People who have their own business often want a car that will work for them as a business and a home vehicle as well.

The choice of vehicle you have for work depends on what kind of business you’re in, whether you have stock to move around, whether you do a lot of miles or need to take colleagues with you to meetings and events.

One of the best shapes for an all-rounder kind of vehicle is the traditional estate car. They have bags of boot space, and often come with fold down rear seats so you can transport awkward shaped objects when necessary. Yet they also double up perfectly as a car you could take your family on holiday in – plenty of space for everyone and the luggage.

Honda’s Accord Tourer is one such example. Yet, unlike the older estate cars, the Accord Tourer is a comfortable and refined vehicle to drive.

It comes in seven different models, with petrol or diesel engines. Honda has a full range of hybrids, but the Accord Tourer is not one of them. In fact, there are very few hybrid estate cars on the market, though Volvo has a concept one and the Peugeot 508 RXH has been launched as a limited edition this year.

The Accord Tourer’s fuel economy is pretty respectable for an estate car, and the ride is extremely quiet and smooth, whether the car is filled to capacity or travelling empty. The boot space can accommodate 477 litres of cargo, and comes with a cargo net to hold things in place and a hidden compartment for valuables. The rear seats split so that you can still carry a passenger at the same time as using the majority of the boot space.

Safety is a key feature in the Accord Tourer and the Advanced Driver Assistance System has cruise control and lane assist.

If your business means that you travel a lot of miles and have people or cargo to take with you, you’ll appreciate the comfort and drive quality offered by the Honda Accord Tourer.

If you have a conference to organise – no matter how big or small – do you manage to think outside the box, to employ a cliché for a moment?

Few people do. Most conference venues tend to be a little clichéd themselves as they’re, … well …, conference venues; i.e. specially built conference centres or hotels which market themselves as such.

And there’s nothing wrong with that in many ways. If the basic function of the conference is to impart and share information amongst people in a related field of industry and there’s no great need for any creativity, then such “normal” venues for hire will do the job very professionally. The fact that the venues and their staff are well-versed in conference organisation is often a great advantage; they’re very well used to dealing with all the little things that can go wrong with conference organisation.

But if your conference is a one-off, or is really more about creatively marketing your organisation, or reaching new audiences etc., then it may well be a good idea to think outside the conventional conference box a little.

For example, how about hiring out a cinema for a really high impact presentation? Cineworld is one company well-versed in doing exactly that.

Alternatively – how about trying to hire a well-known landmark, or a school hall to help fund a school, or a charity’s building for the same effect – and maybe even a partnership with that charity to lend greater note of altruism to your event if that’s your desired intent?

And talking about “in-tent”– does your conference really need to be indoors? These days, outdoor marquee hire specialist can set up pretty much anywhere with a variety of sized marquees to fit your requirements.

Overall, it may well pay you to think laterally.

Hybrid cars used to be a rare sight on the road. They were first introduced in the 1990s in Japan and the States and only made it to the UK after the millennium. However, there are many different models now available and it seems that each major car manufacturer is developing their range to include more and more hybrid cars.

Whether you’re looking for a hatchback, a saloon car or a minivan, you can find a hybrid version somewhere.

And, more recently, there has been the introduction of more plug-in hybrids, which burn even less fuel and therefore produce lower tailpipe CO2 emissions.

The principle design is still the same. Hybrid cars have two sources of power – a small internal combustion engine which runs on diesel or petrol and an electric motor that is powered by its own battery. This battery is recharged as the car moves along through a process called regenerative braking. As kinetic energy is displaced during braking, this is captured and stored in the electric motor’s battery for later use.

With a plug-in hybrid (PHEV), the electric motor can provide more power thanks to its more powerful battery that can also be recharged via a mains socket outlet. The hybrid batteries have become more sophisticated over the years, offering more power and a longer range distance before they need recharging. Recharge times have also been reduced.

Drivers of PHEVs can also take advantage of the increased infrastructure for EV charging points that are gradually appearing throughout nations. Another development is that instead of charging your battery, the development of battery swap stations has been predicted, where you can swap your depleted battery for a fully charged one, thus avoiding the need to wait for a recharge.

The manufacturers with PHEVs already on the road include Toyota, with the plug-in Prius, and Chevrolet with the Chevvy Volt. At the beginning of this year, Honda announced the launch of its first plug-in hybrid – with the new 2013 Accord range including a plug-in hybrid. This will have three driving modes – all-electric, gasoline-electric and direct drive. The Accord’s all-electric range will be around 18 miles, covering the majority of commuter journeys which are under 20 miles on average.

The plug-in hybrid seems to offer the best of both worlds to a driver. They can commute on electric-only power, yet have the flexibility to do distance driving whenever they want to, thanks to the combination of the electric motor and the internal combustion engine. Great solution for a company car!

The IR35 is a legislation which affects all contractors and freelancers and even the self-employed. Should you be in one of the above categories you might benefit from the following information and advice.

If you do not meet HMRC’s definition of self-employment then you must obey the IR35 rules, which means you are eligible to pay more tax resulting in a decrease of your profits and that you will have to pay National Insurance.

