Running a pub, café, restaurant or hotel? The government has announced that from 25 June to 1 September 2026, qualifying children’s meals will be subject to 5% VAT rather than 20%.

There’s a lot of talk around business rates at the moment. What we’re seeing is a lot of owners just accepting their figure and getting on with it. If it doesn’t look right, it’s worth challenging. You can do that through the Valuation Office Agency (VOA) – https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/how-to-challenge-your-business-rates-valuation

Surveys show 70% of employees are now experimenting with AI in the workplace. In most cases, they’re just figuring it out as they go. Used well, these tools can save a lot of time. Used badly, they can create just as many problems. It does raise the question – Is it worth having some training…

SMEs spend around 242 million hours a year on tax compliance, costing nearly £25 billion. That’s not growth. That’s not a strategy. That’s just keeping up. A significant burden before you’ve even got to running your business.

Making Tax Digital has now begun. More regular reporting is coming in, and for many businesses that will mean a bit more admin. The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales has questioned how much value quarterly reporting adds. From what we’re seeing so far, most businesses are still working out what the real…

AI tools are becoming more common in the workplace and can be great for productivity. But it is important to know where to draw the line. There have already been high profile cases where AI generated information has turned out to be wrong, showing how confidently it can produce inaccurate answers. Relied on blindly it…

The major banks have agreed an £11 billion lending package to help smaller businesses invest, grow and expand into exporting. Alongside this, the government is pushing to involve more SMEs in public sector contracts and offering regional funding to support businesses adopting new technology.

Many SMEs owners are looking at new ways to structure their pay rises. One approach is keeping salary increases broadly in line with inflation, with profit linked bonuses on top rather than committing to larger fixed rises. It helps manage long term costs while still rewarding the team when the business performs well.

Interesting to see the number of people on zero hours contracts in the UK reach a record high. For many SMEs it reflects the current climate. Businesses are being more cautious about commitments, and these contracts have become one way to manage uncertainty while still creating opportunities for work.