If you've decided referring makes more sense than building the competence in-house, see R&D tax relief for accountants for that decision. This page covers the mechanics once you've made it. A referral isn't a single, standard arrangement. What follows is what actually varies firm to firm, checked against published terms across 17 UK advisers, not a generic description of how referrals "usually" work.
How the money usually works
A percentage of the adviser's fee, not the client's claim value, and the distinction matters
Where introducer terms are published at all, they're structured as a share of what the specialist adviser earns from the claim, not a percentage of the claim's value itself. Those two numbers can sound similar and land very differently. Easy R&D publishes this explicitly: referrers earn 20% of Easy R&D's own fee on a client's first successful claim, and 10% on subsequent claims for the same client, not 20% of what the client actually receives from HMRC. EmpowerRD's published scheme works differently again, offering the referrer a straight 10% commission once the first claim is awarded, or a 10% discount for the client instead, whichever the referrer chooses. Most firms in the wider market don't publish a rate at all (commission is agreed by conversation), so ask for the number in writing before you refer rather than estimate it from a firm's general marketing.
Who stays the client's point of contact
This genuinely varies, and it's worth asking rather than assuming either way
Some firms build their offering explicitly around the accountant staying central. RAndDTax describes its own model as an "outsourced R&D department" for accountancy practices, working with several hundred firms on that basis, by its own account. Source Advisors runs a comparable accountant-outsourcing page with named accounting-firm case studies attached to it. Other firms run open, individual-level introducer schemes: EmpowerRD's and Easy R&D's are both published and don't require a formal accountancy partnership to join, which suggests a more direct relationship between the specialist and the client once the referral happens. Neither model is better by default. What matters is knowing which one you're referring into, because it changes whether your client hears from you or from someone else next.
Something worth asking directly, not inferring from a firm's website: "once this referral happens, do I stay the point of contact for anything, or does the client deal with you directly from here?" It's a one-line question, and several firms in the market don't make the answer obvious from their published material either way.
Who defends the claim if HMRC queries it
The specialist prepared and filed it. Confirm that means they defend it too
The reasonable default is that whoever prepared the technical narrative and filed the claim is best placed to defend it if HMRC opens an enquiry, and the Additional Information Form makes this concrete: it requires naming the senior R&D contact and every agent involved in the claim, so the specialist's involvement is on record from the outset (see the Additional Information Form for what that actually requires). But "best placed to defend it" and "contractually obliged to" aren't the same thing, and enquiry-defence terms are one of the least consistently published parts of the whole market. Some firms state clearly that enquiry support is bundled into the standard fee. Others name an enquiry service without saying whether it's included or charged separately. Don't assume either. Get it confirmed in writing at the point of referral, not after HMRC has already written to your client.
Decision helper
Where to actually compare firms
This page covers what to ask, not which firm to ask it of. That's a separate, sourced piece of work. See the R&D adviser register for 17 UK firms checked against Companies House and their own published terms, including which have open, non-accountant introducer programmes and which are accountant-partner-only. For fee models specifically, the adviser fee comparison lays out what's actually published versus quoted after a conversation.
Alternatives and limitations
None of this is advice on which firm to refer to; that depends on your client's claim, size and your own relationship with them. And referring doesn't remove every obligation on your side. If you're still the one communicating with HMRC on the client's behalf in any capacity, the Finance Act 2026 registration question applies to you too (see R&D tax relief for accountants for that distinction).
