Who We Are

Welcome to Stephenson Thorner LTD, chartered accountants and business advisors in the heart of Wellington city.

We specialise in helping our clients grow their businesses and achieve their goals. We achieve this through an in-depth understanding of their business and their personal values. We want our clients to have the freedom to choose their future.

Our holistic approach draws on experience and expertise gained over many years and across a wide range of industries. This results in advice that is useful, valuable, understandable and relevant to our clients' goals and aspirations. By providing proactive solutions for our many and diverse clients, we seek to become the trusted advisor in their business. We work with a number of strategic business partners to ensure that the solutions we provide to clients are both robust and complete.

No problem is too big or too small. We believe that our personal style, accessibility and timeliness are but a few of the qualities that our current clients enjoy. Being entrepreneurs ourselves, we understand business. We welcome the opportunity to work with you to add real and tangible value to your business.

We know that having the right people on board is absolutely critical and that everyone in our talent pool must live and breathe our company values. We put a lot of time and effort into our recruitment processes to make sure that we recruit only the best.

Anne Stephenson BCA CA AIF®

Anne can quickly see the “big picture”, identify issues and come up with practical solutions. Many years of working with SME’s both in NZ and the UK has given her a keen understanding of the many issues that face businesses and business owners and how business value can be increased. She is adept at explaining complex concepts in a way that her clients understand.

Anne was previously a principal in a Big 4 firm, where she developed skills in financial reporting, business planning, accounting processes and business valuations, as well as learning how to manage and lead people. She has an interest in trusts and the investment process and making sure that wealth, once created, is retained and grows.

She has a strong tax knowledge and provides effective and innovative solutions to her clients.

Ray Wolken BMS CA

Ray believes your business should work for you. To best achieve that he suggests you use key tools such as forecasting, regular reporting, key performance indicators and setting up the right ownership structure to protect your wealth.

Ray has business experience having helped build a company from start up to success and has been an accountant for 25 years. Ray owns and runs a Ceroc dancing studio and finds dancing to be great workout for the body and brain.

Wutee Amohia

Wutee joined the STL team in July 2008 as Practice Manager and brings a wealth of experience from working in some large New Zealand businesses. Prior to working for STL, she worked at District Health Boards New Zealand (DHBNZ) as Financial Controller managing all aspects of the company’s financial records. Wutee also worked as an accountant at Telecom NZ for several years, where she expanded her knowledge in a variety of roles within the Finance Team.

Away from the office, Wutee is an enthusiastic sports person, being an active participant in many triathlon events. She is currently training to cycle around Lake Taupo in November. Wutee has been a proud Wellingtonian for nearly thirty years now. ‘You just can’t beat Wellington on a good day!!”

Danelle Wilson BCA/BA ACA

It’s great to be able to welcome Danelle Wilson back on the team at Stephenson Thorner. Danelle left New Zealand in June 2008 to work in Ireland. She has had some great experiences while over there and, as surprising as it may seem, found that her experiences working principally with some of our multi-enterprise clients was invaluable when she was working for a major pharmaceutical company in Dublin. No-one can say that you don’t experience the full cut and thrust of the business world when you work with SMEs – it’s only a case of where the decimal point goes.

And to top it all off, Danelle and Ben (finally) got engaged over Christmas.

Stephen Nitschke BBS

Stephen joined the Stephenson Thorner team in August 2008, looking for new challenges and roles after over three years in the accounting sector in Napier and Wellington, working in business compliance and with SME’s. He has experience across a wide variety of industries, and looks forward to working with businesses to assist them in developing further in the current market, and being someone business owners can trust.

He graduated with a Bachelor of Business Studies from Massey University in 2004, and is a provisional member of the College of Associate Chartered Accountants with NZICA.

Rakesh Rawat BBS

Rakesh Rawat has joined us from a CA firm in Te Awamutu as a senior accountant. Rakesh has extensive experience in the day-to-day tax issues that bamboozle many of our clients. He enjoys the challenges of putting in systems and training staff so that managing finances is made as easy as possible.

Rebecca Connor BBS CA

Rebecca joined the team at Stephenson Thorner in June 2008 on a part-time basis after returning from maternity leave. Prior to this, Rebecca gained considerable experience working in a CA environment for a Big 4 firm, in management accounting roles and overseas in London. Rebecca qualified as a chartered accountant in NZ in 2002 and gained her Bachelor of Business Studies from Massey University.

Rebecca’s skill set includes financial reporting, management accounting, budgeting, forecasting, business planning and accounting processes. Having worked for large corporates in the past, Rebecca is enjoying the change to a smaller boutique firm and the chance to work more intimately with SME clients. Rebecca’s hours vary with motherhood responsibilities (daughters Grace and Amelia), but she is always in the office two days a week.

Stephenson Thorner Values

Respect for clients, owners, staff and each other - We will recognise diversity, welcome free & frank discussion, be prepared to stand up and argue for our beliefs, and understand that respect comes from actions & words, not rank or hierarchy.

Quality - we take pride in our work and always strive to produce the best possible results - our clients expect nothing less.

Integrity - We will not compromise our independence, we will not compromise honesty in our dealings with stakeholders.

Honesty - We will own up to making mistakes, we will not attribute blame but we will learn from them.  At all times, we will act in good faith in the best interest of our clients.

Trust - Our clients, staff and strategic partners will understand that we work in our clients' best interest.  We will foster a non-judgmental environment that allows our clients and people to be themselves.

Clear and understandable advice - We will cut out the jargon and talk on our clients' wavelength.  Our advice will be interesting, valuable and useful.  We will do our best to make complex technical concepts simple and understandable to our clients.

Creative solutions and continual development - We will never stop learning and will continue to develop skills & knowledge and put them into practice in our daily lives.  We will look for creative solutions to traditional problems.  We will embrace technology.  We will help our clients do the same.

Vibrancy - Life (and work) is exciting, challenging & always changing - we are willing to try something new because we are curious about what the outcome might be.