Saffery Champness has promoted two directors to the firm’s partnership – Margi Campbell and Hannah Mazrae. Campbell is based in Inverness and provides advice and tax planning to a client base that includes wealthy entrepreneurs, high net worth individuals, professional partnerships, family businesses and landed estate clients. She joined Saffery Champness in 2017 and is both CA and CTA qualified. Mazrae is based in Bournemouth and specialises in providing advice and support to a range of clients, including landed estates, agribusinesses and the commercial sector, working with directors, trustees and individuals on accounting, audit and taxation matters. She joined the firm in 2009 and has both accounting and tax qualifications.

BDO LLP has appointed two new partners this month, both joining from top six firms. Caroline Harwood joins BDO as a partner in the employment tax team and will be based in London. She has 25 years’ experience advising clients on employment tax and share plans. Alongside advising BDO’s clients, Harwood will support the further growth of the employment tax team and help shape the team’s vision for the future. She joins from Crowe UK. Raoul Rambaut joins BDO’s risk advisory team and will also be based in London. He will help grow BDO’s risk advisory team further and have a focus on advising larger, listed corporates with complex structures and processes. He has expertise across the advisory space in areas including internal audit, Sarbanes Oxley assurance, technology risk, data privacy and third party assurance. He joins BDO from PwC.

PKF Francis Clark has announced the promotions of two new partners and five directors. Chloe Mills and Liam Dushynsky are made partners in the firm, while Chris Rodgers, Sarah Brown, Adam Waddle, Kieran Hancock and Mark Bishop are promoted to director roles. The newly promoted partners and directors are based in Exeter, Poole, Torquay and Plymouth. Mills joined the firm as a director of audit in 2010 and is responsible for overseeing audit and accounting services at the Poole office. Exeter-based Dushynsky joined the firm in 2005 as a graduate trainee and is now a key member of the firm’s VAT and customs team.

PwC UK has appointed Sunil Patel as the firm’s first chief data officer (CDO) and he will head up the newly formed data office. Patel, who is also a partner, will be responsible for developing the firm’s overall vision and strategy for the use of data and will join PwC’s growing global CDO network. He also leads PwC UK’s digital upskilling programme which will equip 22,000 staff across the UK with the digital skills required for the future.

Alvarez & Marsal Taxand has appointed New York-based Fabrizio Lolliri as managing director and global head of transfer pricing. Lolliri’s industry focus enhances the firm’s global capabilities as companies adopt to new market challenges from the Covid-19 pandemic and increasing scrutiny by tax authorities. He has 20 years’ experience in transfer pricing, spanning multiple markets and industries. He returns to the firm after spending eight years at Hogan Lovell as global head of transfer pricing.

Fortus Business Advisors & Accountants has appointed David McGeachy, a senior VAT specialist, as head of VAT. With over 20 years’ experience working for top firms in VAT advisory, he began his career at Arthur Andersen, where he qualified as a chartered accountant before training in tax and specialising in VAT. He then spent around 15 years working for PwC and KPMG as a VAT advisor. Before his move to Fortus, McGeachy was national head of VAT at Saffrey Champness for seven years.

Scrutton Bland has strengthened the business advisory team with the appointment of Ben Cussons as director. He has been with the firm since 2011 and has a large portfolio of clients across the region. He specialises in providing targeted business finance advice to clients of all sizes, in particular those operating in the construction industry.

Armstrong Watson has promoted Helen Robinson to accounting director. She currently leads accountancy services at the firm’s Northallerton office and has more than 20 years’ experience working closely with family and owner-managed businesses in a variety of sectors, with the majority of her clients in property and construction sectors. She has extensive accounts experience and is also heavily involved in personal and business tax, corporation tax, VAT and payroll.  Having started her career at a firm in York in 1997, Robinson joined Armstrong Watson in 2001 and qualified four years later. 

