17/10/2026
When you sip the dodgy accountant’s Kool-Aid.
Notes of “trust me, mate”. Expensive finish.
It's the client, and the advisors that truly care about their clients that are kept up at night truly worrying and trying to work through these issues and the eventual hangover this terrible 'advice' will bring come the morning. It's why I am making this post at 1:30am...
Jokes aside, I’m sick of seeing vulnerable business owners sold expensive promises when they’re already frightened about their business, their home and their family.
They need honest advice. Selling them something blatantly incorrect, wrapped in jargon they’re embarrassed to question, is appalling.
If your $30k “family protector trust” amounts to a $4k trust deed and a handful of cheap PPSR registrations, I’d like someone to explain what the other $26k is doing.
Apparently, protecting a family. Just check whose.
Proper advice deserves proper fees. A whole bunch of bu****it words doesn’t make it work.
Legitimate asset protection absolutely has a place. Timing and purpose matter, especially once action is on foot and creditors are knocking.
Alarm bells should ring when the accountant says “Beg, borrow and steal to pay my invoice. It’s the only way to save your family home”, while their engagement terms let them seek security over your assets and cars.
A trust deed or PPSR registration isn’t a magic forcefield. Creditor-defeating conduct can expose directors and the advisers involved to serious consequences. “Asset protection” on the invoice doesn’t settle the legal position.
And if the reassurance is that a “friendly liquidator” will wave it through, everyone gets a piece of the cake, and the important discussions happen in an encrypted WhatsApp group… I have questions.
Encrypted doesn’t mean exempt.
If your accountant writes the plan on a whiteboard, tells you not to take photos, then rubs it off, maybe walk away. Preferably before paying the invoice.
Your vulnerability shouldn’t be a pricing multiplier.
It’s not all doom and gloom. There are good accountants and restructuring professionals doing real good for people under pressure. Jarvis Archer or Des Byron at Business Reset are a few I’m happy to point people towards.
There are legitimate options, and people who will explain them properly and tell you the uncomfortable bits before taking your money.
If something sounds too good to be true, it usually is.
Especially when you desperately need it to be true.
