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For Accounting advice, call Mike Harding on 0401 631 904

What comes first when you are starting up – getting new business or ensuring that you can meet the deadlines you have promised! Well, you need clients to start with – without those you can have the best products in the world, but if no one knows about them, you won’t have a business!

• stand out from the crowd – if you are a plumber what is going to make you different from all of the other plumbers. You need to think outside the square. Not all ideas will be good ones…but some will be.
• Website. All businesses these days need a website. Think about your own way of doing business – If you want to buy a new piece of equipment, do you research it on the web? Of course you do and your customers will be no different. The Website is your brochure. If you don’t have one, speak with Mighty Media (you’ll find them through Google!)
• Sometimes you need a hook to get your potential client to contact you. If you are a plumber it may be something along the lines of a free 1/2 hour – where most plumbers may charge a $100 call out fee you will immediately get customers to call you. When you are running at full capacity, then will be the time to reappraise that offer.
• Honesty – In business, honesty goes a long long way. Be honest when you are starting out, and say you are just setting up. New businesses are hungry, and people know you will go that extra mile. Provide as good a service for a small leaking tap fix as you do for a new house plumbing job.
• Value for money. If you give value for money, people will recommend you. If you don’t, they will tell people not to use you. Price for the value of the job – don’t blindly follow how much time you spent!

At Harding & Co we charge by value of the job. Clients do not pay if I am inefficient and spend more time than it should normally take!

Call Mike on 0401 631 904 to discuss your accounting needs.

Official figures published earlier this month suggested that the number of corporate insolvencies had peaked late last year. But the reports from administrators and receivers suggest that insolvencies are rising as banks and the ATO take a harder line with those debtors who are showing little progress on the reduction of debt outstanding.

Where does this leave you?

If you have a debt with the ATO contact them now to take advantage of the offer by the ATO to not charge interest on the debt outstanding – See http://www.ato.gov.au/businesses/content.asp?doc=/content/00196536.htm for further information. This offer expires on 30th June 2010.

If you have a debt with your bankers talk to them – but be prepared! Show them your business plan – including cash flows – and explain how the business will progress over the next twelve months. If they agree to a proposal, keep them informed on a monthly basis  as to how you are travelling against your forecast that you provided – irrespective of good or bad monthly results.

Cash-flow is critical as we come out of a downturn – update your cash-flow forecast at least monthly – if cash flow is critical you need to do this for a rolling 7 day period.

If you need assistance call Mike Harding now on 0401 63 904. As an elderly partner once said to me a few weeks after I started my accountancy training with one of the big 4 practices – ‘Don’t kick a client when he is down…..He may well get up again!’ We are here to help.