The People Kit, a new initiative designed to support local businesses, was officially launched on 26th January.
Jonathan Madden, owner of Joules Resource Management and one of the founder members of The People Kit explains more:
“The People Kit is a group of experts from different professions who’ve banded together to provide a kind of one-stop consultancy service for local businesses in Norfolk. The support we can provide ranges from HR and legal advice to web development, apprenticeships andbusiness growth.”
The People Kit naturally evolved after the founder members met through working together.They’ve put each other’s skills to the test in the past to add value to their own projects. They saw the opportunity to create a rather unique group, and The People Kit was born.
Jonathan continues:
“The beauty of The People Kit is that we all know we can absolutely rely on the quality of our colleague’s work and expertise. That means we have no hesitation in referring work to each other. When one of us has a client in business who needs one of the services The People Kit provides, we can save our client the time and hassle of trying to find someone trustworthy themselves.
“The individual members of the group came together through mutual respect for each other’s work. Together, we offer a strong proposition for local businesses. Clients come to us with a problem, project or product requirement and members of The People Kit work together or separately to come up with a solution. Our broad mix of skills and connections means, between us, we will know the right person for the job. The whole really is greater than the sum of its parts.”
The People Kit was officially launched at a drinks recepetion which was held at Platform 12 on St. Benedicts Street in Norwich. This gave local businesses the chance to meet the team and find out how it all works. The team have already helped a number of local businesses and look forward to helping many more in the future. Visit thepeoplekit.co.uk to find out more.
With the UK Government struggling to find the unity that would allow it to present a coherent plan for customs arrangements after Brexit, other organisations are filling the gap with their own suggestions.
The latest to do so is BusinessEurope, a body which “speak” for all-sized enterprises in 34 European countries whose national business federations are our direct members.
It has issued Brexit: The Customs Implications and Solutions, a report which can be found at www.businesseurope.eu.
This warns that Brexit could result in a myriad of costly customs procedures, non-tariff barriers and regulatory issues. Every degree of divergence from EU membership creates additional economic barriers, it argues.
These could entail customs duties and declarations; complex rules of origin or issues of cumulation; physical and digital bottlenecks; diverging rules and legislation; a lack of mutual recognition and the introduction of conformity assessments.
BusinessEurope calls on the two sides to maintain the closest possible economic relationship while preserving the integrity of the single market.
As other business groups have noted, it stresses that regulatory alignment between the EU and the UK is of utmost importance in preserving value chains and avoiding non-tariff barriers to trade.
“No free trade agreement to date has come close to solving the issues of regulatory divergence,” the report warns, “and this will be a challenge for both sides to address in the framework of the future relationship.”
If trade really is to stay as frictionless as possible (as the UK Government has repeated on innumerable occasions), but the UK still wants to leave the single market and customs union, then BusinessEurope points out that the two sides have to come up with simplified customs procedures.
They must also start recruiting and training staff including customs officials, veterinarians and related staff such as those involved in managing sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) issues.
Businesses on average will spend upto 11.4% of their total company budgets on marketing.
With statistics as high as this it is essential that you ensure your company that your marketing budget is optimised to your business objectives and goals.
At Netmatters, we have created a handy new tool to help businesses review their current marketing budget.
Our Marketing Budget Calculator
We have created our free to use marketing budget calculator. This has been created to help provide guidance on what budget your business will need, to align your marketing budget with your specific business goals and targets.
We’ve made it easy for you to determine whether you are getting long term value from your current marketing budget. All you need to do is fill out the fields in the marketing calculator with information about your values and goals and it will provide you with figures you should be considering for your marketing spend to achieve the amount of new customers from your marketing efforts.
Visit our Marketing Budget Calculator today and see what your current budget will potentially bring to your business, you can find our calculator on the following page https://www.netmatters.co.uk/marketing-budget-calculator
Chief Executive of accountancy training firm First Intuition, Gareth John, has commended the government for their plans to extend the apprenticeship incentive scheme and thereby support more career opportunities for young people at a time when they need all the help they can get.
In his Autumn budget statement Chancellor Rishi Sunak pledged increased apprenticeship funding in England to £2.7 billion by 2024-25, this is on top of an extension to help and support employers who recruit apprentices.
