What Do the Latest Measures from Rishi mean for your Business? What is the outlook for SMEs?

We are experiencing probably the toughest year most of us have known in our business lives.

Thankfully, there has been support available to help us through the crisis.  On 24^th September Rishi announced further measures of support including:

• a new job support scheme;
• an extension to the self-employment income support scheme;
• an extension to the repayment period for bounce back loans;
• the extension of the 5% VAT rate for the hospitality and tourism sectors; and
• an extension of repayment terms for those that deferred their VAT bills and for self-assessment income taxpayers who need more time to pay.

We welcome the latest measures. The Chancellor has shown he is prepared to “think outside the box”.

These measures will ease some of the impact on cashflow, but SMEs still need to take certain actions and focus on a number of areas to protect their cash, their people and their customers.

In August and the first half of September (pre- the new measures announced by Boris and Rishi) the UK200Group asked SMEs across the UK to share their outlook for the next 12 months.  The findings make for interesting reading – including:

• 61% of SMEs are expecting their revenue to drop over the next 12 months;
• One third (32%) expect to make redundancies; and
• Looking after existing clients, finding new clients and survival are the 3 biggest priorities for SMEs.

You can see a full copy of the UK200Group tracker polls results together with their observations and some practical steps and actions you can take in the SME Outlook Tracker Report.

Here to Help

With a higher proportion of small businesses in the area, these survey results suggest Cumbria could benefit from greater resilience to the headcount reductions than other parts of the UK. However, overlaying the sector-specific results, uncertainty around future restrictions continues to present unique challenges to the area’s hospitality sector, with the potential to offset at least some of that upside across the county as a whole.

The landscape is ever changing. As ever, we are here to support you.

If you would like to chat about how the latest measures affect you and practical steps you can take to protect your business, please do get in touch.

To contact Sam Lyon Head of Corporate Commercial, please call 01228 516666.