THE
ACCOUNT
The latest in finance and business
THE
ACCOUNT
The latest in finance and business
The 12th of never
Late payments are a topic CA magazine has highlighted on more than one occasion.
According to government figures an average of 38 small businesses close every day because of delays in settling invoices, although other sources say the figure is much greater than that. Those late payments can stifle growth among small businesses, costing the UK economy an estimated £11bn a year.
The government recently announced new rules to tackle the problem, which it claims are “the toughest… in the G7”. It has set out the terms as follows:
“The changes will include a new 60-day cap on payment terms on all large firms when paying smaller suppliers. New mandatory interest on late payments will also be introduced, with a requirement for all commercial contracts to include statutory interest set at 8% above the Bank of England base rate.
“For example, if a small business is owed £10,000 by one of its customers and is paid 60 days later than the agreed payment date, they will be owed £10,293.15 including mandatory interest (£10,000 plus £193.15 interest plus £100 compensation).
“We also propose to ban the withholding of retention payments under the terms of construction contracts, consulting on its implementation. This will prevent small firms losing retentions to insolvency or non-payment.”
Meanwhile, a survey of small businesses carried out by QuickBooks produced the following results:
● 61% of businesses report invoices more than 30 days overdue.
● 65% say they are currently owed money from unpaid invoices.
● The average small business is owed £21,400 in unpaid invoices.
The 12th of never
Late payments are a topic CA magazine has highlighted on more than one occasion.
According to government figures an average of 38 small businesses close every day because of delays in settling invoices, although other sources say the figure is much greater than that. Those late payments can stifle growth among small businesses, costing the UK economy an estimated £11bn a year.
The government recently announced new rules to tackle the problem, which it claims are “the toughest… in the G7”. It has set out the terms as follows:
“The changes will include a new 60-day cap on payment terms on all large firms when paying smaller suppliers. New mandatory interest on late payments will also be introduced, with a requirement for all commercial contracts to include statutory interest set at 8% above the Bank of England base rate.
“For example, if a small business is owed £10,000 by one of its customers and is paid 60 days later than the agreed payment date, they will be owed £10,293.15 including mandatory interest (£10,000 plus £193.15 interest plus £100 compensation).
“We also propose to ban the withholding of retention payments under the terms of construction contracts, consulting on its implementation. This will prevent small firms losing retentions to insolvency or non-payment.”
Meanwhile, a survey of small businesses carried out by QuickBooks produced the following results:
● 61% of businesses report invoices more than 30 days overdue.
● 65% say they are currently owed money from unpaid invoices.
● The average small business is owed £21,400 in unpaid invoices.
On the downswing
Several recent reports point to increased participation in golf, with the sport reaching a new, younger and more diverse audience. And just a few weeks ago a proposal was submitted to build a £480m golf resort in Angus, Scotland. That, however, is at the top end of the market, and a recent study suggests that as many as one in five courses across the UK could be at risk of closure.
The study was carried out by Custodian Golf, a consultancy which specialises in golf course management, strategic planning and accountancy. Many of the courses under threat are council-owned and therefore open to anyone.
With many UK councils both badly in debt and under pressure to increase housing development, freeing up land occupied by golf courses would offer one simple solution – and be popular with property developers.
To give one example, The Times recently reported that Dalmuir golf course is set to close because Dunbartonshire council said a drop-off in membership meant it could no longer afford to keep the course open.
Others could follow suit, especially in counties such as Surrey, which famously has more land occupied by golf courses than housing. First to go could be Sutton Green, where plans to build 650 houses on the golf club’s grounds have been submitted to Woking Borough Council.
On the downswing
Several recent reports point to increased participation in golf, with the sport reaching a new, younger and more diverse audience. And just a few weeks ago a proposal was submitted to build a £480m golf resort in Angus, Scotland. That, however, is at the top end of the market, and a recent study suggests that as many as one in five courses across the UK could be at risk of closure.
The study was carried out by Custodian Golf, a consultancy which specialises in golf course management, strategic planning and accountancy. Many of the courses under threat are council-owned and therefore open to anyone.