The government confirmed that employers who recruit apprentices between 1 October 2021 and 31 January 2022 are entitled to incentive payments of £3,000 per eligible learner. This is the second extension to the financial incentives offered to businesses who take advantage of the wide range of benefits of using apprenticeship programmes to develop and retain talent.
Speaking about how the scheme has helped young adults into work since it was first implemented in early 2020, Gareth John said:
“The first round of apprenticeship incentives offered during 2020 and early 2021 did a great job of giving employers of accountants the confidence to continue with their entry-level recruitment plans during a period when they were balancing increased workloads with high levels of economic uncertainty. This recruitment has really helped them with resourcing rising demand now that the economic recovery is in full swing.”
Furthermore, Gareth talks about how the extension and increase to the incentives in early 2021, prompted by the ongoing pandemic, has had an even more positive impact:
“Given the growing difficulties employers in the accountancy and finance sector have been experiencing retaining talent, the extension and increase of the incentives for new apprentice hires through to 30 September 2021 was extremely welcome. It seems clear that at a time when a cohort of young adults leaving education needed as much support as possible in securing their first professional roles the increased incentives stimulated a record number of entry-level vacancies. Well done to the Chancellor for this well-targeted and timely support for job creation!”
Employers are reminded that those who recruited apprentices between 1 April 2021 and 30 September 2021 and who will have started their apprenticeship programmes by 30 November 2021 need to apply for their incentive payments via the Apprenticeship Service by 30th November 2021.
In the Autumn 2021 Budget the Chancellor confirmed a further extension to the apprenticeship incentive scheme which is likely to prompt further recruitment. Employers will be eligible for a payment of £3,000 per apprentice with an employment start date from 1 October 2021 to 31 January 2022. Applications will open via the Apprenticeship Service on 11 January 2022 and close on 15 May 2022.
Gareth comments on this further extension to the scheme: “After seeing first-hand the beneficial impact that the previous two phases of apprenticeship incentives have had on employment opportunities being offered to young adults, it is great to hear the Chancellor has used the Autumn budget to further extend these incentives to the end of January 2022. On top of record intakes of new accountancy trainees being taken on this Autumn I already know of a number of firms whose continued workload growth is now driving a second intake in early 2022. Even more great career opportunities available for even more ambitious individuals.”
Our flagship technology conference Talking Tech is returning to The Space, Norwich this September and now is the time to book your tickets! Our early bird tickets give you a discount of £5 off the standard ticket price. This discount rate ends on Friday 13 July – don’t let this superstitious date be unlucky for you by securing your tickets today. Talking Tech is a half-day conference bringing together local and national speakers for an interactive and inspiring event. The event is made up of keynote speakers, panel discussions, workshops, a tech themed exhibition and over 180 business attendees. Since 2017’s conference the way we do business has continued to change and adapt, ushering in new technology to improve efficiency and productivity. The focus of the conference this year is looking forward to the future of tech in business – how are things going to continue to change and how do we prepare for this? To cover such a wide topic our speaker line-up for 2018 has more than doubled, including the introduction of panel discussions which aim to bring together experts from different backgrounds to share their thoughts and answer your questions. Our three panels this year are Virtual and Augmented Reality, The Tech Skills Gap and Disrupting Industries. Other topics from our keynote speakers include Digital Marketing, Embracing Technology, Shaping the Future of Tech Innovation and more. Closer to the event we will also be releasing workshop only tickets for the first time. As we shuffle our agenda around, our knowledgeable workshops will be the key close to the event. Buying a conference ticket will give you access to the whole event, including our networking lunch and workshops. However, if you don’t fancy the whole conference, you can join us for a spot of lunch and a choice of workshops to break up your day. So what are you waiting for? Book your tickets today! Find out more about the event – click here Book early bird tickets – click here
Successful business-to-business (B2B) marketing agency Full Mix Marketing has expanded their team by welcoming experienced marketer, Karina Zimmermann.
Karina joins the team with over 11 years’ experience gained delivering marketing for one of Norfolk’s most iconic businesses, Bernard Matthews Foods.
“From strategy to digital marketing, I’m so keen to apply my skills in such a fantastic new environment. It’s slightly different to marketing Turkey Dinosaurs but the fundamentals are the same! It’s about delivering effective marketing which really communicates to our client’s customers” says Karina of her new role.