Also, you will not be able to claim all your expenses which you would normally claim if you were self-employed. You can still claim Section 198 expenses and additional expenses:

• Pension payments – either personal or executive schemes

• Business travel – incurred in the course of business duties including gas
• Subsistence – accommodation, meals when away from home
• Professional Indemnity cover
• Benefits in kind – such as private medical insurance

To ensure you know exactly whether your contracting work falls inside or outside the IR35 you should contact a specialist. There are plenty of professionals out there that can offer you an IR35 guide and give the advice relevant to your situation. It’s always better to be safe than sorry.

If you do not get specialist advice then you may find yourself as the subject of an IR35 investigation or worse. The way HMRC decides who’s affairs to look into is at random. They will draw one name out of 1,000 and then verify their IR35 status. So anyone can be selected including you.

Should you be selected, experts at Her Majesty;s Revenues and Customs will look at all your tax returns and decide whether you fall into the IR35 or not. If you do then you will be the subject of an investigation.

If this is the case then do not panic, you cannot get into trouble if your affairs are in order. If, however, you haven’t been completely honest about your earnings you might get into serious trouble.

Have you ever noticed how sometimes, the better organised and more professionally organised a major meeting is – the less friendly and relaxed it also seems to be?

And the problem with such terribly professionally organised meetings is that they don’t truly put people at their ease – so they don’t encourage candour. And surely, the objective of any meeting is to encourage people to speak with as much honesty, openness and integrity as they’re able to?

So if this is true – then it also follows that many of the best-organised meetings and conferences are actually failing in their primary goal courtesy of that professional organisation and polish?

The same can be said of corporate entertainment. Sometimes, it’s done very well, but on the whole it isn’t. It’s almost always done with too high a finish and ends up feeling a little sleazy.

Now if you don’t feel this way about such events and never have then relax, enjoy – and read no further.

But I strongly suspect that most of us have had this slight feeling of unease about corporate events from time to time. And if that is the case – then the ones that most of us would welcome would be far more informal gatherings out of our professional modes as far as convention can allow. At the end of the day we all share a common homo-sapiens heritage so we must all feel broadly the same about such issues.

There are countless psychosocial experiments that have been carried out which prove how keen we human beings are to conform to groupthink. Interestingly enough, psychologists have also proved that this desire remains strong even when we know the group to be wrong! We even go so far as to physically see dimensions differently (according to brain scans) – so strong is our desire to conform to what we think the group thinks.

So it is with meetings, conference venues and the like. What we all secretly want is a completely relaxed atmosphere that enables us to be ourselves and to talk with complete candour – safe in the knowledge that whatever we say will be treated with confidence and respect and kept within the confines of the “perfect” meeting.

But what we all actually get are suits, ties, formal dresses, uncomfortable tea and coffee breaks, name tags and awkwardly stilted conversations whereby not a single one of us feels comfortable stepping outside the accepted confines of group behaviour. This is getting us all nowhere and needs to change for the better.

So next time it’s your turn to organise a conference or major meeting – do things differently by venue, dress code, location, catering and request a “four walls” confidentiality policy. Also – organise a few creative exercises designed to put people at their ease and encourage them to be themselves for the duration. Ironically, this may necessitate making people feel a little uncomfortable to begin with – but challenging our professional fears in a gentle way – and encouraging attendees to face and overcome them is the key to success. Try and get people to break out of their professional roles a little. Good luck

Do you hedge your currency exposure?

If you run a small business and you think it would be wise to reduce your currency risk – thus removing the uncertainty from future currency transactions, there are several tools you can use to help you achieve your goals.

First off, a good currency broker should be able to assist you in various ways including hedging, the placing of stop-loss orders and organizing forward currency exchange contracts. All these policies can help reduce a company’s exposure to foreign exchange risk. So if you’re an importer, an exporter or a bit of both, these may well be sensible actions to take.

We’ve all seen just what kind of shifts the international currency markets are capable of in recent times. These may well work in your favour, but if you’re a business person rather than a gambler, you really want to put policies in place to minimize your exposure.

A currency hedge is a financial tool usually called a “derivative” in that it derives its value from an underlying asset. Most commonly, the types of hedging strategies used for currency exchange are options and forwards; an option allows you to set the exchange rate at which you want to carry out your currency transaction t today’s prices.

A forward contract, on the other hand, allows you to agree on a specific exchange rate for a future date.

You will never be able to completely remove the risks of foreign exchange fluctuations, but by speaking to expert Forex traders and telling them exactly what you want to achieve to minimize the downside risk – the right adviser should be able to help you do just that.

Of course, there is a downside. The exchanges may move against you – and against your hedge. But the whole principle of a hedge is that you cannot completely win outright – but nor can you lose. To run any form of international business without a hedge is really akin to gambling.

Written by David, a keen financial blogger, who writes about topics ranging from currency trading to insolvency issues.

Are you really clear about your business goals? Why did you go into business in the first place? Was it to do something you love, to gain your independence, or simply to make as much money as you possibly could?

