Sekilas Tentang Penurunan Angsuran PPh Pasal 25

Dasar Hukum

1. Keputusan Direktur Jenderal Pajak Nomor KEP-537/PJ./2000 Tanggal 29 Desember 2000 Tentang Penghitungan Besarnya Angsuran Pajak Dalam Tahun Berjalan Dalam Hal-Hal Tertentu.
2. Bersifat tentatif (Hanya beberapa masa di tahun 2009) yaitu Peraturan Direktur Jenderal Pajak Nomor PER-10/PJ./2009 tanggal 11 Februari 2009 tentang Pengurangan Besarnya Pajak Penghasilan Pasal 25 Dalam Tahun 2009 Bagi Wajib Pajak Yang Mengalami Perubahan Keadaan Usaha Atau Kegiatan Usaha.

Sampai saat ini belum ada perubahan ketentuan, jadi tetap mengacu pada KEP-537/PJ/2000 Tanggal 29 Desember 2000 Tentang Penghitungan Besarnya Angsuran Pajak Dalam Tahun Berjalan Dalam Hal-Hal Tertentu.

Pengurangan Angsuran

PPh pasal 25 merupakan angsuran PPh tahun berjalan. Besarnya angsuran PPh Pasal 25 dihitung berdasarkan PPh tahun lalu dibagi 12 kecuali untuk WP tertentu. WP tertentu ini seperti mempunyai kompensasi rugi, penghasilan tidak teratur, adanya perubahan keadaan usaha. Untuk lebih jelasnya dapat dilihat di KEP-537/PJ/2000 , yang coba saya ringkas sebagai berikut :

1. Hal-hal tertentu yang meliputi ; Wajib Pajak berhak atas kompensasi kerugian; Wajib Pajak memperoleh penghasilan tidak teratur; Surat Pemberitahuan Tahunan Pajak Penghasilan tahun pajak yang lalu disampaikan setelah lewat batas waktu yang ditentukan; Wajib Pajak diberikan perpanjangan jangka waktu penyampaian Surat Pemberitahuan Tahunan Pajak Penghasilan; Wajib Pajak membetulkan sendiri Surat Pemberitahuan Tahunan Pajak Penghasilan yang mengakibatkan angsuran bulanan lebih besar dari angsuran bulanan sebelum pembetulan; Terjadi perubahan keadaan usaha atau kegiatan Wajib Pajak.
2. Apabila sesudah 3 (tiga) bulan atau lebih berjalannya suatu tahun pajak, Wajib Pajak dapat menunjukkan bahwa Pajak Penghasilan yang akan terutang untuk tahun pajak tersebut kurang dari 75% (tujuh puluh lima persen) dari Pajak Penghasilan yang terutang yang menjadi dasar penghitungan besarnya Pajak Penghasilan Pasal 25, Wajib Pajak dapat mengajukan permohonan pengurangan besarnya Pajak Penghasilan Pasal 25 secara tertulis kepada Kepala Kantor Pelayanan Pajak tempat Wajib Pajak terdaftar.

Wajib Pajak (WP)

Apabila berdasarkan perhitungan realisasi dan proyeksi memenuhi ketentuan pada  Poin (2) di atas, maka WP dapat mengajukan permohonan pengurangan angsuran PPh Pasal 25 ke KPP terdaftar, yaitu dengan mengajukan permohonan penurunan angsuran surat tertulis diajukan ke kepala KPP; dalam surat disebutkan alasan-alasan kenapa terjadi penurunan omset yg menyebabkan angsuran pph 25 menjadi menurun ; lampirkan dalam surat tsb. laporan keuangan (lap laba rugi) sampai bulan terakhir yang diproyeksikan sampai akhir tahun yang akan menyebabkan posisi PPh  akan menjadi lebih bayar. Untuk mempermudah dan mempercepat proses penyelesaian, maka coba saya simpulkan lampiran yang disampaikan  sebagai berikut :

1. Foto Kopi SPT Tahunan 3 Tahun terakhir beserta Laporan Keuangannya (Sertakan juga dalam bentuk softcopy untuk memudahkan dan mempercepat analisis AR saudara).
2. Proyeksi Laporan Laba Rugi ke depan beserta softcopynya
3. Analisis naik turunnya omset, HPP, dan biaya. Beserta alasan dan dokumen-dokumen pendukungnya (Beserta softcopynya)
4. Tanda lunas pembayaran Pajak Bumi Dan Bangunan 3 Tahun terakhir