Originally from Koblenz in Germany, Karina arrived in the UK as a teenager partly through the German city’s twinning with Norwich and went on to study business management at the University of East Anglia.
In over a decade as Marketing Manager for Bernard Matthews, Karina led many significant projects including two rebrands, nationwide multi-channel advertising campaigns and a number of packaging redesigns.
Karina’s new role at Full Mix Marketing sees her swap the leading brand of turkey-based family foods for a wide range of clients in sectors as varied as flow chemistry equipment, intellectual property law and lorry tension curtains.
Karina adds: “Having taken a break to have my daughters, I’m eager to rekindle my love for marketing. I can’t wait to make a positive difference in the team that has already made me feel so welcome!”
Full Mix Marketing has become East Anglia’s leading B2B marketing agency, delivering strategic, digital and creative marketing for a growing number of clients across the region and beyond.
The agency often acts as another business’ marketing department, delivering a comprehensive range of marketing including strategy, PR, website development and social media.
“Karina joins us with a wealth of experience, gained in a large and well-respected company. We can already see the big benefits it will deliver our clients” says Full Mix Marketing’s Managing Director, Sarah West.
Karina is the third member of Full Mix Marketing’s growing team to have been born outside the UK.
“The great benefit of a diverse team is that it provides different perspectives. It undoubtedly makes us even more effective at delivering the best results through marketing for our clients” concludes Sarah.
Having moved to larger city-centre offices in 2020, Full Mix Marketing now has a team of seven and has recently doubled its number of clients, many of which have worked with the agency since it began in 2016.
Karina’s role as Marketing Executive sees her take responsibility for delivering key aspects of marketing for clients including the UK’s largest supplier of gift cards, the designers of innovative new cleaning technology and one of the country’s leading contract electronics manufacturers.
We finished off lastweek by welcoming Regency Security Groupto our digital signage networks across Norfolk! The ad was created by Impact Media Group using a combination of static imagery, a clever use of personal messaging targeted to the audience and some basic motion graphics to draw the eye.
Established in 1993, with commitment to both customers and staff alongside a strong ethos of a standards driven approach, Regency Security has grown to become one of the premier security companies in the UK providing a complete range of security services to an ever changing marketplace. These services include; Door Supervision, Close Protection, Event Security & Stewarding, Guarding, Mobile Patrols, Key Holding , Alarm Response and tailor-led Training Courses from an award winning, fully accredited Training Company.
Digital-Out-Of-Home, synonymous with new creative options for your communication: Modern and innovative, DOOH is the new communication solution for advertisers looking for a means of communication with a high level of proximity, impact and attraction. Thanks to the great flexibility of its utilisation and content, digital advertising can be adapted in different environment. Well used, it becomes an inevitable venue that enhances the recognition, reputation and allocation of the brand.
Tariffs imposed by President Trump’s administration on global steel and aluminium imports could lead to yearly export losses of £125 million for the UK, but it will be by no means the hardest hit country.
According to leading trade credit insurer Euler Hermes, global export losses caused by the US decision will reach £5.57 billion with the highest losses being suffered by Canada, Brazil, Russia, China and South Korea.
Canada looks likely to be the biggest single loser, Euler Hermes has calculated, suffering a £1.5 billion loss. In Europe, Germany could be the biggest loser with £300 million in lost exports, while the EU as a whole will lose around £800 million.
Despite these figures, Ludovic Subran, Chief Economist at Euler Hermes, still believes that the risk of a fully-fledged trade war – characterised by a doubling or tripling of the average US tariffs and severe retaliation from the EU, Canada and Mexico – still seems unlikely.
However, he warned, the uncertainty caused by the latest wave of measures combined with tit-for-tat tariffs from other countries threatens the status quo of rules built up over the past 25 years.
The most frustrating aspect of the current disputes is that they are taking place in the context of reasonably healthy global trade figures.
“Encouragingly, global trade is actually doing quite well and rose by around 5% last year,” Mr Subran pointed out. “For the moment, it is outweighing the dampening effects of protectionism measures.”
A multi-disciplinary construction consultancy with head office in Colchester, Essex is celebrating 75 years in business this year with a ‘charity challenge’ for staff launched this month.
