Accountants in public practice are the main advisors to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). SMEs use external accountants primarily to help fulfil regulatory requirements or satisfy contractual constraints (e.g., taxation, compilation and audit), but there is evidence that SMEs also rely...

The accounting profession has actively adopted a broader service focus which includes business advice, but the scant extant research in the SME environment identifies only ex-ante demand determinants. Using in-depth interviews with SME owner-managers and external accountants, this study confirms...