The Owner Manager Magazine, Issue 16 by Irish Small And Medium Enterprises Association

The Owner Manager Magazine

Issue 16 October 2017

The Owner Manager Magazine What’s in this issue… Business Advice HR Articles & News A Message from ISME’s CEO Take Advantage of ISME’s Affinity Programme The GDPR and You

Crime Against Business Worsens WRC Inspections – What do you need to know? Don’t Let Power Cuts Affect Your Business! Results of ISME’s 2017 E-Crime Report ISME Skillnet Training Courses Reducing Costs Through Energy Efficiency Tax Update for SMEs - November

MESSAGE FROM ISME’S CEO Hello Owner Managers, We’re getting to the end of the year, and the ISME team hopes you have survived Hurricane Ophelia, Storm Brian, and Budget 2018 unscathed. Obviously for those of you who have been affected by storm damage, we are keen to see how you get on with your insurance company in submitting a claim, and how badly claims will affect your future premiums. Please let us know how you get on. Our Annual Conference 2017 promises to be a lively and informative day, with the major theme being how to use the art of story-telling to help sell your business’s products or services. This won’t be a theoretical or academic discussion; it’s hands-on, real-world material about how to position your business proposition to customers. If you haven’t got them yet, you can still get tickets here.

so. We will continue to advocate on this, but we ask for your help at local and constituency level in doing so. Of course, one of those cost lines of greatest aggravation to business owners is that of insurance. In early November, we will sponsor a Perjury Bill in the Oireachtas. We ask you to lobby your TDs on this. If enacted, our Perjury Bill will do two key things: (1) it will make the prosecution of false (perjured) claims far easier than it is at present under the common-law regime; and, (2) it will require that claims submitted to PIAB are sworn under an affidavit, which is not the case at the moment. Because of our strong position on insurance, we are backing the effort of the Alliance for Insurance Reform, a dedicated cross-sector body which will take up the fight on behalf of all premium payers. We will pass on further details on the Alliance as soon we have agreed a spending budget with them, and we urge you to support this important effort. Lastly, you will have seen from our crime report last month that incidents of hacking and e-crime against small business are definitely on the upswing. Please do not wait until your business is caught, and take precautions now. Garda advice on IT security for business can be found here. From all the staff in Kildare Street, I wish you the best.

By the time you read this, we will have been before the Joint Committee on Business, Enterprise and Innovation to talk about business costs. ISME emphasises the fact (in practically all our inflation-related press releases) that traded costs are declining, while Government-controlled costs are inflating. Despite its protestations to the contrary, Government has the power to reduce many of the costs of living, including the most pressing cost at the moment: that of housing. What is missing is the political will to do

Neil McDonnell, Chief Executive

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Take Advantage of added benefits with ISME’s ADVANTAGE Affinity Programme Faced with rising operational costs in many areas, some business owners are cutting corners to reduce outgoings – often to the detriment of their business. “Some companies find that, rather than using services or products such as insurance, transport and telecommunications, which can enhance their business, they are keeping their spend to a minimum and potentially impacting the performance of their businesses,” said Neil McDonnell, Chief Executive of the Irish SME Association (ISME). Mindful of this, ISME has negotiated preferential rates, added services and companies across a range of industries. This in turn means that members can reduce their costs and add value to their business through the buying power of ISME via its ADVANTAGE Affinity Programme. “Many of our schemes in the finance sector are popular with our members. These include business, home, health and life insurance; along with bank advisory and money transfers provided by ISME partners including JLT Insurance, Halligan Insurance, Lyons Financial Services, HMCA, BankCheck and TransferMate,” said Mc- Donnell. “Additional partnerships include the ISME fuel card with DCI and discounts on Microsoft products with CloudStrong plus member rates and additional services with LeasePlan, FornaxLED, One4All Giftcard and ISME Skillnet Training. Members can also avail of procurement support services with Keystone Procurement.”

At the end of October, ISME will be bringing further business benefits to members with seven new partnerships. They include: ISME Advantage Pension with JLT and Zurich Life Pension Offering Discounted Annual Fund Charges & No Set-up Fee’s, Online Services - ISME Connect Portal, Blanket allocation rate and much more. Pinergy An exclusive discounted electricity unit rate for ISME members, a free energy audit, LED services, access to a full suite of energy services products and more. Gift Card with Me2U Businesses can avail of the Government Benefit-In-Kind scheme and reward up to €500 per employee completely free of Tax, PRSI and USC; access to Me2You Recognition & Reward Manager; discounted acceptance rate of 5.5% for all new merchants joining FromMe2You gift card and more. Jobs.ie ISME members receive a 10% discount when advertising with Jobs.ie.

Sunday Business Post

Magnet Networks

25% off annual digital subscriptions to the Sunday Business Post. A saving of â&#x201A;Ź50.