Account Representative (AR)

Idealnya jumlah PPh pasal 25 dalam satu tahun pajak mendekati jumlah PPh terutang pada tahun yang bersangkutan. Beberapa AR di KPP akan menghimbau kepada WP untuk menaikan pembayaran PPh pasal 25 jika omset WP naik secara signifikan. WP juga berhak mengajukan permohonan pengurangan PPh pasal 25 jika WP merasa bahwa pada tahun tersebut jumlah PPh terutang lebih kecil dari jumlah PPh pasal 25. Namun besarnya jumlah PPh pasal 25 yang dapat dikurangkan tergantung dari perhitungan fiskus. Sebagai seorang AR yang bertugas melakukan analisis akan menerima/menolak permohonan penurunan angsuran 25 yang diajukan oleh wajib pajak dalam hal :

• AR mengusulkan menerima apabila didukung secara makro ekonomi menunjukan fenomena yang ada menunjukan bahwa usaha tertentu  (termasuk kriteria didalam usaha pemohon) memang sedang goncang atau bersifat luar biasa. Serta didukung dengan Laporan realisasi penurunan omset atau peningkatan biaya serta proyeksi yang sangat mungkin terjadi.
• AR mengusulkan menerima jika terjadi peristiwa penting semisal sebagian atau seluruh  dari lokasi perusahaan terbakar; peristiwa pencurian atau demo karyawan yang berkepanjangan tentu didukung dengan bukti dan dokumen terkait serta realisasi dan proyeksi yang signifikan.
• AR mengusulkan menolak jika pemeriksaan tahun-tahun sebelumnya wajib pajak menunjukan kurang bayar (SKPKB) terhadap kewajiban PPh pasal 25 nya.
• AR mengusulkan menolak apabila alasan yang diajukan wajib pajak dalam rangka ekspansi usaha atau akan lebih bayar akibat perluasan usaha.
• dll

Kesimpulan

AR menyadari bahwa wajib pajak  dalam hal ini saudara (pemohon) sebagai karyawan di bidang perpajakan tentu  akan tetap mencoba memberikan kontribusi kepada perusahaan yah salah satunya melakukan permohonan penurunan angsuran tersebut tentu dengan alasan yang dapat diterima dari sudut akuntansi dan perpajakan. Bagi fiskus dalam hal ini AR  tentu akan merespon permohonan saudara dengan baik (sebelum satu bulan sejak permohonan diterima lengkap pasti sudah ada keputusan). Namun perlu saudara ketahui dalam keputusan ini murni sepenuhnya adalah kebijakan dari Kepala Kantor ditempat perusahaan saudara terdaftar dan jangan pernah merasa bahwa hal ini adalah hak mutlak sehingga permohonan penurunan angsuran PPh pasal 25 saudara harus diterima. Beberapa wajib pajak yang permohonannya ditolak maka SPT Tahunannya biasanya akan lebih bayar dan ada sebagian yang memang hasilnya adalah SKPLB namun tidak sedikit yang SKPKB. Reformasi perpajakan sudah menyentuh lini yang terdalam  maka lobby yang ingin saudara lakukan sebaiknya dijauhkan dari upaya yang dapat melanggar kode etik fiskus jika tidak ingin bermasalah.

Tambahan :

kriteria diterima atau ditolaknya pengurangan angsuran PPh 25

Disamping poin-poin yang dijelaskan pada KEP-537/PJ/2000, Saya (pendapat pribadi) cenderung melihat beberapa hal yaitu :
Diterima jika
- Wajib Pajak melakukan perubahan jenis usaha yang menyebabkan penurunan omset (Rugi)
- Wajib Pajak mengalami sesuatu yang luar biasa yang menyebabkan kerugian (Kebakaran/pencurian/banjir dll)
- Kenaikan harga barang (internasional/nasional) yang cukup signifikan yg berhubungan dengan jenis usaha wajib pajak yg menyebabkan nilai jual rendah
- Kepatuhan dan kewajaran Kewajiban perpajakan 3 tahun terakhir
- Melihat apakah wajib pajak pernah dilakukan pemeriksaan dalam 5 tahun terakhir dan hasilnya adalah Lebih bayar
- Melihat dokumen/bukti yg kuat yang menjadi alasan penurunan angsuran
- Wajib Pajak bukan merupakan pengguna Faktur Pajak Fiktif

