LIFE AFTER JOBKEEPER

In three months JobKeeper reaches it is legislated end date of 27 September 2020.

JobKeeper has been fantastic in supporting small businesses to retain their key employee’s during these difficult and uncertain times. Other government incentives like the cash flow boost program, commercial landlord rent reductions, and loan repayment deferrals have also supported small businesses during the COVID-19 crisis.

Perhaps you have started to contemplate life after JobKeeper, what my business look will like and how do I get my business back to pre-COVID-19 capacity and profitability.

The past few weeks have seen lockdown restrictions eased allowing small business owners time to focus on getting their business operating again. Well done to the small business community for showing resilience over this time, especially the businesses that were forced to close.

At Hamilton Taggart, we believe it is now time to start thinking about your business continence without government support. Future planning at this stage is very important. Our team has loved being part of assisting and solving problems with JobKeeper for our clients and we want to be part of business revival post-September 2020.

It will be important for business owners to look at your cash flow now, what does it look like if you take away Jobkeeper payments, cash flow boost, rent reductions and start paying loan repayments and that all happens at once come to the end of September.

It is easy to live in a bubble with all the government and bank support available at present but it will be essential to identify whether cash flow is going to positive or negative without this support. If it is negative, how far negative is it? What changes will you need to make in your business before October to ensure your cash flow will be positive between October and Christmas?

Now is the time to start planning and take action to get your business back to a point where the government stimulus is not required. We encourage you to spend time now on reviewing your cash flow, embrace the recovery process, and work through the issues and be prepared for the day the stimulus measures stop.

Our experience with small business owners during the lockdown has been that most have coped reasonably well if they were fortunate enough to receive JobKeeper. What we would like our clients to focus on now is calculating their cash flow, reviewing expenses, and staffing levels so that their business can remain profitable and return to pre-COVID-19 trading levels.

The team at Hamilton Taggart is here to support you. We can assist with a review of your cash flow. Please reach out if you would like support.