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As a small business owner, you don’t have the luxury of a company-sponsored retirement plan unless you create it for yourself. In some cases, it may not even be possible to predict your income from one month to the next.
Regardless of your financial status, however, it’s important that you start saving for your retirement. Those days will be here before you know it, and you want to be sure that when you’re ready to retire, you’ll still be able to live the lifestyle you want.
You’ve spent a lot of time and effort building your business. Now, put a little effort into building it into a company that doesn’t require your presence every day. In this way, your business can continue to provide income throughout your retirement.
In the early days of your business, you may only be able to make small contributions to your retirement account. Those small amounts, however, add up over time. The sooner you start contributing to your retirement account, the sooner you’ll have the funds you need to retire comfortably.
What’s your retirement goal—that is, how much money do you need to have set aside in order to retire comfortably? When you know the amount, you can start creating a retirement plan.
How much do you need to contribute to your retirement account and when? How will your retirement contributions increase according to the plan you’ve chosen? Without a clearly-developed plan, you may find yourself struggling as you near your retirement years.
By developing solid retirement goals and creating a plan to get there, you can shape your retirement lifestyle now.
Many entrepreneurs have seen their retirement plans fail to grow the way they hoped—or worse, they’ve seen them disappear altogether. By diversifying your retirement plan, you’ll create a more effective safety net that will help provide for you and your spouse when you’re ready to retire.
Examine the benefits of the various types of IRA and 401(k) plans. Consider the risk level you’re comfortable with. If needed, consult with a financial adviser to help you create a solid retirement savings plan.
As a small business owner, your income may fluctuate on a regular basis. It’s tempting to live large when your income is high, assuming that you’ll just scale down during the lean seasons.
Unfortunately, this can lead to skimping on your retirement contributions—and in many cases, that means effectively stealing from your own future. Instead, learn to live below your means and put the rest in savings. This might include:
Savvy small business owners know that it’s critical to have a savings-focused attitude if they want to keep growing their business long-term and preparing for retirement. While you’re making plans for the future, make sure you’ve prepared your business, your family, and your employees for the possibility of disaster.
So, you’re finally ready to start the small business you’ve always dreamed of, or perhaps you’re hoping to expand your existing business. Either way, in order to get going, you’re probably going to need to secure a small business loan.
Here are some questions to ask yourself before applying for a loan. They will ensure that you’re able to set your finances up securely and get the loan paid back in a timely manner.
Before you head to the bank, make sure you understand why you need additional capital. What’s the purpose of the loan? What will you be using the money to accomplish?
Whether you need to fund startup equipment or you need that capital to afford the first couple of months’ rent and advertising costs, make sure those funds have a designated plan. Not only will you need to share that information with your lender, it will help you borrow only the funds you need, rather than going deeper into debt than necessary.
In some cases, you might need to secure a small business loan quickly. A new client, for example, could require you to acquire capital fast in order to meet production needs.
Make sure you have a good idea of the loan timeline that will work for you before you start looking for lenders. This will ensure that you aren’t trapped waiting for the bank when everything else is ready to move forward—and that you don’t miss out on potential business due to poor timing.
Don’t look at the loan just in terms of how much you’re taking out. You’ll also need to consider the interest you’ll be paying on it, which can be substantial over the loan’s lifetime. Take a close look at the total cost of the loan, what payments you’ll need to make on it, and how long it will take you to pay it back.
You have every intention of paying the loan back. Unfortunately, good intentions don’t always make the universe swing in your favor. Make sure that you talk with potential lenders to fully understand the consequences of defaulting on the loan so that if the unexpected does happen, you’ll be prepared.
Sometimes, instead of things going exactly the opposite way you anticipated for your small business, they go even better! Perhaps you’d like to pay your loan off early, while you have the capital. That will be one huge weight off your mind!
Unfortunately, some loans include a penalty for early repayment. Make sure that you know going in what to expect if you need or want to pay your loan off early.
Depending on your industry, you may have to look for a lender who will cover your business. Even if you approach a bank that is known for approving loans relatively easily, it’s still important to be sure that they understand the unique needs of your business to get the type of loan that’s best for you. Don’t be afraid to meet with several lenders to ensure that you secure the best loan possible for your small business.
Securing a loan for your small business is often a big step. You’re ready to branch out, start something new, or do something bigger than usual. Make sure that you have the capital to do it!
