We all know that small businesses are relatively fragile. Not many of them survive the first two years of trade. This can be a bitter pill to swallow, but it’s sufficiently important to consider if you hope to avoid the pitfalls of running a business, learn from those around you, and generally work harder to become a better firm in the long run. However, there are some mistakes you can’t learn from. Some of them can become quite debilitating to your firm. Either through legal action against you, a personal mishap leading to a bad chain of errors, or perhaps something as egregious as causing harm to someone or something, it’s important that your business is a tight ship from the moment you begin to work there.

 

Your small business can’t afford to make these mistakes. Consider them now, as foresight teaches gently:

 

Tax Effectiveness

 

It’s essential for your business to keep a straight tax record from the offset. While it might be that some people are seemingly getting away with hiding tax in offshore companies, highlighted by the Panama and Paradise papers scandals, that is absolutely not the direction you should aim for your business to push towards. It’s essential to hire a specialist tax accountant in order to inform your budget, your balance sheet, and to keep you in the clear with HMRC or the IRS time and time again. Being audited due to incorrect payment can be a long, drawn out process, so in order to prevent that happening it’s absolutely worth ensuring that this is a clinical effort your business takes care of with the utmost sincerity, even declaring the small means of income you might not find important.

 

Legal Documents

 

The legal documents you send are important to perfect. Legal document templates exist to help your legal team send out surgically accurate demands, recommendations and statements when dealing with a problem. This can not only help you focus on the content of your letters with much more wisdom, but it can ensure your letters are read in the appropriate context you are aiming for, potentially shielding you from any manipulation on the other side, or potentially opening yourself up to the accusation of being deliberately misleading.

 

Payroll

 

You just cannot mess with payroll, no matter the justification. Never, never never. It’s essential for your staff to get paid, for your workers to feel comfortable and secure in their financial standing with your firm. It’s essential this is paid on-time and always the correct amount. Firms that fail to do this open themselves up to investigation from the authorities, a class action lawsuit against them from disgruntled and mistreated workers, and a reliably high staff turnover. Ensure your staff can say that no matter what issues they might have with your firm that you’re taking the time to figure out, you never, ever messed up applying their wages at the right time.

 

With these simple tips, your business is sure to avoid making these heinous mistakes, starting and remaining strong.