Ditolak jika :
- Wajib Pajak belum pernah dilakukan pemeriksaan
- Wajib Pajak melakukan peningkatan pada biaya-biaya
- Penurunan omset tidak signifikan
- Dokumen dan bukti tidak cukup kuat
- Kerugian akibat pengembangan usaha

Kemampuan seorang AR dalam menjelaskan keadaan wajib pajak kepada pimpinannya juga merupakan
hal yang penting, untuk itu dalam mengajukan realisasi dan proyeksi sangat ditekankan untuk melengkapinya dengan
bukti-bukti yang kuat sehingga seorang AR tidak menggunakan asumsi yang salah.

artikel ini ditulis oleh Taripar Doly, SE, MM, lebih lengapnya silahkan kunjungi  http://www.nusahati.com

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Western Union Kejar Izin Pembentukan PT

Untuk semakin memperkuat bisnisnya di Tanah Air, yang harus sesuai dengan aturan yang sudah dan akan berlaku, Western Union sedang mengajukan permohonan pembentukan badan hukum perseroan terbatas, untuk memenuhi aturan transfer dana yang akan diberlakukan Bank Indonesia Desember ini. Paulus Yoga

Jakarta (infobanknews.com)–Western Union mengaku telah melaporkan keinginan untuk menjadi badan hukum Indonesia, untuk memenuhi aturan transfer dana oleh Bank Indonesia (BI) yang akan terbit pada Desember 2011. Dengan berbadan hukum maka setiap kegiatan perusahaan akan lebih terpercaya dan jauh dari praktik cuci uang.

“Kita sudah lapor ke Badan Koordinasi Penanaman Modal (BPKM) dan Kementerian Hukum dan HAM untuk memperoleh izin. Kita inginnya segera memperoleh izin, kalau perlu dalam waktu dekat ini, sebelum aturan transfer dana keluar pada Desember,” tutur Direktur Wilayah Jakarta Western Union (WU) Randy Pangalila, kepada wartawan di Jakarta, belum lama ini.

Ia menjelaskan, saat ini pihaknya tengah menunggu keputusan BPKM dan tidak ada kendala dalam proses perijinin meskipun Western Union merupakan perusahaan asing. Selain WU, lanjutnya, perusahaan jasa pengiriman uang lain seperti MoneyGram, PayPal juga mengajukan hal yang sama kepada BKPM.

Setelah memperoleh izin, proses selanjutnya yang harus dilakukan perusahaan jasa pengiriman uang tersebut adalah pengajuan permohonan lisensi ke bank sentral. Dalam proses pemberian lisensi tersebut, BI akan mengecek kesiapan perusahaan, antara lain sistem keamanan bertransaksi, upaya perlindungan nasabah hingga kecukupan sumber daya manusia (SDM).

Sebelumnya, BI meregulasi bisnis pengiriman uang nonbank untuk tiga tujuan. Pertama, meningkatkan perlindungan konsumen. Selama ini, ketika terjadi masalah, nasabah selalu berada dalam posisi dirugikan. Upaya pengajuan keberatan sulit, karena perusahaan tidak beroperasi di Tanah Air.

Kedua, memperbaiki pencatatan pengiriman uang agar lebih akurat. Selama ini, BI kesulitan mendapatkan data karena perusahaan asing tidak wajib melaporkan seluruh kegiatan mereka. Kalaupun harus mengumpulkan, pengawasan datang ke masing-masing bank yang bermitra dengan Western Union ataupun MoneyGram.

Ketiga, pemerintah mendapatkan tambahan setoran pajak. Estimasi BI, di Januari hingga Agustus 2011, pengiriman uang melalui Western Union mencapai Rp2 triliun, dari data remintansi Tenaga Kerja Indonesia (TKI). Saat ini kontribusi WU terhadap total pengiriamn uang lembaga non bank mencapai 60%. (*)

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Boku Accounts: PayPal's New Rival Lets You Pay Via Cellphone Wherever Credit Cards Are Accepted

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - PayPal, the online payments company owned by eBay Inc, just got a new rival in the race to develop a mobile payment service that can be used in physical stores.

Boku Inc, a big online mobile payments company backed by venture capital firms including Andreessen Horowitz and Benchmark Capital, unveiled a new service on Thursday that lets people pay with any mobile phone anywhere credit cards are accepted.