With many UK councils both badly in debt and under pressure to increase housing development, freeing up land occupied by golf courses would offer one simple solution – and be popular with property developers.
To give one example, The Times recently reported that Dalmuir golf course is set to close because Dunbartonshire council said a drop-off in membership meant it could no longer afford to keep the course open.
Others could follow suit, especially in counties such as Surrey, which famously has more land occupied by golf courses than housing. First to go could be Sutton Green, where plans to build 650 houses on the golf club’s grounds have been submitted to Woking Borough Council.
The advisory gap
The recent BDO Young Minds survey has exposed stark differences in access to careers advice among young people.
The study of around 2,000 18–25-year-olds shows just a third had access to a dedicated careers adviser while at school or college, with as many as two-thirds turning to AI to fill the gap.
The results also demonstrate the importance of having connections, with 42% agreeing that access to their chosen career path is equal, but only if people are afforded the opportunity of relevant work experience.
And the disparity is worse for those with a neurodivergent condition or learning disability. “Neurodivergent young people feel they are not being afforded the same work experience opportunities as their peers,” said BDO Partner Sarah Hillary. “This demonstrates a clear and urgent need for structured employer engagement and guaranteed equal access to careers support to ensure no young person is locked out of opportunity before their careers even begin.”
Miles Nikolic, Audit Quality Manager at BDO, who was diagnosed as being on the autism spectrum as a young adult, added: “When I think about equal access to opportunities for individuals with a neurodivergent condition, it strikes me that talent is widely distributed but access is not.”
ICAS believes strongly in equal opportunities for all, including those who are neurodivergent. We have a range of resources, both for neurodivergence and for wellbeing more generally, which you can access here.
The advisory gap
The recent BDO Young Minds survey has exposed stark differences in access to careers advice among young people.
The study of around 2,000 18–25-year-olds shows just a third had access to a dedicated careers adviser while at school or college, with as many as two-thirds turning to AI to fill the gap.
The results also demonstrate the importance of having connections, with 42% agreeing that access to their chosen career path is equal, but only if people are afforded the opportunity of relevant work experience.
And the disparity is worse for those with a neurodivergent condition or learning disability. “Neurodivergent young people feel they are not being afforded the same work experience opportunities as their peers,” said BDO Partner Sarah Hillary. “This demonstrates a clear and urgent need for structured employer engagement and guaranteed equal access to careers support to ensure no young person is locked out of opportunity before their careers even begin.”
Miles Nikolic, Audit Quality Manager at BDO, who was diagnosed as being on the autism spectrum as a young adult, added: “When I think about equal access to opportunities for individuals with a neurodivergent condition, it strikes me that talent is widely distributed but access is not.”
ICAS believes strongly in equal opportunities for all, including those who are neurodivergent. We have a range of resources, both for neurodivergence and for wellbeing more generally, which you can access here.
Top of the slops
In this issue we speak with Alexis Kingsbury about his experimental attempt to create the first all-AI accounting firm. “I concluded that 100% AI firms were a terrible idea,” he says.
That message may not have got through to the New York Times, which recently ran a story about one man (and his brother) building a billion-dollar company, called Medvi, almost entirely on the back of AI.
Medvi, which sells all manner of health supplements and weight-loss drugs, is staffed by just two people – founder and owner, Matthew Gallagher, who runs the business from his LA home with help from his brother. Gallagher built his business using an assortment of AI tools to create his website and online marketing, while using bots to handle customer service. Initially, the bots would make mistakes, inventing products that didn’t exist or selling them at the wrong price.
Gallagher, reported the NYT, always honoured any pricing errors – but then he could easily afford to, given he had spent just $20,000 (£14,870) in 2024 to create Medvi, which is projected to make $1.8bn in revenue this year. Again, with just two people on staff, supplemented, as sales began to take off, by a host of contractors in services such as law and accounts, for which he had initially relied on AI. From which you might well conclude that ‘100% AI firms’ are a great idea.
The article claims Gallagher ironed out his teething troubles. What it mentions only in passing is that Medvi’s website and marketing are littered with endorsements from AI-generated doctors and patients.
