Sponsored Article
by TONY BYRNE Managing Director, Wealth & Tax Management
AS I WRITE this article in my garden on a sunny afternoon, worldwide lockdown is being gradually relaxed and the number of both coronavirus infections and deaths are on the decrease.
By the time you read this article, it is likely that most of us will have returned to work albeit not normality as we know it. We have all got used to a new way of life during lockdown including the new language of furloughing, social distancing, contact tracing, PPE, coronavirus, Covid-19, ‘covidiot’, ‘doomscrolling’, ‘covideoparty’ and ‘quarantini’.
So we will now have to get used to the new normal. But what will it be like?
What I have discovered during lockdown is that my business has had to adapt to new ways of working. For example, all of our client meetings have been by video conference call or telephone. We have started to run regular webinars, which have been surprisingly successful.
We have also made the business decision to produce weekly videos and podcasts in addition to our existing weekly blogs. Furthermore, we are now doing far more posting on social media.
We have found the time to stop and really think about how we want to grow the business in the future. This time of reflection has been really valuable. We have found that staff working from home can be very productive indeed. In fact it makes you wonder whether you even need an office at all when virtually everything can be done online these days.
So the question to you as a business owner, manager or senior executive is what is going to be your new normal business life? If you run an office, I suspect you will make changes like the ones I have mentioned. Certainly more home working and less travelling to business meetings and seminars seems highly likely.
One big issue exposed by the lockdown was the fact that most businesses can only survive for a few weeks without ongoing revenue. What this means is that you should apply for a Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan and/or a Bounceback loan whether you think your business needs the money or not.
That is because every business needs three months’ worth of working capital, in my opinion. What is more, these loans are being offered on very advantageous terms.
For advice on how to grow your business in a tax-efficient manner post coronavirus, join us for a one-hour Discovery Meeting either at our offices – if lockdown is relaxed by then – or by video conference call at our expense worth £470 to each of the first five readers who contact us before July 31 2020. You know it makes sense. We offer a great cup of coffee too.
Tony Byrne is a chartered and certified financial planner, a chartered wealth manager and author of Wealth Magic.
