Sustainability and Better Future Policy
Our commitment to a better future for our clients and communities.
Change is coming. It’s time to build a business model fit for the economy of the future; one which guides our clients into this new period. It’s a chance to lead better, happier and healthier lives, powered by stronger and more resilient businesses.
We believe it’s the responsibility of all businesses to take action by forging a new path and not just following “business as usual”. We’re committed not only to reaching net zero as soon as we can (2030), but we’ll be transparent and honest about what we’re doing – so others can do the same.
What sustainability efforts have we taken so far?
Banking and investments
We bank with Starling, the co-op and Monzo. We’ll continue to closely monitor the credentials of the banks we work with via the bank.green initiative.
Clients
Where our sustainability policy will have the biggest impact will be on the advice and guidance we provide to our clients. Climate change is an existential threat that requires systemic change. We’re aware that current economic models are unsustainable and that newer ones are being created. As ‘Capitalism’ is reformed into ‘Stakeholder – Capitalism’, the role of the accountant will change. Businesses will face new definitions of success and will need to comply with an array of new rules, regulations and client expectations.
No one has all the answers, us included, but we work closely with small businesses to understand the changes on the horizon to prepare our clients for the economy of the future. To quote economist Kate Raworth, “Today we have economies that need to grow, whether or not they make us thrive. What we need are economies that make us thrive, whether or not they grow.”
Our most successful clients live good lives, respect and bring balance to nature, protect their families and nurture the next generation. They meet and exceed their goals, support their communities and lead prosperous and healthy teams. They know there’s more to business than profit, and more to the role of an accountant than tax and year-end processes (important as these are!).
We’ll continue to talk about climate change to educate our clients and encourage them to act, supporting them to make the changes they feel necessary. It’s against our ethos to work with clients that actively harm the environment or treat their employees unethically.
Fair Taxes
A functioning and fair tax system is a key element of a healthy economic society and vital for government funding. It also plays a major role in supporting the environment.
Switchfoot Accounting commits to paying the right amount of corporation tax and other taxes at the right time and in the right place. We will also only work with clients that work to this commitment.
Payment of suppliers
We commit to paying all our suppliers within their payment terms.
During 2024, we added our supplier code of conduct to our website and expect all our suppliers to conform to this policy.
We try to prioritise local businesses and B Corps with diverse ownership over multinational companies or chains. We will continue to monitor our purchases and make all purchases with consideration.
Our Teams
We commit to always paying above the real living minimum wage.
We’re also committed to our team practising lifelong learning. This includes life skills such as first aid and carbon literacy.
Training and Education
Our director has completed the carbon literacy course with Better Business Network (a B-Corp) and the ICAEW sustainability certificate.
As our team expands, every team member will receive climate education. This is core to the ICAEW ACA training syllabus, and our team will also complete carbon literacy training. In addition to this, we’ll regularly review what further training is required.
We have one team member who is currently on an apprenticeship scheme.
Office Operations
We had an office energy audit which highlighted some key areas of focus, which we addressed by using LoCASE grants to part-fund the following projects:
- Replacing our gas boiler with an electric boiler (the gas has been disconnected)
- Installing solar panels on the flat roof, which are now able to generate a significant amount of our electricity
- Replacing our existing lighting with energy-efficient LEDs
- Replacing our air conditioning units (illegal F gases) with much more efficient heat pumps
- Recycling as much waste as possible from the building works
Because we moved to an office in May 2022, this caused a significant one-off carbon impact for the year 2022-23.
We have 100% renewable energy via Octopus Energy (a B Corp) and no gas on the premises. We are also a registered solar energy exporter with Octopus Energy, meaning we export our excess solar energy.
We generated 6,805 kWh from the office solar panels in 2023.
Office Supplies
We use unbleached printer paper and avoid printing where possible. We’re almost 100% digital and don’t send any paper to clients. Most of our meetings are via Zoom.
We use refillable cleaning and bathroom products. We use recycled, unbleached hand towels and Naked Sprout toilet paper.
We use Roupcycle to collect waste, and we have recycling bins in the kitchen. Still, some work is to be done on avoiding single-use plastic. We use refillable water filters and loose coffee and tea.
