Professional Services

Finance built for
knowledge businesses.

IR35, utilisation rates, project profitability, billing efficiency — whether you're a solo consultant or a 50-person agency, we'll help you run a tighter, more profitable business and keep more of what you earn.

Book a discovery call ↗How we can help
Professional services office
Our expertise

We understand
professional services

Professional services businesses — consultancies, agencies, law firms, architects, accountants — have a distinctive financial profile. Revenue is driven by time and expertise, not product. Utilisation and billing efficiency are the key metrics. And the tax landscape, particularly around IR35 and contractor structures, is constantly shifting. We work with professional services businesses every day.

65–75%
Target utilisation rate for profitable agencies
25%
Corporation tax rate — structure matters more than ever
£000s
Potential IR35 liability if contractors are misclassified
The challenges

What makes professional services
accounting complex

01
IR35 and contractor status
IR35 continues to create risk for businesses that engage contractors. We advise on status determinations, structure, and documentation to manage your exposure properly.
02
Utilisation and billing efficiency
The most profitable professional services firms track utilisation rigorously. We help you build the management information to understand where value is being created and where it's being lost.
03
Project profitability
Which clients and projects actually make money? We build the reporting infrastructure to answer that question — and help you make better decisions about pricing, scope, and resourcing.
04
Optimal business structure
Sole trader, limited company, partnership, LLP — the right structure depends on your circumstances, your plans, and the tax environment. We advise on this properly, not generically.
What we do

Services for
professional services businesses

Every business we work with gets the full Runway service — but informed by deep sector knowledge. Here are the areas where we add the most value for professional services businesses specifically.

Talk to us about your business ↗
01
IR35 status determinations and advice
02
Utilisation and billing efficiency reporting
03
Project-level profitability analysis
04
Business structure review and optimisation
05
Payroll for mixed employee/contractor teams
06
Management accounts and KPI dashboards
Client story
When we were raising our seed round, Runway built our financial model, prepared our data room, and sat on calls with investors. They'd been through it themselves — that counted for everything.
James Okafor
CEO, Kairo Consulting
Go.
Let's talk

Work with accountants who
actually know your sector.

Book a free 30-minute call with a Runway founder. We'll tell you honestly whether we're the right fit — and if we are, we'll show you exactly what working with us looks like.

Free 30-minute call  ·  Speak directly with a founder  ·  No obligation