In many cases, you will need to present a full business plan in order to sway lenders in your favor. Download our free small business plan checklist to help organize that vital information!
E-commerce is booming, with nearly 1.6 billion online shoppers making purchases in 2016 alone. For most traditional brick-and-mortar stores to survive these days, a complementary e-commerce site is often a necessity. It is also not unheard of for e-commerce sites to become so successful, they can expand to a physical location.
But are the business insurance needs the same online as they are for a physical location?
For retailers both online and on the ground, here’s what you need to know about insuring your company.
There is an array of risks attached to having a physical location that is open to the public for browsing and shopping. But insurance protection is not just for a retailer’s clientele—a policy also provides coverage for employees, vendors, or service providers when they are on-site.
In addition, insurance can provide certain protections for the business owner’s investment in stock, fixtures, equipment, and even structural elements of a site’s building.
General liability insurance coverage, also called comprehensive commercial liability, covers it all: bodily injury, physical injury, property damage, and theft. Even if a retailer engaged in business-to-business activities experiences an accident at a client’s site, they can rest easy knowing that they are covered.
Retailers also need protection from fraudulent claims—for example, the old slip-and-fall scam. To understand just how important insurance is for your store, consider all the things that can go wrong:
So, if you’ve been thinking you can’t afford general liability insurance for your business, the reality is that you can’t afford NOT to be covered.
But what about your e-commerce site?
Retailers who conduct business online may think that business insurance is not a necessary expense. After all, a virtual store means that no one can get injured at your place of business.
Or can they?
Cyber injury is a very real risk online retailers expose their customers to, as well as themselves. Loss of important personal and financial data, such as credit card information, is a cyber injury that has the potential to affect a person for a lifetime.
Cyber liability insurance provides retailers with the protection they need should they experience a data breach. The cost to resolve the fallout of breach can really add up. Not only will the business owner need to invest time and money to clean up the problems caused by the breach, they could also be responsible for certain fines and penalties attached to the failure to properly regulate the personal data of the customers.
Here’s how cyber liability insurance can protect your e-commerce business:
Cyber liability insurance is designed for the unique risks that arise for e-commerce businesses. Even if a retailer has general liability insurance for their brick-and-mortar store, they need the specific protection provided by cyber liability insurance to protect their digital store.
Once a retailer recognizes how important it is to protect their physical store as well as their virtual store, the next question is usually related to how much coverage they need. There is no one-size-fits-all policy. Every business is different.
How, then, does a business owner know if they have adequate protection, too little, or too much?
A policy should be tailored to protect a company’s particular risks. Knowing the right questions and numbers will help a business owner determine what their coverage needs are.
Security is fundamental for business success. Knowing that your company is protected on the ground and in cyberspace empowers you to continue moving forward—even if the worst happens!
Hiring your first employee is a major milestone in the life of a small business owner. It’s a great feeling to move up in the world! You might have spent your first several months or years working out of a spare room in your home, or found yourself sitting in an office all by yourself with no one to bounce ideas off of or motivate you when things got difficult.
Now, it’s time to hire your first employee!
There are, however, several things you need to know before you bring that them on board.
Your EIN, or Employer Identification Number, is necessary for reporting taxes, contacting the government about your employees, and more.
Hiring an employee means that you’re going to have to juggle taxes. Make sure you know what you’re responsible for paying and what your employee is responsible for paying, then put a plan in place to deal with regular payments.
Once you hire an employee, you need to be sure that you have worker’s compensation insurance. Even the safest desk job can have hazards, and the last thing you want is to destroy your business because your new secretary slipped and fell in the bathroom! Make sure you have worker’s compensation and general liability insurance that will protect both you and your employees.
When you have employees, you’ll need to contact the state’s labor department so that you can make unemployment compensation payments that will offer short-term benefits to individuals who need help getting back on their feet after a job loss.
Your state’s new hire reporting keeps track of all employees who work for you (and anyone else). As you bring employees on board, make sure you register them with the state’s new hire reporting board. Most states and industries require this to take place within 20 days of hiring.
There are several federal guidelines listing what information must be posted in your business for your employees. This may include workers’ rights, specific safety information, and more, depending on your industry. Visit the Department of Labor website to learn more about the information you need to have posted for employees in your business.
