eCentral Business Show^©

How do you save a failing business with Barry Hopkins

Mon 5:34pm 13 Nov 2017
Podcast Audio


We welcome Barry Hopkins from Victory Business Solutions on the ecentral business show. Barry's expertise and passion is working with people in deep financial trouble typically around a business failure.

In this video he speaks about the steps you can take to save a failing business. It's something we would never like to consider would happen to us, but it's sobering advice that will come in handy should do it ever be necessary. Most importantly it may be that you're not in as much of a predicament as you think with your business. To step back and work with someone who has expertise in the field may reveal simple solutions or at least a workable outcome.

Audio transcription how do I save a failing business is what we're speaking about today on the ecentral business sure on John Nayler joined today by Barry Hopkins from victory Business Solutions Barry you've got some expertise in this field yeah yeah thanks John place heavy yeah I have a little bit of expertise about five or six years and you know a history of working as a chartered accountant and working in commercial business proposals and due diligence and assessment of business projects yeah right you've obviously got some passion around the subject so that's go on and explore that so you know and that the answer that they found a lot a question it's like how do I save a failing business because that's where you chime in yeah yeah definitely what I find is many business owners and event happens and it takes a while for that event to come through and be realized that there's a problem with the business hmm so it could be a loss of a big client change in competition yeah and you know it takes a while for that comes through in the business and once it does the business owners don't necessarily see what's happening so we're really trying to open up everything around the business its financials what the environments like any events that have happened over the last couple of years to see where the businesses come from where it is now hmm good fundamentally of businesses normally in some sort of operational position where it's it's kicking along and it something's happened yeah yeah that's right and I think business owners get involved so much in the business particularly small medium business owners their hands on oh yeah they're on the tool from day to day yeah yeah they are and it becomes hard to step back and see the bigger picture of something that's happened and yes things happen that are going as well as I want they work harder how do they work the more deeper they get into the business and they can't slip out so that's pretty why it's one of the most important things are getting someone who's independent coming in from outside like house to have a look at the business because fundamentally we're not emotionally involved okay yeah and you're what and there's gonna be some research project around that we're gonna look and everything yeah I think so I did everything on the table yeah it has to be because what we find is there's little bits the people that I think are important that are actually the driver so it's like saying it's it's funny the cause not just the effects of what's happening to the business and initially the the key part is having a look at the financial statements are making sure they're up to date the information that's there is correct and then having a look what the story the financial statements are telling us yeah what's the cash flow like how much money is coming in where's it coming from how much money are you paying out and when we look at the debtors and the creditors to see how they work together we live in stock sometimes there's been a change in stock but something's still automatically ordering large bits of stock that aren't being sold oh okay so that's an easy fix and you can turn the business around okay yeah and I sort of one thing I struck a lot in terms of the digital marketing just a normal marketing idea around businesses a lot of time and the disruption genuine disruption there's a lot of terrestrial businesses or traditional businesses getting hard shaking at the moment I all thought you know ubers thunder taxis digital music stun to the record of stars you know in history yeah it's a huge change in the world everything from accounting and law firms are being hit by the same sort of thing I'd looked a lot of accountants and their business world's changed because of Technology hmm I talked to retail businesses who are really struggling because their customer bases on life yeah and they're not be able to move without it speed and power of some large multinationals yeah yeah yeah so what are the sorts of things you tend to get in there so what's the process it's it it's let's talk about a process that people can even do for themselves until they need that have a bit of a wake-up called step back themselves I need to do I think it's talking to someone because a lot of the time you've got that you know the hairs in the back in their cursor come out something's not quite right hmm getting someone independent coming to talk to you about that that's good but what you've got to have us look at what financials are doing who your customers are those same customers that you've always had hmm are your debtors paying you on time okay you're looking some of those things because that's what's driving it and the other thing that we see a lot of and and it's just natural when a business gets in trouble one of the first things they stop or slow down on spending money is on marketing yeah if you see this relationship between your marketing hmm and your clients coming in in just couple marketing you don't get clients coming in and that's a really fundamental normal thing the other biggest thing we see in businesses at the moment and I think it's gone on since I was a young accountant back in the mid 80s hmm that people use the tax office as a bank oh no the tax office is a lot more aggressive at the moment and it has been for a number of years to ensure that they're getting the revenue that comes in to fund other stuff in there but that we need but it is also very aggressive in that their legislation has changed and gives the risk if you're not lodging the right monthly quarterly returns and lodgements you can actually become personally liable where you're previously having a company structure you were safe oh okay so they'll even that are the for the fact that you haven't lodged the a yes they're your personal problem yes they can do that if you haven't lodged within 90 days of soup and on PAYG yeah they can then begin taking you personally to redirect to spend with others yeah and though that gives you a number of days 21 days to make something to do something or they can begin to liquidate your business no okay yeah so second very easily start to spiral they know definitely and the thing that a lot of business owners get worried about is that that if they Lodge they're there for most the tax office I think that can't pay the tax office little then pick up on that and come and chase them yeah so that's happening to your business that's the time you need to get someone like me coming to talk to you because that is the first point where you're beginning to get into trouble hmm if you wait too long you've got the tax office other creditors coming in to to chase your business yeah one of the things we said off-camera was even like to engage someone such as yourself that come in and do the books and even if there is no resolve there's no way out at least you get the control or crash-landing yeah yeah I think we were saying that you know you're you're in a plane that all of a sudden does doesn't fly and and you can either hit the ground very hard or you can have a controlled landing and get it somewhere yeah really in most cases if that's the case what we're doing is moving the business owner from being in a position of being a hundred and three hundred a million dollars in the red hmm to being zero and that allows them to get on with their lives yeah okay well there's one other thing we talked about two off camera and just touch on that was nice I think maybe explore in a separate video is that there's sort of that binary thing that is bankruptcy you know it's you go out buy a hundred thousand or you go buy million for the most part of the binary experience you either are bankrupt or not yeah it is that's fundamentally it I see a number of businesses that are you either have the money to pay your bills you don't hmm and if you're an individual you've either got the money to pay your bills when they do or you're not and you've got to make those decisions and you've got to take a be aware of that those things are going to happen to you hmm and really I think the other thing we said off camera is it's really not scared that's scary once you know the process hmm what will happen and how it would happen and you've got some control hmm the biggest thing I find with clients we deal with at all levels is the fear of what's going to happen and uncertainty is bigger than the problem itself and that fear and uncertainty means they don't act and they drift until someone else does and they end up in a much worse position yeah okay so you do need to try and control the process you know they pull the levers and try your best to put the plane near the tarmac part yeah yeah you're gonna hold on the steering which is driving your car fair enough great analogy as well yeah all right Barry running at a time on this occasion of your stick around talk to me a bit as I'm also on this subject yeah great Barry now on now let's touch on how do people contact you Barry the easiest ways have a look on our website at WWE mmm calmed are you or you can give me a call on four six eight eight four eight nine nine six as the director and owner of the business I answer all the major calls an initial consultation with our clients no good on you okay well that's another actually some really important information they're coming out of Barry this morning in terms of you know it's not something any of us would look forward to in terms of our business future we all want the rosy outcomes and you know to retire wealth in the rest of them and obviously have a great business full of great people but it doesn't always turn out that way and it might not be your fault but Barry thank you very much for coming on the show this morning sure okay that's great that's enough for this episode of the East Central Business show I'm John Nayler very much for watching another episode of the ECentral business show