A new year, with an election ahead and economic uncertainty in the eurozone, promises a rocky ride ahead. But a record number of budding entrepreneurs are gauging the risks and deciding that the time is right to start their own businesses. The government-back Start-up Britain campaign, run by the Centre for Entrepreneurs thinktank, has just reported that 581,173 new companies were registered at Companies House last y
Residential landlords have to check the immigration status of prospective tenants under a government pilot scheme that started in the West Midlands on 1 December. Failure to do so could result in a civil penalty of up to £3,000. Under the Immigration Act 2014, landlords and lettings agencies are required to establish if new tenants have a right to rent as a legal resident in the United Kingdom. The pilot scheme only
About 30 years ago an organisation that today has more than 170,000 members worldwide was founded by Dr Ivan Misner. It’s called Business Network International and last year some 6,000 meetings were held every week across the globe, generating 54 million referrals that led to members doing business worth $65 million with each other. If that sounds forbidding, then it shouldn’t. Business is built on relationships of t
My business in the collections industry is built upon trust. Clients must trust me to recover their money without behaving in a manner that threatens their reputation. That trust can lead to referrals of new business when their business contacts have unpaid invoices on their books or rent overdue from tenants. Then there are the business networks that meet up and down the country - often for an early breakfast befor
A row in Croydon over the council’s plans to levy a £200 a year licence fee for each property owned by a private landlord is just the latest to erupt up and down the country. The local paper, the Croydon Advertiser, recently reported on a meeting organised by the National Landlords Association to oppose introduction of a licensing scheme on which the south London borough has been consulting. It quoted Sally-Anne Stap
Lettings agents have taken the private rented sector a step along the road to regulation of the industry that many tenants and politicians have been demanding. Since 1 October it has been compulsory for letting agents in England to join one of three redress schemes designed to give tenants somewhere to complain about discrimination, unexpected fees, missing deposits and the myriad of other disputes that have been hur
The Scottish referendum result is in and the verdict is that the United Kingdom will remain so. Politicians will make of it what they will, with devolution of power from London for all parts of the country now promised. For me, though, the interesting aspect to all the shenanigans, was the impact on the markets as the yes campaign appeared, briefly, to be on the brink of victory. A battle that became bogged down in t
Landlords in the private rental sector will be watching closely the progress of Liberal Democrat MP Sarah Teather’s private member’s bill to ban retaliatory evictions. The bill follows claims by housing charity Shelter that there is a crisis in the sector because landlords have been evicting tenants who complain about the standards of their property. Launching her bill, Teather said: ‘All too often tenants out
The news that two member of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee voted in favour of an increase on interest rates at their August meeting would suggest that the historic low rates are nearing their end. We’ve written before about the possible impact of rising rates, however gradually, on businesses and consumers who are managing, just, their repayments. Once variable loan rates start to increase, whether o
Over twenty years experience in Debt Collection and Credit Control at your service. The worst thing you can do about collecting slow and overdue accounts is: "NOTHING"