Record keeping isn’t an exciting part of business, but it is an essential one if you want to stay trading smoothly and on the right side of the taxman.

In this guide, we cover the bookkeeping basics that every small business owner should know, from simple steps like keeping receipts together, to the more complex business of categorising your financial records.

The three files you must keep

As a minimum, you should keep a cash book, a sales invoice file and a purchase invoice file. Your cash book details payments in and out of your bank account, your sales invoice file details … Continue Reading

Setting up your own business is easy in some ways (announce you’re in business and, well, you are!) and really quite challenging in others (registration docs and record keeping, anyone?).

Before you know it, you can easily become swamped with all the little bits of admin that need doing, you might even be put off before you start trading!

Here’s our ten-step checklist for start-ups to help you see the wood from the trees and get on with doing what you do best:

1) Have you got the funds (plus a little bit extra saved in case of emergency)?

Starting a business … Continue Reading

Invoices are a part of everyday business life, but it’s remarkable how many people don’t include vital information on them, making payments far more difficult than they should have to be.

This guide sets out the minimum info you need to include:

Your name and contact details

In the age of email, it might seem like over egging, but remember invoices are often printed and filed with other accounting paperwork, and need to make sense on their own.

Make sure that you include your name, full address, telephone numbers and email address.

If you’re representing a business, also include the business’ name. All this will … Continue Reading

The economic downturn may still be putting pressure on enterprise, but a quarter (26%) of small businesses are nevertheless giving a higher priority to environmental considerations this year, according to a report released by Abbey and Alliance & Leicester Business Banking.

16% of small businesses were found to have downgraded environmental issues this year in order to keep their firms afloat, with nearly half of them blaming the cost. In addition, 42% reported that they are held back from improving their environmental practices.

Around one in six (17%) have not been able to make their companies more environmentally sound, as desired improvements … Continue Reading

New research from uSwitchforBusiness.com suggests that a feeling of optimism is growing among SMEs. The research reveals that over four in ten SME owners (42%) report seeing some signs of economic recovery, with a further 1% saying that these signs are strong.

The findings also reveal a small increase in the number of small businesses confident that they will survive, with 81% now of the belief that they will get through the downturn, compared with 76% in the first quarter of this year.

However, small business owners still expect the recession to have a long lasting impact. Over a quarter (27%) … Continue Reading

Over £6.4 billion could be saved by businesses every year by taking simple money saving steps, according to a new Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) campaign launched today at the WRAP annual conference.

Environment Secretary Hilary Benn will encourage businesses to recognise the benefits of resource efficiency measures for their bottom line and the environment. Research by WRAP shows that 47% of businesses recognise they could make savings of over £100k through low and no cost efficiency measures – such as turning off equipment when it’s not being used – with 17% identifying over £1m of potential savings. … Continue Reading

New figures released today reveal that the UK business failure rate, which has been seeing an upward trend since 2007, fell in August to its lowest level since September 2008.

The Insolvency and Distress Index from information services firm Experian, reveal that 0.09% of UK businesses failed during August this year, a slight increase on the 0.08% recorded in August 2008. However, this figure is still lower than the 0.11% recorded in July, and the lowest rate so far this year.

According to the report, the total number of business insolvencies during August 2009 increased by 11.3%, compared to August 2008. … Continue Reading

The latest figures from the Office of National Statistics have revealed that business investment for the second quarter of 2009 was an estimated 10.4% lower than the previous quarter and 18.4% lower than the same period last year.

Declines in business investment occurred in most industries, with the quarterly fall in business investment mainly due to reduced capital spending by industries classified as private sector manufacturing (down 16.8 %), private sector non-manufacturing (down 9.7%) and public corporations non-manufacturing (down 7.2%).

Within the private sector manufacturing the fall in capital spending was due to industries within food, drink and tobacco (down 20.8%), engineering … Continue Reading