Iranian & Persian-Speaking Accountant in London

We act for a wide range of Iranian-owned businesses — from shops, salons and restaurants to consultants, contractors and property investors. As a Persian-speaking accountant in London we help you set up correctly, meet every HMRC deadline, claim the right expenses and plan your tax so you keep more of what you earn.

• Company formation and HMRC registration
• Bookkeeping, VAT returns and Making Tax Digital
• PAYE payroll and CIS for subcontractors
• Year-end accounts and corporation tax
• Self-assessment for sole traders, directors and landlords

Based in Finchley (N3) and close to Enfield and North London, we are local to the Iranian community here. Meet us in person or work with us entirely online — either way you get clear, jargon-free advice and quick replies.

The rules for people with income and assets outside the UK changed substantially from April 2025. The old domicile-based remittance basis was replaced with a residence-based regime: broadly, people in their first four years of UK tax residence after a long enough period abroad can claim relief on foreign income and gains, and after that worldwide income is taxable here in the normal way.

If you have arrived recently, that window matters and it is worth understanding before it closes rather than afterwards. If you have been here longer, the position is simpler but the reporting still has to be right — foreign bank interest, overseas rental income and gains on assets abroad are all reportable.

Our Persian-speaking clients run a wide range of businesses — restaurants and food retail, property, professional practices, import and trade, and online businesses. Where the tax position is specific to the trade, we have set it out in more detail:

• Accountant for restaurants, cafés and takeaways
• Accountant for landlords and property investors
• Accountant for online sellers
• Accountant for start-ups and new businesses

This is the practical friction our Iranian clients meet most, and it is worth being straightforward about. UK banks apply enhanced checks to payments with any connection to Iran, and they are entitled to ask where money came from before they will release it. That is a compliance process rather than a judgement about you — but it moves at the bank’s pace, and it is far easier to satisfy with documents you already have than with documents you have to go and find.

Keep the evidence at the time, not afterwards

Whatever the source — a property sale, an inheritance, the proceeds of a business, savings accumulated over years — keep the contract, the statement, the probate document or the transfer record when it happens. Reconstructing a paper trail for a transaction from six years ago in another jurisdiction is difficult and sometimes impossible, and an account can sit frozen while you try.

بانک‌های بریتانیا برای نقل و انتقال‌هایی که به ایران مربوط می‌شوند بررسی‌های بیشتری انجام می‌دهند. بهترین کار این است که مدارک مربوط به منشأ وجوه را از همان ابتدا نگه دارید — قرارداد فروش، صورتحساب بانکی یا سند ارث. این کار بعداً همه چیز را بسیار آسان‌تر می‌کند.

Bringing money in is not the same as being taxed on it

Moving your own capital into the UK is not itself a taxable event. What matters is the income or gain that produced it, and whether that arose while you were UK tax resident. The two questions get conflated constantly, and the anxiety usually turns out to be about the wrong one. Ask before you move a large sum rather than after — the answer is often reassuring, and when it is not, there is usually something that can be done in advance and nothing that can be done later.

A large share of the Iranian community in London is in the professions — medicine, dentistry, engineering, academia, architecture, law — and a recognisable pattern comes with it: a salaried post with tax already deducted, plus private or consultancy income alongside it. That combination is where the first self-assessment appears, usually later than it should have.

PAYE does not cover the other income

Tax deducted from your salary is calculated as though the salary is all you earn. Add private income on top and it sits in a higher band, so the extra tax on it is greater than people expect — and none of it has been collected at source. The first year is the shock; the second is worse if nothing was set aside, because payments on account arrive too.

Sole trader or company?

For consultancy income alongside a salary, the answer is genuinely not obvious. A company can be efficient, but it brings filing obligations, a second set of deadlines and cost. For a few thousand pounds a year it is usually not worth it; past a certain point it clearly is. It depends on the numbers, and we would rather run them than give you a rule of thumb that is wrong for you.

• Self-assessment accountant
• Limited company accountant
• Contractors and IR35