Our nominal opening times are 9 to 5, which will be easy for our clients to remember. We will in fact take deliveries such as accounting records from 8.30 am, and also on Saturday mornings by arrangement. Over holiday periods such as Christmas, we might also take a delivery on a reasonable day by arrangement.

We are open for e-mail all the time, of course, but tend to work on a 24 hour cycle (we may need to contact the Revenue, or view an item on their website, which may be a reason for delay). We view e-mails on the Saturday before Easter, and on working days after Christmas, and will deal with anything urgent.

The 24 hour cycle is typical of computers, which often do overnight batch processing of work because it is more efficient.

David Porthouse & Co is a firm of accountants in Carlisle serving clients in Cumbria and North West England. We have a major interest in new technology and we are working on an optical number recognition/datepoint system for scanning bank statements with the intention of attacking the cost of accounts preparation. We also have a spreadsheet system which can be sent back and forth by e-mail.