Daniel Connal Partnership (DCP), with offices in Norwich, Colchester and London, launched their one-year challenge on Friday 24 September 2021, in an effort to ‘give something back’ as a lasting legacy.
The team of up to 30 DCP staff is aiming to raise £7,500 for Young Minds Trust (www.youngminds.org.uk) by walking, running, cycling and/or sailing 7,500kms over the coming 12 months – as a combined team effort, all logged on the Strava app.
Young Minds Trust is a leading UK charity fighting for a future where all children and young people have access to the best possible mental health support. They work to provide young people with tools to look after their mental health, building resilience and confidence. The Trust also works to empower adults to be the best support they can be to the young people in their lives.
Commenting on the launch Robert Dale, Senior Partner at Daniel Connal Partnership, said: “We wanted to do something special to mark our 75th anniversary and with a few keen cyclists, runners and walkers among our staff we do like a physical challenge for a worthy cause!”
“Supporting the next generation is very important to our DCP family. With recent challenges from the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdown having a particularly heavy impact on young people, we feel that the work of Young Minds needs to be supported now more than ever,” he added.
The 75th Anniversary Challenge will run for a full calendar year. At the launch event last week 25 members of the DCP team - 6 from the Norwich office – walked, ran or cycled around beautiful Dedham on the Essex/Suffolk border. The brilliant blue skies and blazing sunshine on the day really added to the occasion, which saw participants total 383km of the 7,500km total target.
Established in 1946, Daniel Connal Partnership (DCP) offers a range of specialist construction services right across the UK, with key expertise in education sector builds and public interest projects as well as specialist Health and Safety training. Find out more at www.danielconnal.co.uk
East Anglian based chartered accountants, Larking Gowen, is proud to be announced regional winner of the Workplace Wellbeing Award in the British Chambers of Commerce ‘Chamber Business Awards 2018’, it has been announced today.
“Attitudes to workplace wellbeing are rapidly evolving. I’m proud to be seen at the forefront of that in this region,” says Jon Woolston, Managing Partner at Larking Gowen. “For us, the wellbeing of all of our team isn’t just a desirable ‘add on’, it’s a fundamental part of our business culture, with positive impacts right across our business.”
Since launching its wellbeing programme, which is being continually developed through engagement with employees and Wellbeing Champions and covers physical and mental wellbeing, as well as wider career, financial, social and community aspects, the firm has seen increases in employee retention and productivity, as well as a reduction in sickness absence.
“We monitor the impact of our wellbeing measures closely,” says Amanda Ninham, Head of Human Resources at Larking Gowen. “We operate in a competitive sector where we have to work hard to attract and retain people. If our employees feel happier at work and are staying with us for longer, that’s a clear indication our approach works”.
“The partners at Larking Gowen are owner-managers,” continues Managing Partner, Jon Woolston, “and this means we still have a personal interest in and can directly influence the kind of environment we want to work in. The nature of our business, with strict submission deadlines, results in periods of intense pressure. It’s particularly important to create a culture where all employees are as happy to discuss mental health and wellbeing as they are to talk about physical health.”
Larking Gowen will now go forward to the national finals of the Chamber Business Awards. The winners will be announced at a gala dinner at Tobacco Dock in London on 29 November.
The nascent Customs Declaration Service (CDS) faces significant challenges and there is a risk that it will be unable to fully replace the existing Customs Handling of Import and Export Freight (CHIEF) system by January 2019.
Indeed, HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) will not know whether CDS works in live service until all of its functionality has been implemented this December, the National Audit Office (NAO) has warned.
In its latest report on the CDS, the NAO says that the late release of functionality and migration of users increases the risk that HMRC will not have sufficient time to resolve any issues that the last release might highlight and that some traders will therefore have to continue using the existing CHIEF system.
Although HMRC intends to migrate users to the CDS beginning in August, and aims to complete the process by January next year, the migration of all users from the current (CHIEF) to the new (CDS) system by then seems, as the NAO puts it, “unlikely”.
However, if the CDS is not ready, does not perform as planned, if traders have not migrated to it in time, or there is no deal on Brexit, then HMRC now has more robust contingency plans in place, the NAO agrees (something it welcomes given that its previous report of July 2017 criticised HMRC for a lack of planning).
