SELF IMPROVEMENT

pre budget report
As usual, there is both good and bad news for small businesses in the Chancellor's 2009 Pre-Budget Report.
The first bad news is that VAT goes back up to 17.5% on January 1st. The only concession because of the date is that any business that is still open at midnight on New Year's Eve will be exempt from the change up to 6am, or until they close if it's before then. But everyone will be liable to cough up 17.5% of relevant income to HRMC after that time. You'll have to add 2.5% to prices or take a hit.
The bad news on National Insurance contributions doesn't kick in until 2011, but you need to factor this in to your planning. An extra 1% on the wage bill each month from April 2011 may mean shelving planned projects and not taking on extra staff.