Whatever the reason, it’s always important not to lose sight of your business goals. Your goals will probably change over time, but remember not to keep doing your business for its own sake if you’re no longer in it for the right reasons; life’s simply too short.

This may sound like obvious advice, but how many people do you see who went into  business for reason X, but are staying in the game for completely different reasons – or maybe even a simple lack of imagination and lateral thought?

If this is you – it may well be time to re-evaluate.

I remember seeing a cartoon strip a few years ago about a business owner who loved design at school, but hated maths, so went into business as a designer. And as his business became a raging success and he employed other designers to help him, he gradually came to concentrate ever more on running the business by doing – you’ve guessed it – maths in the accountancy functions and business projections etc. So his life had come full circle and he was making a living doing what he’d sought to avoid.

Many of us make this mistake in one form or another. You often see people who ostensibly set out to make money, and who have made more than they could ever reasonably need, but who then carry on aggressively trying to make more and more. This may be OK if they really love the work and the process– but otherwise it’s pure folly; a kind of ultimate madness or folly if you like, that many of us suffer from.

So don’t fall into the trap – do what you love and if you can make a living doing so – be happy!

This article was written by financial blogger David. He will pretty much cover every subject, from the trend of the UK Payday loan to student finance issues.

In this climate of financial insecurity and redundancies many people are thinking about working for themselves. This can be a hugely rewarding experience both for fiscal reasons and work life balance but you need to start any venture with your eyes wide open. Here is a list of the top ten things to ask yourself if you’re thinking of starting your own business to help you decide if it is a good idea or should be destroyed in the office shredders:

1. What is your product or service going to be? Who else is doing it and how does your offering stack up against the competition?

2. What is your market place? Who are you going to sell to and are people going to be interested?

3. What is your business plan, including any plans for growth and expansion?
4. What are you going to charge and is this rate competitive and will it give you the profit you need for the company to be viable?

5. Are you going to open a shop or office or operate from your home address? If you are working from home have you got the workspace you need?

6. Do you have all the required equipment from UK shredders to telephones, a van perhaps or even warehouse storage?

7. Do you have any capital to fund the venture or do you need to borrow money? How will this affect you?

8. How much money do you need to earn to support your family and is this realistically represented in your business plan?

9. How are you going to advertise, market and communicate about your business to potential customers and business users?

10. How will you measure success or failure? How long are you going to give yourself to decide if the business is worthwhile and what is your exit strategy?

If you have international business interest which include mainland Europe, you’ll probably know only too well how unsettling the Eurozone crisis has been for everyone.

Now, news that the UK is the only EC member state not to have backed the tax and budget multi-country EC pact to tackle the Eurozone debt crisis is even more unsettling – regardless of whether or not it’s the right decision to have made. All the 17 countries that use the euro have so far agreed to the deal.

Businesses hate uncertainty. They can deal with bad situations effectively – but they don’t like not knowing what the plan is, exactly, regardless of whether the business leaders actually agree with the strategies or not.

So when business people are trying to make decisions during a time of uncertainty, the logical decision is to defer decisions and to put off any major purchase decisions that don’t really have to be made right this minute.

The knock-on effect of these entirely logical decisions can be disastrous for small businesses involved in international trade.

There are ways in which you can fight back, though. International currency hedging through trading foreign exchange markets, or “Forex”, for example may be very logical if you need to take the fear out of any major seismic currency shifts whose potential you may be over exposed to.

Similarly, gold trading may be a very logical decision for you to take. Gold is traditionally seen as a safe haven in troubled times – which is why its price has risen so sharply of late. If you feel you’re under exposed or maybe even over exposed to gold, then trading in gold futures, for example, enables you to hedge against any pending disasters.

Thinking laterally about the future is key; recent events have shown us that pretty much anything is possible.

This article was written by David – a keen financial blogger. He often tries his hand at gold trading, keeping up to date with the latest news online to help him out.

One of the most important things you can do for your own business is to get good antivirus software for your computers.

If you’ve recently left a bigger business to start up on your own, something that may not have occurred to you is the absolute necessity for antivirus protection, especially if you have been used to the IT department taking care of that kind of thing.

If you’re a one-man band now, though, you have to consider every aspect of the business, from sales and revenue, through to insurance, internet security and everything to do with your premises – if you have them.

Choosing antivirus software doesn’t really require too much knowledge about technology. Have a look online at the different programmes available and consult internet forums to see which are the most popular or reliable.

You’ll soon see which companies offer the best deals – but if you’re not sure about their reputation, find a forum to ask a question. The people on these kinds of forums are far more interested in these topics, and therefore far more knowledgeable than you, and will be more than willing to share their wisdom.

There are lots of free antivirus downloads available. Once you’ve decided on a reputable brand, search their website for a free download – or a trial version. Follow the onscreen instructions to download and install the software. If it’s a trial version, don’t forget to put a reminder in your calendar before the first payment schedule comes up – if you forget, you’ll be paying automatically if you’ve given your credit card details when you signed up for the trial, even if you uninstall it.

Once you’ve sorted out the computers, don’t forget to do the same thing for your mobile phone – these are just as susceptible to virus attacks.