Boku already provides carrier billing through about 230 wireless carriers, including AT&T Inc, Vodafone Group Plc and Verizon Communications Inc in more than 60 countries. This service lets people pay with their mobile number and get the transactions charged to their monthly phone bill.

Carrier billing is typically limited to smaller online purchases, either through personal computers or within mobile phone apps.

Boku's new platform, called Boku Accounts, allows purchases in physical stores, a much bigger market. The service will be branded and offered by wireless carriers to customers, with Boku running the system in the background.

The move puts Boku in closer competition with PayPal, which is pushing its popular online payments service into physical stores. Google Inc is also trying to get its Google Wallet service into stores through a partnership with giants such as MasterCard Inc and Citigroup Inc.

PayPal's in-store offering works with merchants' existing point-of-sale terminals, but usually requires a software upgrade. Google Wallet works with phones that have Near-Field Communication, or NFC, chips in them and merchants need a terminal that supports this technology.

Boku's service comes with a sticker that users can slap on the back of their mobile phones, turning any handset into an NFC-enabled device. It also comes with a payment card that can be swiped using existing retailer terminals, without a software upgrade, according to the company.

"We wanted this to be available in any store," Ron Hirson, co-founder of Boku, said. "You don't need a new phone or a new terminal."

(Reporting By Alistair Barr; editing by Andre Grenon) 
Source:SMALL BUSINESS

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Bank bakal buka lowongan kerja besar-besaran

JAKARTA. Ada sanak saudara Anda yang belum bekerja atau bosan bekerja di tempat yang lama? Cobalah meniti karier di bank. Industri perbankan kini sedang membuka lowongan kerja besar-besaran untuk mengejar target bisnis tahun ini. Bank kelas kakap seperti Bank Mandiri, Bank BNI, Bank Rakyat Indonesia (BRI) dan Bank Central Asia (BCA) membutuhkan tambahan personil khusus untuk menyalurkan kredit.

Bank Mandiri misalnya, akan merekrut sekitar 5.050 karyawan baru sepanjang 2012 ini. Dari jumlah tersebut, sebanyak 83% akan ditempatkan di kegiatan inti dan sisanya pendukung usaha. "Sebagian besar tambahan pekerja untuk mengejar target kredit," kata Ogi Prastomiyono, Managing Director Compliance and Human Capital Bank Mandiri, Selasa, (10/1). Suplai tenaga baru di divisi commercial and business banking ini mengerek biaya pegawai sebesar 21%.

Bank Mandiri bukan satu-satunya. Survei Deutsche Bank for Indonesia yang dipublikasikan Senin (9/1) menyebutkan BCA, BRI dan BNI juga berencana merekrut karyawan dalam jumlah besar. Mayoritas untuk posisi marketing dan analis kredit.

Junaidi Hisom, Pemimpin Divisi Sumber Daya Manusia BNI mengatakan, penambahan tenaga kerja tergantung ekspansi bisnis dan jumlah pegawai yang pensiun atau habis masa kontraknya.

Bank BUMN ini akan menambah 2.000 orang tenaga kerja, terdiri dari 1.000 tenaga lulusan sarjana untuk petugas program pengembangan atau officer development program dan 1.000 lainnya di level asisten atau sales untuk mengisi unit baru dari masing-masing cabang di berbagai daerah.

Junaidi menjelaskan, BNI akan mendidik tenaga kerja lulusan baru selama satu tahun, sedangkan level asisten akan mendapatkan pendidikan kerja selama dua tahun, sebelum diangkat menjadi pengawai tetap.

Muhammad Ali, Sekretaris Perusahaan BRI mengatakan, tahun ini BRI akan menambah 9.000 karyawan untuk marketing. Kebutuhan karyawan baru seiring penambahan jumlah unit mikro BRI seperti Teras, penambahan cabang baru dan unit kerja.

Menurut Taimur Baig, Direktur dan Kepala Ekonom Deutsche Bank Indonesia, kenaikan jumlah tenaga kerja tersebut lantaran bank mampu meningkatkan rasio produktivitas, seperti pertumbuhan pinjaman, peningkatan penambahan modal bagi anak usaha. "Secara keseluruhan, karyawan bank besar seperti Mandiri, BNI, BCA dan BRI adalah tenaga kerja dengan bayaran tertinggi," ucapnya

sumber: http://www.kontan.co.id/

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Top 10 YouTube Tips for Small Businesses

Video can be a very powerful tool for businesses of any size, but YouTube‘s free-to-use model, ease of use and mass market audience means it’s a great channel for small businesses. However, like any tool, in order to get the most of it, it needs to be used well.