If you’ve never had an employee before, you may not have policies yet! While your policies will probably be a work in progress for a little while, make sure you have policies that cover everything from excessive tardiness to specific procedures for dealing with customers or specific tasks throughout the day. This practice can help ensure that employees know what’s expected of them, as well as giving you something to refer back to if you have problems with an employee.
As a small business owner, you likely can’t afford to provide the types of employee benefits many large businesses can. You can, however, choose benefits that are more likely to attract quality employees. These include, but are not limited to:
It’s important to have a good idea of the benefits you can offer potential employees before you begin the hiring process. While they may be adapted over time as your business grows, your first set of employees will want to know what you can offer them before they agree to work for you.
As a small business owner, you already have plenty to worry about when it comes to insuring and protecting your company. Unfortunately, for many, this comes at the expense of handling personal responsibilities and coverages, including life insurance.
You may find yourself wondering, “Do I really need life insurance? Is that a necessary expense at this point in my life?” Or you might simply be putting it off, choosing to avoid thinking about it until you’re a little older, more settled, or better prepared.
Of course, you can’t predict the future—nor can you control it. Anything can happen, so it’s always better to cover your bases early than be unpleasantly surprised down the line.
Before you put off purchasing life insurance, consider the following points to determine whether or not it might be a valuable coverage for you and your family to invest in now.
If you have dependents who rely on you to provide for them financially, then the answer to the question, “When is the right time to purchase life insurance?” is now!
Consider this:
Is the income from your small business the primary way that you pay the bills each month? If you have a spouse who doesn’t work or who only works part-time, how would your family cover the bills if something happened to you and you were no longer able to work?
Maybe your spouse has a better job than you do—a common trait among small business owners who are just getting their businesses off the ground. Still, chances are, you contribute quite a bit to the household income, and your spouse and children will need time to adapt and learn how to cover those important expenses in the event of your death.
Are you responsible for picking the kids up from school every day, thanks to a more flexible schedule than your spouse? Do you take care of the yard—something that your spouse would have to hire someone to do if you weren’t around to take care of it? Carefully consider the additional expenses your family would face if you were no longer around to help provide for them, then make sure that you have a life insurance policy that will cover it.
You don’t like to think about the idea of leaving your spouse and kids behind. Choosing the right life insurance plan, however, can ensure that they’re provided for even in the event of your death—and that means financial security.
Many people don’t start thinking about life insurance policies until they’re older. They imagine that they have all the time in the world to worry about it—and in many cases, they do.
Securing life insurance as a younger individual, however, is often easier and less expensive than securing the same policy in your late forties or fifties.
In general, the younger you are when you take out your life insurance policy, the less expensive it will be. You may only have to pay a few dollars a month in your thirties, but those premiums will increase significantly as you age.
Taking out a life insurance policy is the one type of insurance that isn’t just protection for you or your business. It’s protection for the people that you’ll leave behind.
As a small business owner, we’re sure you’d love it if all your employees got along all the time.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t always work that way!
When you find yourself dealing with employee conflict, sometimes mediation is in order. These strategies will help you constructively resolve conflict in your workplace.
It’s not necessary to mediate issues every single time a couple of your employees have a minor squabble. The day-to-day tensions of working together will typically ebb and flow over time, and you don’t have to step in for fleeting disagreements that everyone will soon move past.
On the other hand, long-term conflict needs to be dealt with quickly and effectively in order to come to a resolution and create a more peaceful working environment for everyone.
If there’s a true conflict in your workplace, it’s usually not just about the two people who are battling. Everyone who has to work with the two of them on a daily basis is impacted by the stress of the conflict.
In looking for a resolution, it may be useful to involve other parties in your workplace—both to help come up with a resolution that works for everyone and to take steps to avoid similar conflicts in the future.
If possible, avoid meeting with the two antagonists separately. Instead, bring them together and give them each the opportunity to speak. Don’t try to jump in yourself, and don’t allow them to interrupt one another.
Instead, take the time to listen to what they have to say, increasing your understanding of the whole situation before you interrupt. Try to get the whole story before you start trying to resolve it.
There are at least three sides to every conflict: what party #1 has to say about it, what party #2 has to say about it, and the truth, which generally falls somewhere in the middle.
That’s not to say that your employees will necessarily lie or exaggerate in order to make their side sound better, but they will automatically view the conflict through the lens of their own experience and their emotions about it. As a result, there may be overreactions and assumptions that don’t necessarily fall in line with the facts.
