After the budget on the 11th March, you may be wondering what it means for you. It was a budget that did a lot in the way of helping small businesses, so we thought it might be good to do a quick roundup of how the budget affects small businesses.
Business Rate Relief:
A launch of a fundamental Business Rates Review to report back in the Autumn.
Businesses eligible for small business rates relief will get £3,000 cash grant
Business rates in England will be abolished for firms in the retail, leisure and hospitality sectors with a rateable value below £51,000
Employment Costs
Increase in the Employment Allowance to £4,000 from April - this means employers don't have to pay the first £4,000 of Employers' NICs, bringing down the cost of staffing in your business. (As an aside, you may have received a letter about AE reforms from HMRC in the last couple of days. If we run your payroll there is nothing that you need to do in order to claim your AE - we do this for you automatically. If you're claiming other state aid funding you just need to check that you are within the limits - but otherwise this letter should not be a cause for concern).
The National Living Wage will increase from £8.21 to £8.72 from 1st April.
Increase in the National Insurance Thresholds to £9,500 from April for employees and the self-employed (but no mention of the employers' thresholds). This move will take 500,000 employees out of the NI threshold altogether.
Time to Pay: in response to Coronavirus and the difficulties that businesses may experience with administration and cashflow, there should be a more sympathetic ear at HMRC to requests for time to pay. If you're feeling the impact of Coronavirus in your business then talk to us about how a time to pay agreement could help you get through this difficult trading period.
Other help for small businesses during the Corornavirus outbreak are:
All those advised to self-isolate will be entitled to statutory sick pay, even if they have not presented with symptoms.However, firms with fewer than 250 staff will be refunded for sick pay payments for two weeks
Small firms will be able to access "business interruption" loans of up to £1.2m
Self-employed workers who are not eligible will be able to claim contributory Employment Support Allowance. This will be available from Day 1 and not after a week as it is currently.
Other highlights:
No rise in fuel or alcohol taxes.
Plastic packaging tax to be introduced from April 2020
Tampon tax has been abolished.
If you wish to discuss how these may impact your business, or you personally, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. SKD Accounting 07764 338219 07368 239888 sandra@skdaccounting.co.uk