Modern Slavery Statement

ISSUE DATE: 1 APRIL 2024

INTRODUCTION

This statement is made pursuant to section 54(1) of the Modern Slavery Act 2015.  This statement relates to actions and activities of AAB Group during the financial year to 31 March 2024.

As a growing Group we are committed to preventing slavery and human trafficking occurring in any of our supply chains and business.

Organisaton’s Structure

We are a tech-enabled business services group providing audit and accounting, tax, payroll and HR, outsourcing and advisory solutions globally from offices in Scotland, England and Ireland.  We are comprised of trading entities that can be found here:

AAB Group & Engagements – Entities List | AAB Group

This statement relates to actions and activities of AAB Group during the financial year to 31 March 2024.

Services

The services AAB Group provides to its clients are predominantly office or site-based at clients’ premises located in the UK, Ireland and the United States.

Most of its work is undertaken by its own people.  AAB Group’s professional service supply chain consists, on the whole, of other regulated professional service firms and individuals. It’s assessment is that this represents a low risk of anyone supplying it with services being involved in slavery and/or human trafficking.  As a result of this assessment, AAB Group has not identified a need to take any additional action about such relationships.

Additionally, on the occasions where AAB Group contracts others to assist in the provision of services, the firm takes steps to ensure it has any required accreditations and are appropriately qualified. Given the nature of these relationships and the fact that they are predominantly UK and Ireland based, AAB Group also deems them low risk and considers that there are no additional steps required over and above it’s supplier approval processes.

The Group’s Anti-Slavery Policy, a policy document which applies to all partners and team members, makes specific reference to the Modern Slavery Act and the firm’s position on improper business conduct of any sort. The Group encourages the reporting of any concerns in this area, whether under its internal Whistleblowing reporting processes or otherwise.

In conclusion, given the low risk profile of anyone supplying it with services being involved in slavery and/or human trafficking, the Group believes the current procedures are appropriate.

Goods and Indirect Services

In terms of goods and non-regulated services supplied to AAB Group, our supply chains are non-complex, being almost solely restricted to suppliers providing infrastructure support and supplies such as property, marketing, ICT services and travel & subsistence for our teams.  The Group assesses this to result in a low risk profile that anyone providing it with these goods or indirect services will be involved in slavery and/or human trafficking.

The Group’s due diligence is proportionate to the identified modern slavery risk and its knowledge of its suppliers. AAB Group will review this in the coming year and where a change increases the risk it will adapt the review and assessment processes accordingly.

REVIEW

This is the third year (2023/2024) we have completed a Modern Slavery Statement and our focus for that year was in reviewing our key supply chain.  Some progress has been made in this area, but there is still work to do and as a current action it will carry into the 2024/2025 period, however we are in a stronger position now and have formulated a supplier management system and supplier onboarding procedure, so the ground work for making progress is there

The implementation of our supplier management system will allow us to capture key data from our suppliers, allowing for identification and introduction of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).