Do your best to check the facts of the conflict with an outside source. Is one employee always late to work, leaving the second to scramble to cover their duties until they get there? Does one employee take too-long breaks or fail to meet important deadlines? Make sure you have documentation for as many complaints as possible.
By the time conflict increases to the point that you feel the need to step in, all parties are pretty emotional about it. It’s essential, however, that you avoid letting emotion guide your decision-making process. Once you’ve taken the time to check the facts, make sure you use them to come to a resolution based on company policies and the type of workplace environment you want to work in every day. Don’t be swayed by one employee’s emotion over another’s!
When you take the time to fully understand the conflict, check your facts, and listen to each employee, you’ll get a better idea of what’s needed to resolve the situation. Don’t be afraid to get creative with your conflict resolution solutions! Many times, what the situation needs most is an unbiased outside perspective.
A new study has found that boxed macaroni and cheese contains a hazardous chemical causing birth defects. It can also be harmful to young children.
The study discovered phthalates in macaroni and cheese products that contain powdered cheese. It points out that although the presence of phthalates is unintentional, the envelope of powdered cheese flavoring has a high concentration of the chemical, which is believed to migrate into food through contact with the plastic equipment and packaging.
Exposure to phthalates in pregnant women appears to block production of testosterone in the developing male fetus, raising the risk of malformed reproductive organs as well as infertility, low sperm counts, and a heightened risk of testicular cancer, according to a July 12 New York Times article on the study. Exposure to phthalates in early childhood can cause aggression, hyperactivity, and cognitive delays, the Times article said.
Even though the risk of birth defects related to phthalates is known, establishing a link between illness and consumption of a particular product could be difficult. The most difficult part of the legal claim is establishing “causation.”
In the legal world, “causation” has two elements:
Factual cause is “but for” test. This means that “but for” the conduct of the wrongdoer, the injury would not have happened. In plain terms, this asks that if the wrongdoer had done nothing, would the injury still have occurred? If the answer is yes (the injury would have occurred anyway), then there is no factual causation.
Proximate cause is a little trickier. Even if we have factual causation, in some cases, the law decides that a person is not liable. For example: “But for the defendant’s grandmother being born, the defendant would not have committed the crime.” Clearly, we don’t hold grandmothers accountable for the crimes of their grandchildren.
The best way to describe proximate cause is in terms of foreseeability. If the defendant should have foreseen that his conduct would cause injury, then he is said to have proximately caused the injury.
In the case of chemicals in mac and cheese products, it might be difficult to establish that the manufacturer should have known its packaging and equipment would cause contamination.
Since this story came out, there have been talks of establishing a class-action lawsuit. This may be a viable option, especially if long-term medical monitoring is involved. A large class of consumers may also put more pressure on the manufacturers to address the issue.
If you suspect your child developed medical conditions or birth defects due to a toxic chemical, contact an attorney in your area to discuss your situation.
Michael Levenson has extensive experience working for insurance companies and in the health care field. Prior to joining InsureYourCompany.com, Michael was an attorney with one of the largest insurance defense firms in the country where he specialized in health care law and previously served as the judicial law clerk to a judge presiding in the New Jersey State Superior Court.
Mr. Levenson earned his Juris Doctor degree from Albany Law School with honors. While in law school, he served as a Constitutional Law Teaching Fellow and worked at Albany Law School’s Civil Rights and Disabilities Law Clinic, where he dealt with a myriad of health care law issues.
‘What Happens When…’ is a video series in which we’ll talk about the most common insurance scenarios and how to get the most out of your coverage! Watch the whole series and more videos about insurance on YouTube!
You might recall a popular pizza chain that had what they thought was a genius marketing campaign some years back. If your delivery didn’t arrive within 30 minutes, your pizza was free!
This gimmick was great for the customer, but not so great for the pizza chain when they realized that this hurried delivery expectation made their drivers drive recklessly. In the end, they were sued for $78 million as a result of an accident with a delivery driver—something they could have avoided without the gimmick.
For many small business owners, there are no speedy-delivery promises to worry about, but it’s not uncommon for employees to run errands and conduct business using their own vehicles. Without hired and non-owned auto insurance, the employer takes on a lot of risk. If one of those employees got into an accident on company time, everyone involved could get sued—even the employer.
Watch our latest installment of What Happens When above to learn more!
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