Engineering Certainty in an Unregulated Market.
The R&D advisory industry is largely unregulated. Firms enter this market, lodge claims on behalf of businesses, collect fees, and disappear — with no minimum experience, no mandatory oversight, and no accountability when claims fail at audit. In that environment, the standard you choose is the only protection you have.
The following table sets out what the commoditised market delivers — and what Pattens delivers.
THE PATTENS ADVANTAGE
The Pattens Standard vs. The Commoditised Market.
|
Feature |
The Pattens Standard |
The Commoditised Market |
|
Expertise Model |
Exclusively senior expertise applying years of learned wisdom to your specific technical conditions. |
Often relies on leveraged juniors, graduates, or offshore contractors to prepare claims. |
|
Preparation Logic |
We engineer defensible claims from the ground up, assuming every narrative will be audited. |
Focuses on ‘just preparing’ a claim using simplified templates and questionnaires. |
|
Role of AI |
Selective partnership — we only work with companies where genuine R&D exists and calibrate the claim to your business context. |
High-volume, ‘claim anything’ tactics that often result in underclaiming or dangerous audit exposure. |
|
Pricing & Value |
AI used only to identify, structure, and defend claims at a level humans alone cannot — backed by strict technical oversight. |
Dangerous reliance on AI to complete claims, often resulting in descriptions of technology that does not exist. |
|
Technical Depth |
You pay for the years of knowledge, not the hours of effort — ensuring simplicity that cannot be commoditised. |
Low fixed prices or contingency fees that prioritise cheap execution over technical depth. |
|
Client Outcome |
Structured engineering systems that translate complex technical work into compliant R&D logic regulators expect to see. |
Personality-led delivery or RDTI-only specialists who lack broader engineering insight. |
|
Client Outcome |
Effortless execution for the client — producing such clarity that partners extend their engagement rather than renegotiate. |
‘Hassle-free’ processes that often lead to expensive mistakes and clawbacks years after the benefit is paid. |
WHAT THE MARKET IS DOING
Volume-Obsessed. Template-Driven. Accountability-Free.
The industry has shifted toward a model where firms use R&D calculators and ‘hassle-free’ questionnaires to drive mass applications. These firms treat the R&D Tax Incentive as a simple grant rather than the complex tax offset it is. The client receives a fast lodgement. The client also bears the liability when that claim fails at audit, sometimes years after the benefit was paid.
Full compliance of R&D claims cannot be achieved quickly. It is the result of many years of experience — knowing exactly what to include, what to exclude, and how to frame what remains in the language regulators want to read in a claim. That knowledge is not available at a fixed fee. It is not replicable by a template. It is what you get when you engage Pattens.
We don’t just tell stories — we engineer narratives grounded in real experimentation and uncertainty, ensuring your technical IP is protected, and your financial incentive is maximised.
WHAT PATTENS DOES THAT OTHERS CANNOT
The Four Capabilities That Define the Difference.
Senior-only delivery — no juniors, no graduates, no delegation
Claims built from the ground up with audit as the design assumption — not an afterthought
AI used to identify and structure claims with technical oversight — not to generate descriptions of work that did not happen
Calibration to your specific business context — the claim reflects your actual activities
These are not positioning statements. They are structural features of how Pattens operates — built over 35 years of practice and tested against the most demanding levels of ATO scrutiny.