A hospice room has been named in recognition of the Newport accountancy firm which has raised more than £50,000 for St David’s Hospice Care.

Phil Bessant Ltd smashed its target of raising £50,000 for the Newport-based charity and now has a room named after it at the 15-bed in-patient unit at Blackett Avenue, Malpas, Newport.

The Phil Bessant Accountants room is number 13, Sirhowy. Rooms at the in-patient unit are either named after Welsh rivers or castles.

But the Caerau Road accountancy practice isn’t stopping there as it is already well on its way to achieving its new target of £60,000.

The accountants, who adopted St David’s Hospice Care as its nominated charity, completed a wide range of events to raise the funds.

The most recent was a cheese and wine evening at the Fugitives Club in Rogerstone, where a further £846.10 was raised bringing the current running total is £52,565.85.

The accountants initially set a target of raising £5,000 but boosted this to raising £50,000 in five years after initial fund raising went well.

Phil Bessant, MD of the practice, said: “We are absolutely thrilled to have been recognised by the charity by having a room named after the business. It’s great recognition for all the hard put in by everyone at the business to raise all that money through fund raising for St David’s Hospice Care.”

Phil said: "We easily went way beyond our initial target of raising £5,000 so we set the bar at £50,000 and are heading in the direction of reaching that target next year.

“Everyone in the office has been involved in the effort to raise money for St David’s Hospice Care. I am delighted at the sum of money we have managed to collect and we’ve now decided to carry on and raise £60,000 for the charity.”

“The reason we started the fund raising is because we are passionate about giving back to the local community as they provide the majority of our income. Giving something back is very important to us.

"We chose St David’s Hospice Care as it is a very local charity, based in Newport as are we.

"We haven’t had any direct contact with the charity, thankfully, so we were free to offer support without feeling that we should or must. We have thoroughly enjoyed raising the funds and had a whole lot of fun with our friends and most importantly our clients in the meantime."

Phil said the fundraising started with a ‘lock in’ at their office.

“I was locked in to the boardroom and until I raised £1,000. Thanks to the tremendous support of our clients we smashed that target in one day almost raising £4,000 by 4pm. I had no idea how well I was doing – to this day we still are not sure whether clients and friends paid their money to release me or keep me locked in.”

Phil Bessant Ltd has staged a quiz night, race night, a golf day at Woodlake Park and a beer mile at The Newport Fugitives in Rogerstone Newport. The accountants also held a wine and cheese evening, awards evening, a horse racing evening and Beaujolais Day held at The Lion, Blaenavon.

“The funniest of all has to be our pop up shop. A whacky idea that seemed too hard to start with but which flew once we agreed to do it. We all dressed up as elves, Mother Christmas and who can forget Chelsea and her blow up snowman costume. The kids in town paid just to see her walk in it. She alone filled two buckets, and a further best part of £1,000 was raised.

“Work colleague Bec had her long hair cut off to raise funds and we don’t know who cried most, Bec or her mum.

“I’d like to say a huge thank you to St David’s Hospice Care for allowing us to support them and to our wonderful staff who have all helped along the way and a very special thank you to all our clients and friends, or all their generosity and support.”

Kris Broome, of St David’s Hospice Care, said: “Phil Bessant and his marvellous staff have worked tirelessly over the months in their efforts to raise money for St David’s Hospice Care in so many different ways. Reaching their target of £50,000 is a huge achievement.

“It’s a fitting tribute to them all that they now have a lasting memorial to their efforts with the room at the inpatient hospice named after their business.

“We’re so grateful as all the money raised by Phil Bessant Accountants will help us to continue to fund the vital work that we deliver free of charge to people throughout our community 24 hours a day 365 days a year.”

For details of Phil Bessant’s future charity fund raising events contact Katie@philbessantltd.co.uk