Fuel pump crisis and the looming “challenging” winter

With panic buying at the pumps, the shortage of HGV drivers, and a looming winter energy crisis many of us are running our businesses in an ever increasing level of uncertainty.

If you are concerned about the future of your business then take some time to reflect on where you are and what could happen in the next few months. It is now vitally important for all businesses to plan ahead for a range of scenarios. Cash flow and business planning in these uncertain times may appear difficult but there are some practical steps you can take to minimise potential disruption to your business.

• Review your Budgets and set realistic and achievable targets for the remainder of 2021.
• If you have employees, get them involved in a discussion of likely trading conditions and get their input on reducing costs and maintaining revenues. 
• Review and flow chart the main processes in your business (e.g. Sales processing, order fulfilment, shipping etc.) and challenge the need for each step.
• Put extra effort into making sure your relationships with your customers are solid.
• Review your list of products and services and eliminate those that are unprofitable or not core products/services.
• Review your prices and increase if necessary to account for the increasing costs of buying from suppliers and the increase in inflation (the Consumer Prices Index, CPI, rose by 3.2% in the 12 months to August 2021, up from 2.0% to July). 
• Pull everyone together and explain the business strategy and get their buy-in.

Please talk to us about cash flow planning and budgeting for the next few months, we can help with a template so you can do this yourself, or we can work together to produce estimates for a variety of scenarios.