Coronavirus (COVID-19): Advice and guidance for small businesses and the self-employed

What help for the self-employed will there be, and who can I talk to about it?

On the evening of Friday 20 March, the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak announced the first set of additional measures to help smaller businesses and the self-employed affected by COVID-19. The UK government has told us there will be more help as the situation intensifies. Within draft emergency legislation now being published, the government is taking new legal powers to enable it to offer whatever further financial support is necessary to back business.

FSB is pressing for further help for the self-employed and for those outside of the leisure, hospitality and retail sectors. As the virus accelerates we want to look at larger, more radical measures such as 3-6 month holidays on National Insurance Contributions, VAT, PAYE; changes to insolvency; and the suspension of paying rent, tax and utilities for the same time.

Guidance for employers

Current government advice is that the risk to the public in the UK is high. Employees must work from home wherever possible.
On 20 March 2020, the government ordered the closure of cafes, pubs and restaurants by that evening, except for take-away food. It further ordered that nightclubs, cinema, theatres, gyms and leisure centres should close “as soon as they reasonably can”. A business operating in contravention of the Health Protection (Coronavirus, Business Closures) Regulations 2020 will be committing an offence. On 23 March 2020, the government announced that all “non-essential” shops and community spaces are to be closed with immediate effect for at least 3 weeks and until further advised and the Regulations will be extended to apply to those businesses too. A full list of the non-essential businesses which are to close are available here

Takeaway and delivery services may remain open and operational. This means people can continue to enter premises to access takeaway services, including delivery drivers. Online retail is still open and encouraged and postal and delivery services continue to run as normal.

To view original article and find more help and advice click here: https://www.fsb.org.uk/campaign/covid19.html#looking-after-your-mental-health