Travel and transport
Our office is within walking distance of both a bus stop and the train station. As these services improve and the team grows, we hope the team will use them.
We have installed an electric vehicle charger at the office, and over time we’ll make sure all parking spaces have access to a charger.
We have a travel policy of walking/cycling wherever possible, with the next option being public transport followed by driving. Flying is prohibited.
We have added two cycle hoops to the office so the team can lock their bikes securely, and our director has converted her bike to an e-bike using a conversion kit. As part of the director’s carbon literacy pledge, we purchased a second-hand bike for office use. This will make trips to the local area cleaner and healthier for the team and encourage purchases from local businesses.
Charities and donations
We donate to charities throughout the year, and we use these donations to achieve SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) that wouldn’t otherwise be possible through our operations alone.
We select our charitable partners annually with a preference for organisations that work to solve climate breakdown, reverse biodiversity loss, support economic development and reduce inequalities globally.
We also purchase trees and carbon credits from Ecologi. We do this to more than offset our unavoidable carbon footprint and will continue to look for ways to reduce our negative climate effects and increase our positive impact on the planet.
We very occasionally get offered a small amount of introducer fees for referrals and we will often ask for trees to be planted on our behalf instead.
Pro bono and donated time
It is important that we support the next generation of accountants in the industry as well as the new generation of business owners.
Our director often donates time to mentor ICAEW trainees and has in the past mentored business owners via the Help to Grow scheme.
We also get involved in careers and sustainability events on behalf of the ICAEW and have been asked to provide thought leadership at these events.
Our team often volunteer time for projects that advances the mission to change professional services and support our local businesses to build resilience through sustainable practices.
Certified B Corporation
Switchfoot Accounting is a certified B corporation.
- In the Governance section, we scored 21.2 compared to an industry/sector average of 8.7.
- In the Workers section, we scored 30 compared to an industry/sector average of 22.4.
- In the Environment Section, we scored 13.4 compared to an industry/sector average of 4.4.
- In the Customers Section, we scored 2.2 compared to an industry/sector average of 2.7.
- In the Community Section, we scored 28.5 compared to an industry/sector average of 14.7
Giving a score of 95.6
Pensions
The director has used her pension fund to purchase part of the office for Switchfoot. Greening the pension is therefore a case of managing the environmental performance of the underlying asset, which this sustainability policy contributes to. Any future invested contribution will be managed by a B Corp investment manager and must be signed up to the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi).
Our Team’s pension funds are defaulted to a sustainable fund with the people’s pension. The team have access to financial advisers who can support them in selecting the funds they wish to invest in and can discuss the impact of the money they invest,
Training and Education
All new team members must complete the carbon literacy course within the probationary period. All team members are encouraged to set annual carbon reduction and positive climate action goals.
Truth
We pledge to always tell the truth about the climate crisis, and we will never get involved in projects where we can only speak about the positives of climate change.
Reviewing Our Progress
This plan is being reviewed quarterly as part of our board meetings, and we will challenge ourselves to do more and take action more quickly to change the world.
What is Switchfoot accounting currently working on?
Influence
We believe one of our biggest impacts on the world is through the influence we can have on clients, suppliers, the community and our industry.
A joint project with Switchfoot Wealth, we set up the Surrey Sustainable Professionals’ Group in 2023, which is a small group of accountants, tax advisers, solicitors, financial advisers and discretionary fund managers supported by academics and PhD students from the University of Surrey Centre for Environment and Sustainability. Where we spent 12 months exploring the question, “What is sustainable professional advice?” We are due to launch our white paper in early 2025.
We produced a guide for small businesses, “Be Climate Confident”, in 2021 and republished it in 2023 that we share on our website and in our newsletters to help any small business with their sustainability journey.
Our director supports Switchfoot Wealth’s work via the Surrey B local and helps at the events when extra hands are required.
Rebecca is an ICAEW Climate Champion, recognised by her professional body as a thought leader. She has given presentations and webinars for the ICAEW on several occasions.
