Mazars UK makes up 2 new tax partners

International accountancy firm Mazars is pleased to announce that Howard Jones and Geraint Lewis of the firm’s 227-strong UK tax team have been promoted to partner.

Howard, a specialist in the financial services sector, qualified in his native Zimbabwe and began his career at Deloitte. Following a secondment to London, he returned to Harare and was instrumental in establishing the firm’s local tax practice. In 1990 he moved to the UK permanently, taking a job in industry with leading insurance broker AON where he spent ten years within the in-house tax team as director of tax.  This was followed by time with Arthur Andersen and Deloitte before joining Mazars in 2003.

Howard has been instrumental in the rapid growth of Mazars’ financial services tax practice over the last few years. As a new partner now leading this part of the business, robust growth will continue to be his main focus. Howard said:

“The financial services tax practice has experienced significant expansion in recent years and has worked very hard to  produce some great results. It is a very exciting time to be leading the team and I am confident that we will maintain out current momentum.”

Geraint, a VAT specialist, began his career at the then Customs and Excise before joining PwC where he spent ten years in a variety of roles. This included five years in Cardiff where he developed the local VAT practice from scratch, and later a secondment to Poland to establish an Eastern Europe VAT practice. He joined KPMG in Milton Keynes in 1998 where he expanded a one person practice into a regional practice.

Since joining Mazars in February 2006, Geraint has helped to grow the firm’s VAT practice outside of London by almost 300%. As a partner, he has been charged with further growing the practice – with a focus on the mid market – to a £3m practice within the next three years. Geraint said:

“The last two and a half years have been hard work but incredibly rewarding and I am privileged to be leading Mazars’ regional VAT teams as they continue to grow and achieve success. We have set ourselves some ambitious targets and I am looking forward to the challenge of meeting them.”

Mazars tax partner Lindsey Pentelow commented:

“Howard and Geraint have both made significant contributions to the strong overall growth of the UK tax practice in the last few years – Mazars now has the fastest growing tax practice amongst the top 20 firms. We are extremely happy to see them join the partnership and have every confidence they will ensure the ongoing success of their respective teams taking them to the next stage of their