We’ve pulled together ten top tips to help you get the most out of YouTube. Rather than video production hints or content tips (there are tons of other resources that can help you on that front) here are the dos and don’ts of using YouTube from a behind-the-scenes perspective.

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1. Create and Customize Your Channel

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First things first, customizing your channel is well worth the time it will take to set it up. You should add your company’s branding, customize the colors to compliment your company’s look, and add relevant information and links. A channel setup also offers YouTube users the option to subscribe to your content via the click of one button and the option to search just your uploaded content. The channel structure also allows you to highlight just uploads, playlists, favorites or all.

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2. Add Subtitles

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Since March 2010 auto-captioning has been available to all YouTube users, so there’s no technical excuse not to. Doing so adds captions for the hundreds of millions of hearing impaired folk across the world, ensuring your content is accessible to anyone who’d like to watch it. It’s an easy enough process that uses voice recognition, the results of which can be (and frankly need to be) edited for accuracy.

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3. Don’t Overuse Annotations

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A recent “improvement” from YouTube is the ability to add comments that display over the top of the footage. Don’t be tempted to go down this route, the annotations look unprofessional, are a distraction to viewers and depending how overused they are, can be a downright annoyance. Sure, you want to grab people’s attention and make an immediate impression, but your video content and other info you’ve added to the site should be enough to not have to rely on extraneous text.

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4. Act To Remove Offensive Comments

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While you can’t stop trolls from adding nasty comments to your videos or channel, you have the power to delete offensive or spammy remarks from the worst offenders. Taking advantage of this option requires good judgment. It’s obviously not a great idea to instantly remove any negative or critical comments, especially relevant ones, but you can certainly remove any spam or comments that use offensive language. If challenged over the removal make a simple statement to the effect that such comments will not be tolerated. If you’re getting seriously spammed or abused by a particular person, you can also block that user, but this should be a last resort. There are also options open to you to moderate comments before they go live, so you can nip any nasties in the bud before they are posted.

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5. Engage With the YouTube Community

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Don’t be a YouTube island. After all, it’s a social platform, so be sure to check out other content on the site, favorite appropriate videos and make suitable YouTube “friends.” If you really can’t, or don’t want to associate your company with other companies or individuals, then think wider. Why not look at content or channels that cover your local area, or that are for a good cause that you/your company supports. As well as engaging with other users, be sure to keep up to date with YouTube’s own news. The site goes through some fairly major changes from time to time and adds new features on a regular basis, so it’s well worth following the official YouTube blog, at the very least, to be kept up to date with site and community news.

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6. Organize Your Content

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Be sure to organize your content to be viewer-friendly rather than just offer a linear stream of video uploads. Create playlists to group relevant videos together, or lump older content into time-related (March 2010, Spring 2010, etc) folders if that’s more relevant to your organization. Remember that YouTube offers users the option to embed entire playlists (in addition to individual videos) into external sites, so give the creation of them, their titles and description, some decent thought.

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7. Don’t Overlook Tags

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As with many other sites, YouTube’s content is organized on a tag word basis. It’s more than worth taking the time to add the correct tags to your videos. The beauty of a tag word system is that it works on the basis of logic, but also on the more-the-merrier principle as you can’t know what search terms people will use. Really try and brainstorm around the tags you’re adding. For example, if your company offers dog products add “puppy,” “pooch,” “mutt,” “hound,” etc, too. As far as categories go, YouTube offers around 15 to choose from. Obviously try to use the most relevant, but don’t be afraid to experiment if your content could fall into one or the other, but be sure to monitor how the different videos perform so you can make an educated decision about categories in the future.

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8. Promote Your YouTube Videos Elsewhere

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Don’t assume viewers will come to you, or automatically think to look you up on YouTube. Every time you post a video that’s relevant for general sharing, blog about it, tweet it or add it to your Facebook Page. The last two actions are easy through YouTube’s account settings that automatically publishes news of a new video if you’ve linked up the social services. While YouTube is due to retire its “Link to Blog” option from the account settings soon, it’s easy enough to embed the relevant video in a blog post using HTML and will help push users towards your video content. In addition, don’t shy away from allowing embedding of your videos on other sites — the more views the better.

