Australian accounting firms are saving as much as $50,000 per employee by using offshore labour in countries such as India and the Philippines.
The firms are using Indian offshore auditors for tasks such as auditing, accounting, administration and financial planning work.
This was revealed in a survey conducted by the AFR amongst Australia’s top 100 accounting firms. The respondents said that they were relying on skilled foreign labour to help service client demands.
According to AFR, outsourced skilled labour is 25 to 50 per cent cheaper than in Australia. This move is also helping Australian accounting firms to pay higher salaries to local staff to meet the talent crunch.
Nexia Australia has hired staff in India because of a shortage of experienced accountants in Australia. Its chairman Mal Di Giulio told AFR that there was a “significant indirect cost of managing the activity.”
He added:
“We hope that indirect cost will reduce over the next couple of years.”
Further, many Australian firms are using a combination of offshore workers and hiring their own staff overseas. Large firms such as PwC have even set up a specialised talent centre to meet demand.
Bentleys Network marketing director Jo Adams told AFR that the member firms using offshoring providers saved 50 – 75 per cent in wages for administrative and processing roles.
Boyce Chartered Accountants, which hired seven offshore accountants, said that the salary difference between those workers and their Australian equivalents was $47,000 annually.
Other countries where Australian accounting firms used outsourced skilled workers were Vietnam, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Fiji, and Thailand.