For the British Chambers of Commerce, Anastassia Beliakova noted that, until the Government has decided which customs option it wishes to pursue with the EU post-Brexit, the 145,000 UK businesses that are only trading with the EU are left in the dark as to the future costs and administration they have to factor in.
The NAO report, The Customs Declaration Service: A Progress Update, can be found here.
• 24% of firms have never heard of Making Tax Digital, which comes into effect next April for VAT
• Only 10% of firms know ‘a lot of details’ about the switch to the digitised tax system
Ten months ahead of its planned introduction, an alarmingly high proportion of UK businesses have little or no awareness of HM Revenue and Customs’ flagship Making Tax Digital project, according to new research released today (Tuesday) by the British Chambers of Commerce, in partnership with Avalara.
Based on the responses of over 1,100 firms, with less than a year to go until the government plans to roll out Making Tax Digital (MTD), there is a widespread lack of awareness among business communities about the switch to a digitised tax system. A quarter (24%) of firms have never heard of it, and two-thirds (66%) know it only by name or some details about it.
All VAT registered businesses will have to maintain digital records for VAT and submit their returns digitally from April 2019 – just days after the UK leaves the EU. Of those that are aware of the change, a quarter (25%) have made no preparations at all. This is a concern as MTD will require VAT registered firms to have MTD compatible software in place that can create a VAT return and connect to HMRC systems via an Application Programming Interface (API). This is a much more complex process for businesses than the current online process of manual completion of VAT returns.
As the government prepares to roll out this flagship policy, businesses are reporting low levels of satisfaction and support from HMRC. Asked to rate the overall level of service, help and support received from HMRC on a scale of one to five, 60% of firms gave the tax authority a rating of 3 or less. Levels of direct engagement with HMRC remain low. Of those firms that are aware of MTD, just 6% of businesses have contacted HMRC for advice (including online services, webinars, or via their telephone services), compared to 51% who have spoken to an accountant.
The BCC is therefore calling for the introduction of Making Tax Digital to be delayed for all businesses until the start of the 2020/21 financial year. This would give HMRC the breathing space to engage effectively with businesses, ensure that the necessary software is in place, and raise levels of awareness about the impending changes. While steps have been taken to free-up capacity, businesses remain concerned that HMRC may still lack the resources to deliver MTD at the same time as supporting firms through the Brexit process (particularly given the level of uncertainty over the final customs arrangement), as well as day-to-day compliance issues. The delay to this initiative would also provide HMRC with the extra headroom that maybe needed to support business on these vital issues.
Mike Spicer, Director of Economics and Research at the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC), said:
“The government’s aim to modernise the UK’s tax system is admirable, but in view of low business awareness and the impending challenges of Brexit, it would make sense for HMRC to delay the implementation of Making Tax Digital in order to get this change right.
“We are concerned that far too many firms still aren’t clear on what Making Tax Digital is, or what it means for their operations. With just months to go before the deadline, these knowledge gaps could make the timeline for change unworkable for many firms.
“Ministers must face up to the reality of the pressures facing HMRC and delay the introduction of Making Tax Digital for all businesses for the next financial year. This would allow the Revenue to focus its immediate attention on supporting businesses through the Brexit process, which must be a key priority.
“When Making Tax Digital is implemented, the acid test will be whether it ultimately creates a simpler and more efficient tax system, or yet more onerous administrative burdens that stifle the growth of UK firms.”
Richard Asquith, VP of Global Indirect Tax at Avalara, said:
“Making Tax Digital will affect 2.6 million businesses. It is the biggest overhaul in VAT obligations in decades. Approximately 25% of businesses are still using manual or spreadsheet record keeping, which falls foul of HRMC’s new requirements. It is still not clear how they can become compliant without more education plus investment in compliance accounting packages. To date, HMRC have remained confident that they can cope with MTD and Brexit; although 29 other efficiency projects have had to be cancelled or delayed in preparation of the UK leaving the EU in March 2019.
“HMRC will be clarifying their Making Tax Digital program at our free Tax Summit in London on the 3rd October. This will be a great chance for businesses to have some of their concerns addresses by HMRC directly.”