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9. Use YouTube’s Free Analytics Tools

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YouTube offers every user free analytics data via the “Insight” button on every uploaded video. This free-to-view info should not be overlooked as it can offer you some valuable info on not only views stats, but demographics, community, and the most useful — “discovery” data — info on how users came across the video, including the popular links they followed to get there. The tools are there – be sure to use them.

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10. Don’t Neglect Your Channel

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There are so many neglected YouTube channels, even from social, or web 2.0 firms that you’d think would realize the value in an up-to-date video resource for their company. While we’re by no means advocating needlessly creating video content, if you’re looking to go down the YouTube route then don’t let your resolve or enthusiasm for the service dwindle a couple of months in. Even if you have no new content to post, still keep logging in to stay on top of comments, friend requests, add favorites, etc, so as not to relegate your channel to the ranks of the unloved.

Source: http://mashable.com/

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Business Plan Template

Preparing your business plan

It is crucial to have a realistic, working business plan when you’re starting up a business! A good business plan should help you to:

• Research and clarify the ideas you will already have about your business
• Focus your development efforts and spot potential pitfalls
• Structure the financial side of your business efficiently
• Present your ideas to another person (particularly helpful when trying to gain finance)
• Measure the progress of your business

You should also bear in mind that a business plan is a living document that will need updating and changing as your business grows. Regardless of whether you intend to use your plan internally, or as a document for external people, it should still take an objective and honest look at your business. Failing to do this could mean that you and others have unrealistic expectations of what can be achieved and when.

Tips for completing your business plan:

• Focus on what the reader needs to know
• Be realistic
• Make the plan professional
• Use charts if relevant
• Include a contents page

What your plan should include

Your business plan should provide details of how you are going to develop your business, when you are going to do it, who's going to play a part and how you will manage the money.

Clarity on these issues is particularly important if you're looking for finance or investment. The process of building your plan will also focus your mind on how your new business will need to operate to give it the best chance of success.

Your plan should include:

• An executive summary - this is an overview of the business you want to start. It's vital. Many lenders and investors make judgments about your business based on this section of the plan alone. 
• A short description of the business and its history - who you are, what you plan to sell or offer, goals of the company.

·         Markets and Competition - define your market, your position and outline who your competitors are. In order to do this you should refer to any market research you have carried out.

• Your marketing and sales strategy - why you think people will buy what you want to sell and how you plan to sell to them.
• Your management team and personnel - your credentials and the people you plan to recruit to work with you.
• Your operations - your premises, production facilities, your management information systems and IT.
• Financial forecasts - this section translates everything you have said in the previous sections into numbers.
• Presenting your plan – you must know how to effectively present your plan so it makes the maximum impact on the reader.

Writing your business plan

Section 1 - Executive Summary

 

You may find it easier to complete this section last. It should contain a summary of the key points of your business plan and why you are confident your business will succeed. Some of the areas you might want to think about including are:

·         What the business is.

·         Who the key people are and what skills and experience they have.

·         Why you think it will be successful.

·         What product or service your business will be selling, and what your Unique Selling Point (USP) is.

·         Some brief detail of the projected financial performance of the business and how it will be financed.

In particular, explain your aims, objectives and eventual aspirations. It should be concise - no longer than two pages at most - and interesting!

Section 2 - Your business, its products and services

This part of the plan sets out your vision for your new business and includes who you are, what you do, what you have to offer and the market you want to address.

Start with an overview of your business:

• when you started or intend to start trading and the progress you have

    made to date

• the type of business and the sector it is in
• any relevant history - for example, if you acquired the business, who

    owned it originally and what they achieved with it

• the current legal structure
• your vision for the future

Then describe your products or services as simply as possible, defining:

• what makes it different
• what benefits it offers
• why customers would buy it
• how you plan to develop your products or services
• whether you hold any patents, trademarks or design rights
• the key features of your industry or sector
• price

Remember that the person reading the plan may not understand your business and its products, services or processes as well as you do, so try to avoid jargon. It's a good idea to get someone who isn't involved in the business - a friend or family member perhaps - to read this section of your plan and make sure they can understand it.

Find out more about Intellectual Property rights in the legal issues section.

