Scotiabank shares effective management tips at Small Business Seminar

Small business owners were exposed to tips for effective management at a Scotia Bank Small Business Seminar, last Thursday, March 15.

Managing director Pamela Herbert-Daniel said Scotiabank considered how best they could provide small businesses and entrepreneurs with the support needed to expand job opportunities in the economic environment. She explained that the topics chosen for the seminar were critical to business success.

Private accountant Peter Alexander said keeping proper financial records helps in making management decisions.

The accountant made recommendations on how to improve a business’s cash flow and distributed examples of documents used for record keeping, including monthly income statements and balance sheets.

He pointed out that it doesn’t matter how much is sold, but rather, how the payments are received, since if money for credited goods is not received, there would be little cash flow for restocking and paying expenses.

He explained that keeping a record of how payments are received would inform the business owner whether strategies need to be put in place to collect monies owed. He advised that to avoid problems, a monthly budgeted income statement should be made before each financial year.

Syran Clarke, manager and team lead (Corporate and Commercial Banking) within Scotia Bank, explained that the main causes of cash flow problems were: not selling enough, or too many credited goods; business expenses too high; underpricing goods; and businesses growing fast with inability to restock on time. He suggested that one way to improve cash flow is to provide the customer with an invoice soon after the product or service is provided, to enable the customer to arrange for payments at the earliest of time.

“Many times people come when they need the funds tomorrow and at that time it is very difficult for us to be able to turn things around, to give you money in time to help your business succeed. Now, if you were keeping proper financial records… you would come to the bank months before you actually need the actually funds…,” Clarke explained.

He also asked persons to include the loan repayment amount in their cash flow projection when looking for a loan.

Entrepreneurs were also enlightened on the effectiveness of Point of Sales (POS) payments (using a terminal to allow payment by debit or credit cards), how to use a POS terminal and some of the problems associated with it.

Following the seminar, one business owner said she intends to keep better financial records.

“I am not good at Quickbooks, I am not good with paperwork, but I’m a very good cook…

“I think it was very beneficial and I am hoping to see much more to come… I definitely would apply to use the card system (POS terminal) and the Quickbooks. That’s a good idea,” she said.

Another business owner was also complimentary of the session.

“Some of the security features involved in the credit card and the debit card; how you go about identifying a customer who may have a fraudulent card. You can make a wire transfer online, I didn’t know that. Those are the main points that jumped out at me, but most of what Peter spoke about I already knew…,” he said.

Norman Cumberbatch, Global Transaction Banking Sales officer for Scotia Bank, said the seminar was the fifth one hosted by the bank and that 40 small business owners were recommended.(CB)