Blog posts

Last week saw me take my final calls of the summer with two clients who both take August off from their businesses. Both calls involved agreeing what we'd be looking after while they take a step back, and what their priorities will be when they get back. We effectively act as a finance team for them, so invoicing and paying freelancers, etc. can all still happen while they take a complete break.

A month off each year is the goal for lots of business owners I speak with. But for others it's not concentrated time off they're looking for, but regular time off for travel, or a 4 day week so they can explore other interests. Freedom to work when they want is a theme that runs right across all of our clients.

At the Spring Budget 2023 earlier this week, the Chancellor confirmed that corporation tax will be increasing from 1st April 2023. It's quite a big jump, from 19% to 25%. Although it was originally announced a while ago, from speaking with business owners recently it seems as though the impact of this isn’t really understood. So if you’re not sure about what it means for your business, get comfy and we’ll get started!

Corporation tax applies only to limited companies, so if you’re a sole trader with no plans for a limited company in the near future, you can jump off here. You directors, buckle up.

I’ve been speaking to a lot of people about their goals this month, ‘tis the season and all that. There’s been a common theme, and that’s been around building a 6 figure business. 6 figure chat seems to be everywhere I look at the moment, particularly in the female founder online space, so it’s not surprising that it’s on a lot of people’s 2023 vision boards. Having a financial goal is a great idea, as when you know where you’re going you can use your numbers to plan for what will happen along the way.

But often when I start drilling down into what 6 figures means to them, they don’t have a clear definition in mind of this, or how they’ll know when they get there.

Now the dust has settled and a lot of the detail has now been released, I thought we’d take a closer look at what was announced in the Chancellor’s spring budget. I’m just going to be looking at things specifically related to small businesses here, but the full budget can be found on the Government website.

It’s now been a couple of weeks since the Chancellor announced the latest financial support for businesses feeling the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. To find out what’s available and what you’re eligible for, head over to COVID-19 financial support post. Understandably, it’s just the top level details that have been announced at the daily briefings, with the finer details following later, and often being drip-fed into HMRC’s guidance. This has led to a lot of speculation being passed around as fact, so I thought I’d look at some misconceptions that I’ve seen being discussed. I’ll be concentrating on the Self Employed Income Support Scheme (SEISS) here, but will be covering limited companies and some other schemes available in future posts.

I know that many of you are worried about the current situation, and the effect it could have on your businesses. The original financial support measures announced back in March were designed to take us through to May/June. As a result extensions and changes have since been announced in order to provide further support for the next few months.

So many people put their tax return off until the last minute, and the HMRC phone lines are inundated with callers asking for advice and support throughout January; it can be a terribly stressful time of year, and - coming directly after the expense and frivolity of Christmas and New Year - can see pennies stretched to their thinnest—so I always advise getting yourself organised well ahead of time, meaning that you don’t have the pressure of that deadline looming over you as your next exciting year begins.

Time flies when you’re having fun - and when you’re focussed on running your own business the months can rush by faster than you anticipated, meaning that things slip down the to-do list waiting for the right time to be actioned. I’ve written about payments on account before - but here’s why it matters today:

You’ve got a fantastic business idea and you can’t wait to get going with it and make it a success. But what type of business should you be? It’s not as exciting as sorting out your branding, or planning your marketing strategy, it’s definitely worth spending some time thinking about what type of business you’re building.

After what has felt like the longest greyest Winter we had a week of sun, where it felt like we’d just jumped straight over Spring and into Summer. Although we’re now back to more normal Spring-like weather, the sun made a huge difference to my mood and it was so nice to not be completely drenched each day!

Although you wouldn’t think it to look at the weather, Spring has sprung. The majority of my clients have their year end as the end of March, so this time of year is generally pretty busy and filled with looking back at the previous year and planning what is to come.

Starting a business can be complicated. Not only do you need to provide your services or products to your clients, but you also suddenly have to deal with all the other sides of running a business such as the finances. VAT in particular seems to confuse a lot of people, so let’s bust some VAT myths.