Rural connectivity to broadband through the new Magnet Networks LTE service, members with less than 10 employees can get 10% discount on Magnet Office in a Box services; and for businesses with over 10 employees free consultancy on their phone system.

Codex Office Solutions Access to a special ISME office solutions catalogue offering discounted prices on everything for the office; free office design and consultation from Codex Office Interiors; and redesign of any printed material used within an organisation.

This means there will be over 20 affinity programmes available to ISME members, the most offered by any business association in Ireland.

Find out more at ISME.ie. ISME members can access full details when they log into the Memberâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s portal on the website.

The GDPR and You 1

General Data Protection Regulation

How will Access Requests change?

Becoming Aware

Becoming Accountable

Review and enhance your business risk management processes – identify problem areas now.

Make an inventory of all personal data you hold. Why do you hold it? Do you still need it? Is it safe?

Personal Privacy Rights

Communicating with Staff and Service Users

Ensure your procedures cover all the rights individuals are entitled to, including deletion and data portability.

Plan how you will handle requests within the new timescales – requests must be dealt with within one month.

Review all your data privacy notices and make sure you keep service users fully informed about how you use their data.

What we mean when we talk about a ‘Legal Basis’

Using Customer Consent as grounds to process data

Processing Children’s Data

Are you relying on consent, legitimate interests or a legal enactment to collect and process the data? Do you meet the standards of the GDPR?

Review how you seek, obtain and record consent, and whether you need to make any changes to be GDPR ready.

Data Protection Impact Assessments (DPIA) and Data Protection by Design and Default

Reporting Data Breaches Are you ready for mandatory breach reporting? Make sure you have the procedures in place to detect, report and investigate a data breach.

Data privacy needs to be at the heart of all future projects.

Data Protection Officers Will you be required to designate a DPO? Make sure that it’s someone who has the knowledge, support and authority to do the job effectively.

Do you have adequate systems in place to verify individual ages and gather consent from guardians?

International Organisations and the GDPR The GDPR includes a ‘one-stop-shop’ provision which will assist those data controllers whose companies operate in many member states. Identify where your Main Establishment is located in the EU in order to identify your Lead Supervisory Authority.

10 GDPR Tips for ISME Members! 1. Establish if you are a Data Controller, Data Processor or both, and what Personal Data you hold within the business

2. Create a Cookie Policy and a Privacy Statement for your website if you collect data via this means. Have an internal Privacy Policy in place

3. Personal Privacy Rights â&#x20AC;&#x201C; Understand Subject Access Requests and The Right to Erasure â&#x20AC;&#x201C; 40 Days to Respond to the Data Subject

4. A Data Breach must be reported within 72 Hours. Ensure your business has an Incident Response Process in place to be adequately prepared

5. For all CCTV footage been utilised within the business, ensure there is a Fair Processing Notice in place to clearly outline its use cases

6. Outline a Data Protection Policy, including Security Policies such as BYOD Policy, Password Policy & Data Breach Management Policy

7. If your business is mass marketing via continuous automation, all Data Subjects been marketed, must have provided explicit consent & freely given

8. If Processing High Risk Data, ensure a Privacy Impact Assessment is conducted

9. Monitoring of employee activity. Ensure your business has a Social Media Policy & Acceptable Use Policy (Internet Browsing) in place & employees are fully aware

10. Data Protection measures must be enforced to ensure security of Data Subjects information are not at risk. i.e. Encryption, Remote Wipe of devices

www.cloudstrong.ie | Twitter: @CloudStrong | Email: gdpr@cloudstrong.ie | Phone: 01-9022783

CRIME AGAINST BUSINESS WORSENS The results of our latest annual crime survey 2017 where published in September. The findings are based on a serious of questions applied to various sectors, business size and locality. Unfortunately, the results do not paint a pretty picture. The survey found that 35% of business have been the victim of crime in the past twelve months, with 75% experiencing more than two incidents. The Association in its publication makes eleven recommendations to Government, law enforcement, and the business community to help reduce crimes.

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The main findings are: •

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35% of companies have been the target of criminal activity in the last 12 months; a 4% increase on the 2016 figures. 54% of enterprises stated the direct cost of criminal activity was €1,000€5,000, while 10% of business stated that direct cost was more than €10,000. 21% of respondents said they believe that crime in their locality is ‘getting worse’, down from 28% in 2016. This is an improvement of 7% from 2016.

