Record number of new trainees join Carpenter Box
Carpenter Box has taken on a record number of trainees at its Worthing and Crawley offices over the last twelve months, opening up career opportunities for local school and college leavers, and university graduates, despite the challenges presented by coronavirus.
The 13 recruits have joined the firm’s highly-rated in-house training programme and will be guided by a team of qualified and experienced accountants, business advisers and auditors, many of whom also started out as trainees with the practice.
Alan Edwards, Carpenter Box Managing Partner, welcomed the new arrivals, commenting:
“These are challenging times for everyone but particularly young people, so I am delighted we can go further this year in offering more traineeships for local school and college leavers and university graduates. Some of our current partners started out as trainees with the firm, so I am looking forward to seeing the new intake thrive as they launch their professional careers.”

Some of the new trainees at the Worthing office, left to right: George Renshaw-Fox, Imogen Peters, Abi Blades and Jack Hallums
Joining the Business Services team in Worthing will be Chloe Dacombe, Noor Ali, Thomas Redpath, Oakley Evans, Jack Hallums, Dean Backstrom and George Renshaw-Fox. The Audit team in Worthing welcomes Sharna Challenger and Jamie Corps, while Abi Blades and Imogen Peters join the Tax Services team.
At the Gatwick office, Ben Summers has joined the Business Services team while Harry Smith has been welcomed into the Audit team.
Eight are studying for the ACCA qualification, three for the Institute of Chartered Accountants (ACA) qualification, one for the Association of Tax Technicians (ATT) qualification and one to become a Chartered Tax Adviser (CTA).
65 trainees including eight from Carpenter Box, took part in a virtual national business induction day in September, establishing the foundations for their career development; part two of the training will, hopefully, be face-to-face in the new year.
The training covers a variety of topics including, ingredients of good service, professional risk, how trainees can help manage risk in their firms and an overview of professional qualifications.