We are an active member of a number of local groups including the Surrey Sustainable Business Network. We often attend and contribute to local events, especially on the topic of sustainability.
We are deliberately transparent about our work & enquiries on LinkedIn to make sure all professionals know that other professionals are working on these topics and that they are not alone. It is important to normalise the conversations even when they are uncomfortable and challenging topics. We believe peer-to-peer influence has a big impact.
We will continue to look for ways to influence and positively challenge the professional services industry and those working in it.
System Change
We are exploring new advice models for the accountancy profession, and we commit to sharing our findings in time in order to contribute to system change.
This includes advised emissions and carbon reduction services.
Advised emissions
We are continuing to explore how we can measure and report on this area and are testing our “know your client’s carbon” process internally. We hope to share the process with the wider community in 2025.
We are reviewing our client and supplier processes to reduce our impacts and see what influence we can have on the organisations we come across.
Carbon reduction services
We plan to launch a carbon reduction and sustainability suite of services in 2025.
Activism
The director attends several peaceful protests each year with her family to raise awareness of the issues and to show her young family that adults are trying to make a positive difference and to give them hope.
We often complete surveys, write open letters and write to MPs to request action on climate and nature issues.
Carbon footprint and Net Zero alignment
Our scope 1 and 2 emissions are very low ( < 1T), and scope 3 is where we have a significant carbon footprint (2023 – 13T) (2022- 30T) (2021 – 4T).
We are using Zero Ecologi to monitor our Carbon footprint. Our carbon footprint was much lower for 2023 as a lot of the building work had been completed in 2022. We are actively working towards net zero and are looking to reduce our carbon footprint down further in 2024.
We would like to have a certified carbon audit (or equivalent) and build a formal carbon transition plan during 2025. Having said that, we have probably done everything practical we can on operations.
We understand that the carbon emissions of our operations are a drop in the ocean compared to the impact of the advice we deliver to clients.
We are exploring how we can measure and report our advised emissions.
Supplier Reviews
During 2025, we will write to all of our suppliers and complete a review of their sustainability plans.
What aren’t we able to do straight away?
Website
We moved our website to Krystal (a B Corp) and launched our new website. We will continue to monitor our digital footprint.
Given the small number of visits to our website, we don’t consider the footprint of our website to be a priority area for action.
IT
We will use our IT equipment until it can’t be repaired or upgraded. We will purchase phones and laptops only when they can’t be repaired by our IT team. In other words, saying goodbye to technology when it dies. IT performance has to be considered when we purchase laptops & phones, so refurbished laptops are not our preferred solution currently. Phones are currently on SIM-only contracts and won’t be replaced until it is a business necessity. Fair phones and Dell laptops are likely to be the preferred solution for new team members.
Data
We need to retain data for AML, HMRC and regulators. Therefore, the scope 3 carbon footprint of the data we generate is significant and can’t be avoided. We will carry out a digital audit every December to delete any unnecessary data.
Water
Water harvesting is prohibitively expensive, and our water usage is very small. We will continue to monitor developments and will consider water conservation when we replace the very dated and degenerating kitchens and bathrooms.
Company cars
The director wants to move to an electric company car as soon as possible, but the carbon impact of a new car would outweigh the carbon impact of her 1-litre petrol Ford Fiesta that does less than 5,000 miles a year. She, therefore, plans to make the switch when this car gets to the end of its life to minimise the carbon impact.
When we refurbish the kitchen and bathrooms in future, we want to add energy-efficient hand dryers to avoid hand towel waste. We are also considering a shower for cyclists but need to consider the water usage.
Environment and biodiversity
We have added planters at the front of the office and will attempt to plant wildflowers in the grass area. We will see how wild this goes and will try to limit any mowing. This is a small step, but all small impacts add up.
In 2023, we enjoyed watching birds nesting in the tree next to the office window and had mixed feelings when they fledged. In 2024, we saw smaller birds feeding on our alder trees, and we witnessed many blue beetles on the planters.
We will consider what else we can do directly during 2025.
Conclusion
We have started our rebellion, and there is more to do. We commit to accountability, continuous learning and development, and transparency throughout our journey.