Of the 63% of respondents are were aware of the Crime Prevention Office, only 19% had used the service. Only 15% of Dublin businesses have used this service. 67% of respondents favoured the concept of sharing CCTV data among businesses to combat crime, up from 58% in 2016. SME owner-managers rate an increase in Garda numbers as the most effective deterrent against crime at 79%. Tougher sentencing follows behind on 71%, while 61% would like to see more CCTV in town centres. 35% of companies have never requested crime reduction advice. Of those who did, 25% received their advice from a security company and 18% received it from the Gardaí. Of those who did not report the criminal incidents, 35% stated that it was because they believed the crime was ‘too trivial’ (an improvement from 56% in 2016), while 24% stated they had ‘no faith that the criminal would be charged.’

The report has laid out eleven recommendations . One of these recommendations is the introduction of a single, national definition for business crime in Ireland under the ICCS Offence Groups published by the CSO, as is done in the UK. Such a move would allow for offences to be properly tagged, measured, analysed and ultimately solved by An Garda Síochána.” For a full analysis, see here.

What I need to know about………

WRC Inspections Notice of a Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) Inspection is enough to fill even the most compliant of employers with a sense of dread and sometimes anxiety. Employers often have many questions in the lead up to such an inspection. The WRC has existed in its current form since 1st October 2015. Since this date, the WRC has assumed the responsibilities of Workplace Inspections, previously carried out by National Employment Rights Authority (NERA). Under the Workplace Relations Act 2015 WRC inspectors have been granted the power to: • Enter any place of work at a reasonable time • Inspect, take copies of, and remove and retain records • Interview and require information from any relevant person The inspection: Inspections will normally arise as a result of: 1) A specific complaint received 2) Targeted sector inspections 3) Random/Routine inspections Inspections can either be announced or unannounced. For announced inspections, employers will be provided with approximately 2 weeks’ notice. This inspection will take place during normal hours. Unannounced inspections are also common, and can occur at any time during the day or night. Over the course of the inspection, the inspector will look to speak to you as an

employer, in addition to some of your employees. If, for any reason, the inspector is not able to interview employees on the day, alternative arrangements will be made, normally through the use of an employee questionnaire that will be issued to the employees home address. In addition to interviewing employees, the inspector will request to see certain paperwork. Further information on the inspection process, including a checklist for the type of information they will require can be found here. What happens if the inspector finds I am not compliant? The WRC inspectors are encouraged to work with employers to achieve compliance where possible. Where breaches are found they may issue a Fixed Payment Notice and/or a compliance notice. If an employer fails to comply with either a compliance of fixed payment notice, prosecution could occur. What should I do to prepare for a WRC Inspection? A lack of Record-keeping is one of the biggest issues that emerges from a WRC inspection. In preparation for an audit, ensure you have all records in place to prove compliance. Pay particular attention to ensuring you can prove compliance with minimum wage legislation and ensuring all employees have eligibility to work within the country. Use the WRC checklist, mentioned above, as a guide. In addition ensure compliance with the ISME HR Audit checklist. For further information contact niamh@isme.ie or 01-6622755.

Donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t Let Power Cuts Affect Your Business, Keep the Power on during a Power Outage As life moves on for many, the damage and hardship caused by Storm Ophelia in some parts of the country continues. In particular, those businesses, home offices and home owners who have spent many days without electricity. There were plenty of warnings from Met Eireann that this storm was unprecedented and its impact would indeed be felt country wide. Power cuts were expected but the scale and intensity of the damage may not have been. The recent power cut caused by Storm Ophelia prompted one business owner in Co. Cork to act. She was frustrated not just with the power cut caused by the Hurricane but by constant planned and unplanned power cuts which were causing enormous problems for her business. Her WIFI, phone, computer, heating and other electrical devices are essential to the daily running of her business and when these are not available, her ability to work efficiently and most importantly strategically is affected.

After extensive research, she decided the best option for her circumstances was the

Briggs and Stratton 14kW automatic gas powered generator. The main advantage for her was that she didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t need to go outside and flick on a switch or mess with petrol or diesel. The gas generator automatically detects a power cut providing power in seconds to her premises. Once the electricity returns, the generator automatically switches itself off again without having to press any buttons and even leave the house. As standard, a built in automatic voltage regulator prevents any power surges allowing her to continue working without causing damage to her devices. Another feature of the generator is the weekly diagnostics check where the generator turns itself on for about 10 minutes running through the settings identifying any issues such as low gas, filters, etc giving the customer the reassurance that if the power goes, the generator is guaranteed to work. Now installed, an unexpected or expected power cut doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t bother her, she can confidently continue her work and build her business. The Briggs and Stratton automatic gas powered generators are available in two sizes, 8kW and 14kW. Powered by Professional Briggs & Stratton Vanguard engines, the generators work off bottled gas (propane) or main gas pipe (natural gas). More information on the generators is available by visiting www.standbygenerators.ie or by calling 056 444 1988.

2017 Training Schedule

Training Courses – BOOK NOW! Course

Date

Venue

Fees

Intermediate Excel

01/11/2017

Olas, Dublin