Wonderful Wefinda weekly news (Week ended 10 December 2010)

Base Rate held at 0.5%
As expected the Bank of England Monetary Committee held base rates at 0.5% alongside the Asset Purchase programme remaining at £200 billion. The base rate is generally expected to remain unchanged until mid-2011 at least despite concerns over inflation levels.

Data Security takes top spot
A recent survey by Symantec found that 71% of UK businesses had suffered some form of data breach in the last year. Tie this up with the 87% of organisations who don’t encrypt data on portable devices such as USBs and it is a wonder that data theft is as low as it is. The Information Commissioner’s Office (www.ico.gov.uk) has a range of helpful advice for SMEs and it is well worth going through to avoid being fined for data breaches.

Businesses planning to expand
The latest CBI/KPMG London Business Survey says 68% of businesses are planning to expand over the next 12 months. With 45% planning to recruit as normal over the next 6 months, compared with 11% a year ago, the recovery looks to be starting to unlock recruitment freezes and reduce redundancy threats. However, there is still some caution around with 54% of firms being optimistic about their business futures.

Government plans to tighten regulation may cost SMEs
Two government plans have hit the headlines this week. The first considers making businesses provide security to cover PAYE and NI payments that they have deducted from employees salaries and not yet passed on to HMRC. The government says this will avoid firms going bust with the funds lost to the UK tax economy. Secondly, there are consultations on a General Anti-Avoidance Rule (GAAR) to stop firms coming up with complex financial arrangements to save tax. Both proposals seem sensible ways of collecting potentially missed revenue but implementation could cost SMEs dear.

So, what do we have to look forward to?
Whilst the usual select committee investigations continue, in the Main Chamber in Parliament there is not a lot to interest the SME. Most government departments are winding down before Christmas. HMRC are the exception with the change in VAT on 4th January prompting regular reminders to make sure your accounting software is ready for the change.

And finally
If you are taking on temporary employees this Christmas, make sure you give them a full safety briefing including explaining the difference between the shredder and other machines. That way you might save yourself the trouble faced by a Taiwanese man recently when he accidentally dropped a bag containing the equivalent of £4,200 into his shredding machine. Luckily for him patient forensic scientists managed to piece the notes back together in a week.