 

Section 3 - Your markets and competitors

 

It is vital to understand the environment in which the business is operating. This section will familiarise the reader with a description of the industry, its size, history (five years), a forecast (next five years), the major business applications and the customers (manufacturers, institutions, governments, consumers, other)

1.   Define the market segment in which you will be selling

• How large is each market segment?
• What is your market share?
• What are the most important trends? (and why)
• What are the key drivers affecting each segment?

2.   Existing customers

• Do they fit the profile of your chosen market segment?
• Is there a heavy concentration of sales around one or two large customers?

3.   Outline the competition

• What are the competing products or services and who supplies them?
• Why will customers buy your product or service instead of theirs?

Find out more info on how to research your market and competitors in the know your market section.

Section 4 - Marketing and Sales

This section should describe the specific activities you intend to use to promote and sell your products and services.  A strong sales and marketing section means you have a clear idea of how you will get your products and services to market.

In this section of the plan you should usually address these five questions:

1.   Where do you position your product or service in the market place?

·         USP!

2.   What is your pricing policy?

·         How sensitive are your products?

·         Is there scope to increase margins or sales (look at each segment)

·         How much will you charge for different customer segments?

3.   How do you promote your product or service? (eg: direct marketing, advertising, PR)

·         Cover all  market segments considering the best method for each.

·         Which method of promotion are you focusing on and why?

4.   Through what channels do you reach your end user?

·         Compare your current channels with alternatives

·         How do these compare with your competitors?

·         Look at the positive and negative trends in your chosen distribution channels.

5.   How do you do your selling?

·         Identify which methods of selling are the most effective four you segment

·         Analyse the cost efficiency of each selling method

See the sales and marketing section to find out which methods best suit your business.

Section 5 - Management and personnel

Your business plan needs to set out the structure and key skills of both your management team and your staff. It should identify the strengths in your team and your plans to deal with any obvious weaknesses.

1.   Management

·         Set out structure/roles and key skills

·         Identify weaknesses and what your plans are to cover this

2.   Staff

·         Will there be any employees?

·         Analyse the current workforce in terms of total numbers & department

·         Compare efficiency ratios with competitors

·         Benefits to employees

·         Explain any plans to improve or maintain motivation

·         Note any plans to expand your workforce

Things to consider when taking on staff and how to improve their performance are listed in the business planning section.

Section 6 - Operations

Give a description of the processes the business will go through and how will it operate?  It helps to break these processes down into steps.  Consider all activities not just the buying and selling processes

1.   Premises

·         What premises does the business currently have?

·         Are there any commitments to these premises?

·         What are the advantages/disadvantages of the location?

·         Do you have any plans to move or expand premises?

2.   Production facilities (equipment)

·         Do you need your own production facilities or would it be cheaper to outsource any manufacturing processes?

·         If you do have your own facilities, how modern are they?

·         What is the capacity compared with existing and forecasted demand?

·         Will any investment be needed?

3.   Management information systems

·         Do you have established procedures for stock control, management accounts and quality control?

·         Are they reliable?

·         Can these cope with expansion?

4.   Information Technology

·         What is currently in place?

·         What are the strengths and weaknesses of this?

·         Outline the reliability and planned development of your systems

 

Section 7 - Financial Forecasts

 

As part of your plan you will need to provide a set of financial projections which translate what you've said about your business into numbers. 

 

What your forecasts should include

·         Cash flow statements - your cash balance and monthly cash flow patterns for at least the first 12 to 18 months. The aim is to show that your business will have enough working capital to survive so make sure you have considered the key factors such as the timing of sales and salaries. 

·          Profit and loss forecast - a statement of the trading position of the business: the level of profit you expect to make, given your projected sales and the costs of providing goods and services and your overheads. 

·         Sales forecast - the amount of money you expect to raise from sales

More information on these forecasts along with examples are included in the finance section.

 

Section 8 - Presenting Your Plan

 

To make sure your business plan has maximum impact, there are a number of points to observe.

Keep the plan short - it's more likely to be read if it's a manageable length. Think about the presentation and keep it professional - even if you only intend to use the plan in-house. Remember, a well presented plan will reinforce the positive impression you want to create of your business.

Tips for financial success:

1.   Learnt to control your finances

2.   Make sure your bookkeeping is done frequently

3.   Choose an accountant you feel comfortable with

4.   Write down your financial procedures and controls

5.   Choose a bank manager you can relate to (develop a relationship)

6.   Never borrow money you cannot afford to pay back

7.   Keep it legal

8.   Be realistic

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