After a year which has seen the confidence levels of small businesses, particularly high street retailers, plummet and with the forthcoming VAT rise meaning a bleak New Year, many small businesses may struggle to survive in the early part of 2011.
Even before the weather struck, businesses dependent on discretionary spending were predicting job losses and a difficult year ahead - almost 40% of retailers thought that their business prospects in quarter four would be worse than in quarter three, and the recent cold snap will only serve to compound this.
With more bad weather still to come, the FSB is calling on the Government, banks, local authorities and landlords to give struggling small firms some leeway and recommends that:
- HMRC extends its Time to Pay scheme to allow small businesses time to recoup lost takings in order to have the cash-flow to be able to pay
- Landlords, especially where the landlord is the local council, should push back rent reviews due in the New Year
- Local Councils should use their powers to grant hardship relief and temporarily reduce business rate bills for those businesses in financial difficulty
- Banks, utilities and insurers should give small businesses some breathing space
"The last thing this Government needs is a wave of bankruptcies and shop closures in 2011, but small firms will find it very difficult to bounce back in the New Year when VAT increases to 20% and the spending cuts start to bite.
"We need to see a co-ordinated effort from Government, banks, local authorities and landlords to give small businesses some breathing space to recover in the New Year."
