President's Perspective
I start my term as President of DFK International with great enthusiasm and eager to lead the NUMBER 7 GLOBAL ACCOUNTING ASSOCIATION. We all know the present statistics. We are an association of over $1b revenues, 212 member firms, 388 offices in 82 countries. We have tremendous momentum driving us forward and it is my expectation to build upon that. I will make sure during my term of office that DFK will expand and grow in both existing and new markets.
Let me re-iterate on the basic objectives and culture of our association on which I will base my leadership:
- Provide exceptional service to clients around the world
- Enhance DFK’s ability to foster friendships and working relationships among members
- Reach out to the younger partners, managers and staff in our firms as they are the future DFK
- As a partner of a small to medium size firm, I am representative of the vast majority of our members and recognize the difference that they and the larger member firms together make as an association.
DFK reached the position that it is today through a teamwork of very capable individuals. Martin Sharp, after a few years as our executive director, has transformed himself from a helicopter brigadier to a DFK General. He has managed to gain the respect and admiration of all the members. He has built and continues to build a brilliant team to support and serve all the members.
I would be unfair not to acknowledge the contributions of the many unpaid volunteers from member firms who serve on committees, give presentations, serve as board members and serve as regional vice presidents, national chairpersons, etc. The contributions of time and talent from this group is what really makes DFK such a success.
Finally, I especially want to thank the past presidents whose shoulders I now stand. I may be biased but I cannot conclude without mentioning the names of Scot Hazy and Mike Tovey that we worked so closely together the last six years and look forward to their valuable contribution to the new council in the years ahead of us.
The international community is fast changing and we have tremendous momentum to build upon and I look forward to the next few years with great anticipation.
– Demetrius Demetriou, President, DFK International
Conferences
The DFK North American Annual Conference is the premier educational and networking conference for partners and shareholders of DFK member firms. The General Sessions will feature a range of presentations from respected experts within their fields. Topics will include: an update on DFK International, presentations from each of DFK/USA’s and Canada’s new member firms, lessons on overcoming adversity, gaining new business opportunities and the utilization of technology and social networks.
The Young Professionals conference is a unique opportunity to benefit from both high level professional training and DFK networking exposure. The delegates will have the chance to meet colleagues from all over the Europe, Middle East & Africa region and to learn from each other throughout working sessions and social activities.
This year’s conference will focus on communication skills; communicating with both clients and colleagues, tendering processes, preparing tender documents for new work, using the DFK Association in this regard and in many other ways. We have Barry Lewis and Beatrice Rodenstock who will take the delegates through these skills. It will be an interactive training session over the 1.5 days, with lots of time to engage with their fellow DFK colleagues.
Registration is open for the 2014 DFK UK & Ireland Annual Conference which is being hosted by our local firm Duncan Sheard Glass in Liverpool City Centre.
We have lots planned for the conference with Steve Edge of Edge Design taking the hotseat to discuss re-branding and exciting ways to promote your firm.
Click here for more information and to register
Mr Jingchao Zheng of Topsun CPA Partnership, Xi’an, and Mr Navin Patel, Vice President DFK Asia-Pacific, invite you to join them in Xi’an for the 2014 DFK Asia-Pacific conference.
As usual, there will be some keynote speakers bringing us up to date with the growing economy in the Asian region, plus we are also arranging an interactive session called “The China Experience” which will focus on referring work in and out of China.
Click here for more information and to register
Latin America Annual Conference
Cancun, Mexico
4-6 September 2014
Click here for more information and to register
UK & Ireland Annual Conference
Liverpool, United Kingdom
18-20 September 2014
Click here for more information and to register
EMEA Young Professionals Conference
Munich
9-11 October 2015
Click here for more information and to register
North America Annual Conference
Palm Springs, USA
21-24 October 2014
Click here for more information and to register
Asia Pacific Annual Conference
Xi’an, China
19-21 November 2014
Click here for more information and to register
EMEA Annual Conference
Cyprus
5-7 February 2015
Amathus Beach Hotel, Cyprus – Registration docs will be available in Nov 2014
For more DFK conference information please click here
Regional Highlights
INTERNATIONAL
Demetris Demetriou, President, DFK International
History has been made with the appointment of a new president of DFK International.
Demetris Demetriou is the first member from Cyprus to be made president of DFK International. Demetris takes on the role in his 20th year of being part of DFK International as co-founder of audit and accounting firm DFK Demetriou Trapezaris based in Nicosia, Cyprus.
Download the Press Release here or from the Private Members Site. Please feel free to distribute this to the staff at your firm and to your local media outlets.
DFK member firm iAudit in Croatia, together with IT consultants and ISA audit methodology experts have developed specialized audit management software which supports audit team members to manage a wide range of audit-related activities in a single framework. The main aim of this tool is to ease the audit work, supporting project team members with tailored audit procedures, plans, checklists, review procedures and other activities relevant to the audit process. It is also important to emphasise that the software is using cloud based technology and therefore improves accessibility of the data, collaboration of team members located on different locations and ultimately work efficiency of the team.
