SME Business News

The prize on offer in the BBC’s popular television show, ‘The Apprentice’ has been changed to reflect the reliance currently being placed on small businesses to boost the economy.

In 2011, the successful Apprentice will no longer win a £100K job working in one of Lord Sugar’s businesses. Instead, Lord Sugar will set up a new [...]

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Faced with difficulties borrowing from the banks, and attracted by easy availability of funding, a growing number of small business owners are turning to pawnbrokers.
One such firm, Borro, says it has seen a 45% rise in small business customers over the past year alone.  In an interview with Will Smale, the BBC’s Business Reporter, Borro’s [...]

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Guideline procedures which businesses can implement to prevent bribery on their behalf will be published in the New Year, prior to the Bribery Act coming into force in April 2011.  This is to allow businesses an adequate familiarisation period before the Act commences.
The Act is intended to ensure the UK is at the forefront of [...]

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New data released by Experian has revealed a fall in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and equity capital market (ECM – flotation, rights issue and placements) deals during Q3 2010, compared with the same period last year.
The total number of UK M&A and ECM transactions during Q3 2010 fell by 22.7% compared to the same period [...]

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Only one in five of the UK’s smaller employers have begun to consider the financial impact of new pension regulations coming into force in 2014 which require them to autoenrol millions of extra employees into workplace pension schemes, according to new research.
The survey, conducted by the Association of Consulting Actuaries, gathered responses from 404 smaller [...]

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Business lending has fallen by £28 billion since the start of the global economic downturn, a new report has indicated.
Bank of England figures reveal that lending has declined sharply since the collapse of Lehman Brothers two years ago, and companies now owe £471 billion to the banks, down from £503 billion in September 2008.
British bank [...]

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The future of many small businesses is in jeopardy because their managers are failing to adopt basic business practices, according to recent research.
The survey, which was conducted by Simply Business, found widespread evidence of inadequate financial management, an absence of basic business planning coupled with uninformed decision-making and totally inadequate employment policies.
29% of SME bosses [...]

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The number of directors taking illegal dividends or loans from their companies is rising at an alarming rate, says Wilkins Kennedy, the Top 22 accountancy firm.
According to Keith Stevens, Partner of Wilkins Kennedy, eight out of the last ten insolvency cases he has taken on have led to investigations over the directors allegedly taking illegal [...]

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The latest quarterly figures released by the Asset Based Finance Association (ABFA) show that lending to businesses is growing, with total advances from ABFA members at £14.59 billion this quarter, a growth of 2 per cent from this time last year. ABFA members are now advancing more than they were at any time in the [...]

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Plans by HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) to stop issuing copies of some paperwork to tax agents has been severely criticised by the Chartered Institute of Taxation (CIOT).
While supportive of the need to make cuts in Government spending, the CIOT is extremely concerned that this measure will result in far more additional work for HMRC, [...]

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