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10 Ideas to Beat the Credit Crunch
Newsletter issue - November 08.
If your business is feeling the pinch in this general economic downturn, it's more important than ever to look at what you can do to help your business. Here's 10 ideas to get you started...
- Get paid sooner! Encourage your customers to pay more quickly, by giving small discounts or just by chasing them promptly. Send out invoices for completed work as soon as possible, and for long term projects ask for stage payments on account.
- Promote best value products. If you have a range of products or services, look at giving more prominence to the best value items in your marketing.
- Talk to your bank. Keep your bank informed, especially if you are going to have a need to secure extra funding or even renew existing arrangements. If fees are being increased it may pay to shop around for facilities.
- Take advantage of the crunch. If you are cash positive, turn the crunch to your advantage. Some businesses may be keener to make a sale so those with cash to spend may be able to negotiate some great bargains, especially for early payment!
- Staffing needs and working hours. Consider asking staff to change their working hours to part-time or flexi-time, with an appropriate drop in total pay. Or to take their holidays now if business is slow. If a skilled member of staff is about to retire ask them to stay on part time, as this may be cheaper than recruiting a new employee.
- Office rent. Ask your landlord if you can change from a quarterly payment in advance to a monthly payment. Or with improvements in technology perhaps now is the time to consider if you could run your business from home and make use of home workers and lose the office rent altogether!
- Don't forget the marketing. Whilst cutting back on costs can be necessary in a recession and it may be tempting to cut the marketing budget, it may prove a false economy if sales suffer. Whilst others cut back on their marketing, you may be able to use this to your advantage and keep on marketing to get a larger share of the present market.
- Renegotiate with suppliers. Review the agreements you have with suppliers for continuing services, such as; security, energy, or cleaning. Can you renegotiate any of these contracts to get a better deal?
- Reduce tax payments on account. Review the projected tax payments for your business. Payments on account for unincorporated businesses can be reduced and reclaimed if you are confident of the final taxable profit figure. This is a good reason for getting the accounts completed quickly after the year end.
- Carry back losses. If your business is likely to make a loss for the current year, quantify that loss as soon as possible and submit a claim to carry back the loss to get a refund from HMRC.
If you would like to meet up to discuss these and other ideas as to what your business should be doing in the credit crunch, please contact us.
What our clients say about us...
"Paul has provided accountancy services to my company for 2 years now. I can recommend Paul very highly; his skills as an accountant are highly detailed and professional and he is always available to provide advice. One aspect of the way Paul works that I greatly appreciate is a preference to meet face to face when there is a detailed conversation to be had. I personally find this more productive and is a benefit of working with a small accountancy firm that you wouldn't get with the large faceless providers."
ALISTAIR FAIRWEATHER - PROGRAMME & PROJECT MANAGER, DELIVERING/RESCUING I.T. 7 BUSINESS CHANGE WITH BUDGETS UPTO £50M INC SUPPIER MANAGEMENT
"I couldn't ask for more from Paul as an Accountant. Paul has been accountant to Work Relief Charity Recruitment for just over a year now and is proving an invaluable asset. Accurate, knowledgeable, flexible with an emphasis on service delivery, I would recommend Paul's services to any organisation looking for an accounts professional."
Neil Price - Managing Director at Work Relief Charity Recruitment
"Paul was a referral from a family member when I started my business 2 years ago. As this was the first time I had ever run my own company I was totally clueless over the financial side of matters and was worried that I may have made mistakes in any of my accounting. I needn't have worried as after enaging Paul for a set monthly fee he was always there on the end of the phone for all sorts of questions I had and no matter how trivial they were Paul gave me all the information I required and more and did an excellent and painless job at the end of my first year! Couldn't ask for any better to be honest. Just two words - hire him!!!"
Lee Westrap MBCS - Director - Bulldog IT Services
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