{"id":3890,"date":"2024-03-07T10:02:59","date_gmt":"2024-03-07T10:02:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/camcab.co.uk\/spring-budget-fails-to-deliver-for-retailers-and-smes\/"},"modified":"2024-03-07T10:02:59","modified_gmt":"2024-03-07T10:02:59","slug":"spring-budget-fails-to-deliver-for-retailers-and-smes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/camcab.co.uk\/spring-budget-fails-to-deliver-for-retailers-and-smes\/","title":{"rendered":"Spring Budget fails to deliver for retailers and SME\u2019s"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Budget that wasn\u2019t. Spring Budget fails to deliver for retailers and SME businesses: ParcelHero<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Spring Budget was more notable for what wasn\u2019t announced than what was, says the home delivery expert ParcelHero. Among expected measures that weren\u2019t announced were business rates reforms, scrapping the tourist tax and cutting VAT for hospitality businesses.<\/em><\/p>\n

The home delivery expert\u00a0ParcelHero<\/a>, a champion of small retailers and SMEs, says today\u2019s Budget was more notable for its deafening silences than what was actually announced.<\/p>\n

It says Chancellor Jeremy Hunt\u2019s Spring Budget failed to deliver some essential and widely expected measures that could have made the difference between survival and closure for many SME retailers and small businesses.<\/p>\n

ParcelHero\u2019s Head of Consumer Research, David Jinks M.I.L.T., says: \u2018This was the Budget that wasn\u2019t, as far as many small businesses are concerned. Hundreds of SME retailers and local companies were waiting desperately for urgent reforms to their business rates, as well as specific tax cuts for those in the hospitality sector and on foreign tourists\u2019 retail spending. It\u2019s distressing that none of these widely expected reforms actually happened.<\/p>\n

Business rates reform:<\/strong>\u00a0\u2018The Government has again failed to tackle business rates reform, leaving many retailers and businesses in a state of limbo. Businesses will find it hard to plan for the future until there is a proper solution to the vexed issue of rates. There was a woolly reference to further business rates support, together with \u00a3200m more for the post-pandemic Recovery Loan Scheme\/Growth Guarantee Scheme. That\u2019s not enough.<\/p>\n

\u2018Business rates are charged on shops, pubs and other business properties based on their rental value. They devour a significant amount of most local shops\u2019 annual turnover. News that film studios in England will get 40% relief on their gross business rates until 2034 is welcome but will do little to help our favourite local High Street stores.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Tourist Tax:<\/strong>\u00a0\u2018The Chancellor also pointedly ignored calls from retailers and business leaders to reinstate VAT-free shopping for overseas tourists. Tourists from overseas were allowed to reclaim the 20% VAT on their purchases in the UK until January 2021, when the tax break was scrapped by then-Chancellor Rishi Sunak. This has resulted in lost income for many stores in tourist areas and has impacted the entire tourism industry.<\/p>\n

Hospitality tax cut:<\/strong>\u00a0\u2018Hospitality businesses had been calling for a cut to the 20% rate of VAT charged on pubs, bars and restaurants. The sector\u2019s recovery from the pandemic has faltered significantly in recent months. Many industry leaders had called for a reduction back to the previous 12.5% rate that had helped businesses recover from the Covid crisis. The freeze on alcohol duty will be welcomed but won\u2019t be enough to save many of our favourite pubs and eateries.<\/p>\n

\u2018Of course, there was some good news for Britain\u2019s small traders and manufacturers. The threshold for VAT registration will go up from \u00a385k to \u00a390k. That\u2019s not as far as the \u00a3100k some were hoping for, but it\u2019s still good news for many smaller traders.<\/p>\n

\u2018Back in his Autumn Statement, Mr Hunt unveiled a \u00a310bn tax cut for businesses that make capital investments in the UK, known as \u201cfull expensing\u201d. \u00a0Now, following calls from business lobbying groups, he\u2019s revealed that firms will be able to claim tax relief for leased assets as well. However, he ominously added \u201cas soon as the Government can afford to do so\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u2018The \u00a3270m\u00a0to advanced manufacturing industries, to grow \u201czero emission vehicle and clean aviation technology\u201d will also be good news for businesses such as courier companies that are keen to further decrease their carbon footprints.<\/p>\n

\u2018However, this was the Budget of what was not announced, rather than what was. As such, it will do little to increase the confidence of SME retailers, manufacturers and other businesses, as customers continue to struggle with the cost of living.<\/p>\n

\u2018As retail settles to a new equilibrium, it will be those retailers with strong in-store\u00a0and\u00a0online sales that will ultimately triumph after a concerning start to the year. ParcelHero\u2019s influential\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0\u201c2030: Death of the High Street\u201d has been discussed in Parliament. It reveals that, unless retailers develop an omnichannel approach, embracing both online and physical store sales, the High Street as we know it will reach a dead-end by 2030. Read the full report at:\u00a0https:\/\/www.parcelhero.com\/content\/downloads\/pdfs\/high-street\/deathofthehighstreetreport.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n

Transport & Logistics<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 Driving The Industry Forward<\/p>\n

The post Spring Budget fails to deliver for retailers and SME\u2019s<\/a> appeared first on Transport & Logistics Magazine<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Budget that wasn\u2019t. Spring Budget fails to deliver for retailers and SME businesses: ParcelHero The Spring Budget was more notable for what wasn\u2019t announced than what was, says the home delivery expert ParcelHero. Among expected measures that weren\u2019t announced were business rates reforms, scrapping the tourist tax and cutting VAT for hospitality businesses. The home delivery expert\u00a0ParcelHero, a champion…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1439,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3890","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-camcab"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/camcab.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3890"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/camcab.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/camcab.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/camcab.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3890"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/camcab.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3890\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/camcab.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1439"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/camcab.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3890"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/camcab.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3890"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/camcab.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3890"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}