Leeds accountancy firm, Brown Butler, has hired Phil Kitchen as accounts director. He has more than 16 years of experience supporting businesses across Yorkshire, and has skills in accounting, audit, taxation services and general business advice. A fellow of the ICAEW, Kitchen brings further knowledge and practical experience to Brown Butler’s already strong audit and accounts team, and has particular expertise in the manufacturing and construction sectors.

Harbottle & Lewis has appointed Marcus Parker as a partner in its private capital practice, strengthening further the firm’s offshore tax, trusts and estates offering. He has over 20 years’ experience in the private client industry as both a lawyer and, for the last seven years, as a professional trustee in the Cayman Islands. His practice focuses on establishing efficient and effective international structures to hold and manage the global wealth of international families. He has also developed particular expertise in contentious trust and estate matters. Before moving to the Cayman Islands in 2013, Marcus was a founding partner of London-based boutique private client law firm New Quadrant Partners.

Addington Chambers, the new ‘virtual’ international barristers’ chambers specialising in tax and revenue law, has further expanded the number of its members taking on one new member and two associate members. This takes the numbers of members at the chambers to 14. Hartley Foster, head of tax disputes at law firm Fieldfisher has joined the chambers. He has specialised in contentious tax matters for over 20 years. Two new associate members, Andrew Noble and Dominic Hodge, have also joined the chambers. Noble is an experienced barrister and chartered arbitrator, specialising in commercial chancery litigation, including associated professional liability and insolvency cases. Hodge practises in all areas relating to tax and trusts but has a particular interest in international tax and contentious trust matters.

The Pensions Research Accountants Group (PRAG) has made three appointments to the PRAG executive board with Andrew Mansell, Mark Hedges and Michael Do set to join the board. Mansell is group financial controller at British Airways Pension Services Ltd, having joined BAPSL in 2015 after 10 years working in audit with BDO. Hedges recently joined Capital Cranfield having previously been chief investment officer of the Nationwide Pension Fund, and remains on the Fund’s board as an independent trustee. He is a member of the PRAG derivatives working party. Do is head of finance & risk reporting for the HSBC Pension Trust and is currently a member of PRAG’s derivatives working party and the cyber and fraud working party.

PTL, the trustee and governance services provider, has appointed Anne Sander as a client director. She joins PTL from Aviva Investors, where she was senior internal audit manager and interim head of internal audit. Her role involved overseeing the risk management controls across all asset classes in the UK, US and Europe. She currently serves as the chair of the audit, operations and governance committee for the Aviva staff pension scheme.

Metapraxis, the financial analytics technology business, has appointed Jacqueline de Rojas CBE, previously an adviser to Metapraxis, as chair of the board of directors. She is president of techUK and co-chair of the Institute of Coding. She is also a non-executive director on the boards of Rightmove, Costain Group and FDM Group.

Payink, a payments and receivables provider to professional services firms, has appointed Branislav Trajkovski as CEO. Previously, he was global head of corporate development and a board member at cross-border payments company Dlocal. A chartered accountant, Trajkovski trained at PwC.

The Independent newspaper group has hired Richard Langrish as chief financial officer (CFO).  He is an experienced finance professional with over 25 years of expertise as an international financial executive and management consultant across a variety of sectors. He joins The Independent after 12 years at The Economist, most recently as CFO of client solutions and global events, where he supported strategic business reviews and implementation, including the operational restructuring of divisions to align with the new business direction. Langrish will report to Zach Leonard, chief executive officer, to support The Independent’s global expansion, diversification and growing portfolio of B2B and B2C businesses.

The Medical Protection Society (MPS) has appointed Richard Pile as executive director for finance. Previously he was chief financial officer of RSA Luxembourg, the European arm of RSA Group. He spent seven years at RSA in various senior finance roles, and prior to this, worked at Hyperion Insurance Group supporting its global expansion as head of group FP&A and reporting. Pile started his career at Grant Thornton, where he qualified as an accountant, working in its financial services practice. At MPS, he will primarily focus on finance, investments, business information, procurement and facilities.

Want to feature in People in the News? Please send people appointments, hires and promotions to accountancynews@croneri.co.uk