Business Finance

Independent Financial Advice for your Business

At Acumen Associate Financial Services Ltd we are committed to add significant value to businesses with our bespoke corporate financial services proposition. It is this commitment which gives us the foundation for our comprehensive ongoing corporate service and delivering value to our business clients.

Client care is always the catalyst for our tailored financial plans to suit the needs of both our personal and business clients.

Working with you in partnership ensures that we have your common business goals at the forefront of our financial strategies.

Choosing the right corporate financial planning partner is one of the most important business relationships-we at Acumen Associate Financial Services Ltd look forward to working with you in attaining those successful financial outcomes for your business.

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What your business needs to know about Auto-enrolment

Auto enrolment is a government initiative to help people save for later life through a workplace pension.
In the past, many employees may have missed out on valuable pension benefits, either because they didn’t join their company’s pension scheme or their employer didn’t offer them a pension.

This was changed by the introduction of auto enrolment which makes it compulsory for employers to enrol eligible employees into a pension scheme and to pay a minimum contribution into it. Auto enrolment was phased in from 2012 and all eligible employees should have been enrolled by 1 February 2018.

Employees – how much do I and my employer have to pay?

The government has set minimum levels of contributions that must be paid to the workplace pension scheme by you and/or your employer.
Your employer must pay some of the minimum total contribution. If your employer doesn’t pay all the minimum total contribution, you will need to make up some of the difference. Your employer will tell you how much you need to pay.
Through tax relief on your contributions, the government will effectively also be paying into your pension pot. Even if you don’t pay Income Tax, you’ll still get tax relief if your pension scheme uses tax relief at source.
The minimum total contribution to the scheme is usually based on your ‘qualifying earnings’. These are your earnings from employment, before Income Tax and National Insurance contributions are deducted, that fall between a lower and upper earnings limit that are set by the government.
If your employer decides to pay only the minimum amount, the minimum total contribution, as a percentage of your qualifying earnings is:
Your employer pays: You pay: The government adds tax relief of: Total contribution:
3.0% of your qualifying earnings 4.0 of your qualifying earnings 1.0% of your qualifying earnings 8.0% of your qualifying earnings
Employers – What are my responsibilities?

Under the Pensions Act 2008, if you employ at least one person, you have a legal duty to enrol certain staff into a workplace pension scheme and contribute towards it.
What you need to do will depend on whether you have staff who need to be put into a pension scheme or not. The Pensions Regulator has an online tool to find out what you’ll need to do to meet auto enrolment requirements.
Ongoing duties
Automatic enrolment is a continuous responsibility and each time you pay your staff you need to do the following:
• Monitor changes in their age and earnings to see if they need to be enrolled into the
scheme
• pay the correct amount into the pension scheme
• manage
requests to join or leave the scheme
• keep records
In addition, every three years you must carry out re-enrolment to put back in any staff who have left the scheme.

Business Protection

A business may want to protect the key employees within their firm – perhaps the key salesperson, or the IT manager, without whom the business would not function properly.

Keyperson/Shareholder/Partnership Protection

This protection can provide a fixed sum should the individual be unable to work, or even die. The benefit will be designed to cover the firm’s expenses in meeting any emergency costs, recruiting a replacement employee and protecting the future of the business.

If a shareholder were to pass away, the firms remaining shareholders or directors may want to purchase the deceased’s shares from their estate promptly to maintain control of their business. The same scenario also applies to partners in a firm.

Employee Benefits

Employee Benefits consist of a range of products from Group Life and Group Income Protection right through to Private Medical Care and Dental Insurance.

Although such products may be considered a luxury to many business owners, there are many positive attributes often overlooked. As well as the product itself, some products such as Group Life and Group Income Protection offer additional added-value such as free services that provide counselling, promote employee wellbeing and even in some cases assist in getting an employee back to work should they have been on long-term sick leave.

Why should I offer employee benefits to my staff:

Attract

To help attract and retain high-calibre staff.

Morale

Boost morale within your workforce.

Wellfair

Promote employee health and wellbeing.

Loyalty

Helps build and promote loyalty.

Motivate

Beat the competition in the race for talent.

Have the advantage

Although the initial outlay on such cover may seem daunting, the long-term advantages can vastly outweigh the costs.

Still unsure? Here are some facts from the MetLife UK Employee Benefit Trend Study 2017* you may find useful:

36% of employers found retaining staff a challenge.
46% of employers expect a talent shortage in the next 12 months
73% of employers are currently using benefits to attract talent
87% of employees say a wellness programme has had a positive effect on their health
Use of such wellness programmes is at 35% (up by 24% from 2015!)
Happiness makes people about 12% more productive.

Disengaged employees have 37% higher absenteeism and 49% more accidents.

Improved benefits is the 3rd most popular reason employees look for a new job.

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Directors Insurance

Don’t Make This Costly Mistake

Are Your Business Directors Insured?

If you were to die or become terminally ill could your business manage financially? Protecting your business protects those you work with and those working for you, as well as your profit.

Keyman Insurance provides your business with a lump sum should the worst happen. A financial lifeline paying much needed income to the business to cover additional staff costs, compensation or the funds to replace lost income.

Group Life Insurance

Group Life cover is a type of Life Insurance in which a single contract covers an entire group of people. Typically, these policies are owned and provided to staff by their employers.

In most cases, Group Life cover equates to far less than a member would have to pay for a similar amount individual protection and can help to provide your employees a sense of comfort to know that their loved ones would be looked after in the event of their death.

The majority of available providers can offer cover up to the age of 75 and benefits can be paid as a multiple of salary or even as a defined lump sum. You can even set multiple categories within a scheme enabling you to offer various levels of cover dependent on the members position within the company or even the length of service they have under their belts.

Many policies can even come with a free Bereavement Counselling service offering a mixture of telephone and face to face support for employees and their families as well as Legal support with regards to Probate.

Group income protection (GIP)

As with Group Life cover, Group Income Protection is a type of Insurance in which a single contract covers an entire group of people. GIP is often offered by employers as a way to attract employees but can often have a very positive impact for the employer. GIP provides a replacement income if an employee is absent and unable to work due to sickness or injury. More often than not the insurance will start to pay a claim after the employer has ceased to pay the members wages and the insurer has assessed all relevant medical information (most commonly after a period of 13, 26 or 52 weeks).

These policies can also be set up to cover both pension contributions and national insurance contributions for employees and the employer to meet NI liability.

Different levels of cover are available and benefit commonly based on a percentage of the members salary less any state benefits they may receive.

The cost of absence to any business can have an impact but this impact can be particularly devastating to smaller businesses. The overall cost of funding an employee’s long-term absence including sick pay, national insurance, pension contributions, temp workers and loss of productivity can all have an impact on the overall running of your business.