Planning in advance is essential for business success

 

One of the most important activities you can do for your business to ensure you reap financial success is to plan ahead.

Why would you risk making a bad decision because you didn’t allow yourself the adequate time to research a certain topic, when making great decisions is simple when you plan for them in advance? It’s far more effective to identify and address issues before they arise!

Sure, there will be moments when you will be faced with sudden challenges which will require quick decision making, but that only makes planning ahead for everything else which you can anticipate, even more important, leaving you with the headspace to deal with genuine, unexpected fire-fighting situations.

Budgeting and financial planning offers an opportunity to build scenarios with various factors, and forecasting is all about strategy! It gives you a chance to identify what parts of your business are performing well, and where there may be opportunities for increased revenue or cost savings.

One of the easiest areas to plan in advance consistently, to ensure you are always making the most of your money, is when it comes to your energy and gas supply. You know your business will always need it, and suppliers contracts run on predictable schedules.

But if you leave it up for your current supplier to remind you that your current contract is about to end, then you will be risking having to make yet another hasty decision that you would have otherwise been able to avoid - with just a bit of advanced planning!

That’s because your suppliers don’t actually want to give you much lead time, and therefore might contact you with as little as a few weeks’ notice only! You then might then end up falling into a not-so-great tariff because you didn’t have time to do an adequate research, especially considering that you need to give one month’s notice to your existing supplier to switch...

To ensure you are constantly at the best possible rate for your business, we recommend starting the research with 3 or 4 months in advance from the end of your contract. There is nothing like being too early.

So, tracking these times on a calendar is a simple, yet effective way, to ensure you don’t overspend on energy. You don’t want to delay the decision, but you don’t want to rush into a bad decision either, so planning for it is essential.

At Mycos, we can keep track of these timelines for you and advise, when the time is right, what are your best options to change. Plus, we also make sure you don’t run the risk of falling into a low-rate trap, with a supplier with bad customer service that might give you a headache further down the line.

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