We haven\u2019t gone broke but it would\u2019ve been touch and go if we hadn\u2019t pumped our own money into it and we didn\u2019t have family to help us out.<\/p>\n
The light is at the end of the tunnel, they say. Maybe it is, but if that\u2019s the case, it\u2019s because of the ebb and flow of the economy rather than anything this Government has done to help.<\/p>\n
Dallas and Donna Gurney outside the Whananaki Store that they bought two years ago. Photo \/ Shayne Currie<\/p>\n
In fact, this Government seems to be hell-bent on making life as tough as possible for small businesses like ours<\/a>. They continue to crap all over us. And worse still, I don\u2019t think they\u2019ve noticed.<\/p>\n It started with the proposed addition of 4.5% to our payroll costs<\/a> for casual sick leave. We are a seasonal business and employ a lot of casual summer workers. Some are teenagers, but for local families, it can often be much-needed extra money over Christmas when things are tight. In the past, when a casual employee has been sick, we\u2019ve paid them. Sounds fair. No big deal. It actually happens rarely because we\u2019re a summer operation and when the weather is good, people are a bit healthier.<\/p>\n But the Government has decided that instead of just giving people paid time off when they are sick, we need to pay every casual employee 4.5% more on top of their pay in case they do. That means between holiday pay and sick pay, we\u2019re paying 12.5% on top of regular pay. How do we fund it? Fewer staff, do more ourselves. The employee loses and we lose.<\/p>\n The banning of the ability to pass on card transaction fees<\/a> shows utter contempt for small businesses too. We choose not to pass on these fees at our shop, but I totally understand retailers that do as they are significant.<\/p>\n Instead of banning them outright at the source \u2013 the banks \u2013 they\u2019ve just banned the small guy passing them on, so we pick up the tab for a technology that shouldn\u2019t cost anything these days anyway. It\u2019s a gravy train for the banks and their partners.<\/p>\n National wants to take the win from removing the stickers on the Eftpos machines that say \u201c1.8% fee\u201d but don\u2019t have the balls to do the work to address the problem directly in the first place.<\/p>\n You can\u2019t hit big banks too hard, they complain too much. Well, it\u2019s about time small business got a little louder and fought back.<\/p>\nSurcharges on the likes of PayWave card payments are set to become a thing of the past. Photo \/ Sharepix<\/p>\n