Struggling To Raise Development Finance?

CIS - An Alternative Capital Source

• Check out the benefits of Collective Investment Schemes, a viable alternative source of much needed capital.

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News

BBC News - Business

• Tax credit repayments 'to soar'

• Interns are 'entitled to be paid'

• Addresses set to lose county name

Personal finance and money news, analysis and comment | guardian.co.uk

• Nationwide: is the holiday over?

• Isa war sparks into life as rates rise

• Ditch the fix and get a tracker mortgage

Purchasing

It's been my experience in business that when you buy anything from a supplier, a great deal of energy goes into the original sourcing of the raw material, component, product or service and then it falls from the radar as 'job done'. This can be a costly mistake.

I understand the time pressures on all operators of micro and small businesses, but where margins of net profit are so tight in most businesses, shaving a few pounds from suppliers can really help the bottom line. So it usually pays dividends to ask now again for lower prices, bigger discounts, rebates on volume, loyalty discounts, whatever you can imagine; and it's best to be armed with the names of competitors along with their prices as an indicator of your market awareness.

Suppliers will happily take 'advantage' of your soft nature not to challenge their prices so don't get carried away with the idea that they are necessarily totally on your side. Like a child, if you don't ask, you don't get.