Monahans, the chartered accountant and business advisory group, is considerably strengthening its Chippenham office through a transfer arrangement.

Simon Cooper moves from the company's Trowbridge office to develop the forensic business in the Chippenham area.

Mr Cooper, an associate member of the Academy of Experts, will act as senior forensic manager, assisting lawyers in the accountancy aspects of litigation.

He is highly experienced in this very specialised work and will become involved in areas such as earnings and pension loss arising from personal injuries, business valuations in divorce cases, losses arising from professional negligence actions and investigations in criminal cases such as fraud or theft.

In addition, he will work closely with Ian Lloyd, the partner at the Chippenham office, to develop the general accountancy business.

Mike Shawyer, managing partner of Monahans, which also has offices in Swindon and Glastonbury, said: "We are very excited about the opportunity to develop our business in the Chippenham area.

"Simon is highly experienced and will help us provide a valuable service to solicitors in the area as well as assisting in developing our general business".

Staff at Monahans have also achieved great success in recent exams they have taken.

Ben Freeman, Andrew Perrott and Rob Scane have all passed their finals and are now qualified chartered accountants.

Sarah Greenhill has completed her Association of Accounting Technicians exams and six other individuals have successfully passed exams to complete preliminary stages towards eventual qualification.

Mark Snelus, senior partner, said: "Monahans recognises that having a team of qualified, capable staff, enables us to provide the high levels of service, and quality of advice, that our clients demand.

"Our future success depends on our people, so we provide them with all the encouragement and support they need to pass exams which recognise the high levels of knowledge and skills they gain."