Camp quits Taxsoft

Taxsoft has been hit by a third executive departure sinceon since Sage takeover. Newcastle-based Sage bought the taxation specialist for £10.8m in February.

Director John Camp left the company at the end of July, following in the footsteps of founders Robin and Charles Cook-Hurle, who left the company in April. As with the Cooke-Hurle brothers, Sage said Camp’s resignation was amicable. ‘We’re sorry to lose him, but he has decided to follow his own career path,’ said a Sage spokeswoman.

Leading users were aware of the change, but said they were comfortable with Taxsoft’s post-acquisition strategy.

Gavin May, director of Sage’s professional accountants division, has taken over responsibility for Taxsoft but was unavailable for comment.

At the time of the acquisition, May was keen to cross-sell Taxsoft’s personal and corporation tax products with the accounts preparation package, Sage Audit 2000. He said work would begin to integrate the two product lines so that accountants could take information directly out of the accounts preparation package and feed it straight into the tax computation modules.

Ernst & Young and KPMG both use Taxsoft’s corporation tax system. Ernst & Young also had a joint development project under way with Tax-soft to develop EYPDplus, a package to handle P11D expenses returns.

Since Sage bought Taxsoft, it has picked up the project, even though it already markets a P11D package, said E&Y head of tax Douglas Fairbairn.

‘Sage is reorganising,’ he added. ‘The style is changing, but we’re happy with the way things are going. In the meetings we’ve held with them, they’ve shown they are serious about maintaining research and development and keeping their main accounts happy.’

KPMG tax partners are due to meet Taxsoft later this month. Manchester-based partner Ian Stewart said there were no signs of deterioration in Taxsoft’s service since Sage bought it.

‘I’m not aware of any intention to change, but we keep software under constant review. If we saw competitive advantage, we would change,’ he said.