat on the wrong side of the table during it.

Why Riebeek Kasteel

I left Johannesburg six years ago, for much the same reason anyone leaves Johannesburg.

This isn't a satellite office with a local phone number and a head office somewhere else. I live in the valley. If I get your VAT return wrong, I'm going to run into you in town on Saturday — which turns out to be a fairly effective quality control system.

It also means I understand the businesses here. Guesthouses that make their year in four months. Farms that spend a season's money before they see a cent of it. Small operators competing with people who have finance departments. These aren't case studies to me; they're the people I see every week.

How I work

Fixed fees, agreed before anything starts. No hourly billing, no invoice at year end that you didn't see coming. If the scope changes, we discuss it before the work happens, not after.

Plain language. You shouldn't need an accountant to understand what your accountant just said. If I've explained something and you're still unsure, that's on me, and I'll explain it differently.

Honest about limits. There are areas where specialist input is the right answer, and I'll tell you when we're in one rather than working it out at your expense. Being part of The Tax Shop network means I have technical specialists to draw on across more than a hundred offices — which is the practical advantage of not practising entirely alone.

No judgement about where you're starting from. Plenty of clients arrive years behind, with a box of paperwork and a certain amount of dread. It's a process problem. We fix it and move on.

Credentials

• Professional Accountant (SA)
• Member of the South African Institute of Professional Accountants (SAIPA)
• Registered tax practitioner — PR-0009749
• The Tax Shop Accountants, part of a network of more than 100 offices across Southern Africa

SAIPA is a SARS-recognised controlling body, which means my registration as a tax practitioner is subject to continuing professional development requirements and a professional code of conduct.

Let's talk

If you're weighing up whether to move your accounting, the first conversation costs you nothing and commits you to nothing. Tell me what your business does and where things currently stand, and I'll tell you honestly whether I'm the right fit.

Get in touch →