A post on X by Dr Jon Slotkin reveals that “The company’s ad network included fabricated physician personas, ‘Professor Albust Dongledore’, ‘Dr Tuckr Carlzyn MD’, running over 5,000 Meta ads alongside a website disclaimer that these individuals ‘may be actors or AI portraying doctors’.”
Some of those doctors appear on different affiliate sites with the same name but a completely different picture, and there is an extraordinarily fake before-and-after video of a ‘patient’ showing how much weight he lost taking Tirzepatide.
Tirzepatide is a genuine weight-loss drug which is administered using an injection pen. Medvi sold the pen version, but also offered the same product as a pill with its own branding. Given the choice, most of us would prefer a pill over an injection. But, says Slotkin, “oral tirzepatide is a biological impossibility” – certainly, as of April 2026, it is not Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved. Not even close.
According to the website Futurism, Medvi has received warnings from the FDA over fake images and marketing language, while one of its partners is facing a class action lawsuit in which Medvi is named.
But the NYT deemed none of this worthy of further investigation. Instead it has been held up as proof of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s 2024 prediction that we would soon see the first one-person billion-dollar AI company.
For now, at least, a 100% AI company remains a terrible idea – certainly for consumers. Medvi’s revenues may persuade others that the ends justify the means, but they highlight extraordinary ethical flaws – and there may yet be consequences for all their dubious claims and products.
The Medvi ads may be the product of cutting-edge AI slop; the NYT article is just plain old sloppy.
Ryan Herman
Top of the slops
In this issue we speak with Alexis Kingsbury about his experimental attempt to create the first all-AI accounting firm. “I concluded that 100% AI firms were a terrible idea,” he says.
That message may not have got through to the New York Times, which recently ran a story about one man (and his brother) building a billion-dollar company, called Medvi, almost entirely on the back of AI.
Medvi, which sells all manner of health supplements and weight-loss drugs, is staffed by just two people – founder and owner, Matthew Gallagher, who runs the business from his LA home with help from his brother. Gallagher built his business using an assortment of AI tools to create his website and online marketing, while using bots to handle customer service. Initially, the bots would make mistakes, inventing products that didn’t exist or selling them at the wrong price.
Gallagher, reported the NYT, always honoured any pricing errors – but then he could easily afford to, given he had spent just $20,000 (£14,870) in 2024 to create Medvi, which is projected to make $1.8bn in revenue this year. Again, with just two people on staff, supplemented, as sales began to take off, by a host of contractors in services such as law and accounts, for which he had initially relied on AI. From which you might well conclude that ‘100% AI firms’ are a great idea.
The article claims Gallagher ironed out his teething troubles. What it mentions only in passing is that Medvi’s website and marketing are littered with endorsements from AI-generated doctors and patients.
A post on X by Dr Jon Slotkin reveals that “The company’s ad network included fabricated physician personas, ‘Professor Albust Dongledore’, ‘Dr Tuckr Carlzyn MD’, running over 5,000 Meta ads alongside a website disclaimer that these individuals ‘may be actors or AI portraying doctors’.”
Some of those doctors appear on different affiliate sites with the same name but a completely different picture, and there is an extraordinarily fake before-and-after video of a ‘patient’ showing how much weight he lost taking Tirzepatide.
Tirzepatide is a genuine weight-loss drug which is administered using an injection pen. Medvi sold the pen version, but also offered the same product as a pill with its own branding. Given the choice, most of us would prefer a pill over an injection. But, says Slotkin, “oral tirzepatide is a biological impossibility” – certainly, as of April 2026, it is not Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved. Not even close.
According to the website Futurism, Medvi has received warnings from the FDA over fake images and marketing language, while one of its partners is facing a class action lawsuit in which Medvi is named.
But the NYT deemed none of this worthy of further investigation. Instead it has been held up as proof of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s 2024 prediction that we would soon see the first one-person billion-dollar AI company.
For now, at least, a 100% AI company remains a terrible idea – certainly for consumers. Medvi’s revenues may persuade others that the ends justify the means, but they highlight extraordinary ethical flaws – and there may yet be consequences for all their dubious claims and products.
The Medvi ads may be the product of cutting-edge AI slop; the NYT article is just plain old sloppy.
Ryan Herman
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