Currently the software is in the Beta testing phase and iAudit expect to have a Release version for the use within their company by mid October and they are targeting to use the Released version of the software for the 2014 audit projects after completing rigorous user acceptance testing.
By investing in this project, together with the received government grant, iAudit managed to bypass required investment in third party developed software licenses (i.e. Case ware) for the audit management tool and they also created a possibility to offer our solution to other audit companies. Since DFK member companies are currently working and tendering on several joint group audits for multinational companies, we believe that there is a potential for increasing the unification of used audit methodology/support among DFK partner companies which could ease the audit process and improve the overall DFK competitiveness.
If this is of interest to your firm. please contact the executive office or Boris Vidas, partner, iAudit d.o.o. (Slavka Krautzeka 83/A, Rijeka, M: +385 (0) 98 9798 447, F: +385 (0) 51 224 238, Skype: hr_boris) for more details.
AMERICAS
Bennett Thrasher LLP is proud to announce that it has been named an “IPA Top 100 Firm” by INSIDE Public Accounting, a designation given to the top 100 firms in the country.
The firm is one of only four Atlanta-based accounting firms to earn this recognition for 2014.
For more information you can download the press release here.
ASIA PACIFIC
John Mann, Executive Officer of DFK Asia Pacific, has a new email address.
Please update your records to the following address: jmann@dfk.com
EMEA
Langdowns DFK is celebrating its 60th anniversary this year.
Langdowns DFK started from humble beginnings in 1954 and has grown to become one of the most experienced and reputable chartered accountants and business advisors in the United Kingdom.
Executive Office News and Updates
All Member Firms and National Group chairs are reminded of the importance of casting your vote on the ballot on the new DFK constitution. The ballot asks member firms to vote on a motion that will see the establishment of DFK International as a UK company limited by guarantee and result in the dissolution of DFK as a Dutch vereniging, with the transfer of assets to the new UK entity. If members vote in favour of the resolution, all Member Firms, Group Members and Correspondent Members will be invited later this year to sign new agreements to join of the UK entity as members of the new DFK International association. The agreements will be based on the existing agreements with some changes to voting rights, the creation of a Members’ Council and changes to the composition of the board of directors.
PLEASE CAST YOUR VOTE BY NOT LATER THAN CLOSE OF BUSINESS ON 12 SEPTEMBER 2014.
This does not apply to Correspondent Members (which are not entitled to vote) or to Members of National Groups (which vote through their National Group representative).
Many member firms are late paying their annual membership dues, which are due within 60 days of the invoice. Therese Grant (DFK Accounts) has written to the firms concerned, who are asked to make the transfers as soon as possible. Please be aware that the board of directors is taking an increasingly strict line on members that do not pay on time and we have recently terminated the membership of firms that fail to respond to reminders.
Members are reminded that we will be using the information from the DFK Workbooks database to compile these documents, so firms should check that the information on their firm is current and correct. The information can be accessed through the Member Administration section of the DFK Members’ Site. Please contact the Executive Secretary (Zoe Daniel) if you require a reminder about how to access the portal or the members’ site.
As part of the DFK Quality Programme, every member firm (including correspondent members and members of national groups) is required to complete the annual online ‘fit and proper’ declaration. As at 28 August, the following firms had not completed to form and should contact the DFK Quality and Business Support Manager (Emma Tran) if they require the link to the form:
- DFK Port Accounting Pty. Ltd., Australia
- Chongqing Heqin CPA, China
- AHC, Egypt
- Cabinet Oréglia-Christophe et Associés, France
- Crossdomain Solutions PvT, India
- D.M.S & Associés S.à.r.l., Luxembourg
- Vázquez Pola Consultores – DFK, S.C., Mexico
- AMAYA LACAYO Y CIA, LTDA, Nicaragua
- Paul Taiwo & Co., Nigeria
- IBN Hyan Chartered Accountants, Oman
- Focus Revision AB, Sweden
- Klint Andersson Revision AB, Sweden
- DFK Camero, Romero y Asociados, Venezuela
Please note that our Royal Bank of Scotland accounts are now closed.
Be sure to update your records with our HSBC account details below:
HSBC
153 North Street, Brighton, East Sussex,
BN1 1SW, U K
Sort Code 40-14-03
Account No. 22518503
IBAN GB85MIDL40140322518503
BIC MIDLGB2111V
Account Name: DFK International
Are you a member of the DFK International LinkedIn Group?
Join us now by clicking here.
If you would like more information on how to use LinkedIn the DFK LinkedIn user guide is available to download here and from the members’ site.
Do you have any news for us? We are always happy to receive any news that you would like to share with the other member firms. Please contact exec@dfk.com.