The Scottish Government Coronavirus Business Support Fund application forms are now live and available to download.
There are two main grants included in this fund:
£10,000 grant
This is aimed at ratepayers of businesses located in a non-domestic property that is on 17 March;
- in receipt of the Small Business Bonus Scheme (SBBS);
- in receipt of Rural Relief; or
- eligible for SBBS but in receipt of Nursery Relief or Disabled Relief;
Within the application form, you'll see that there are a few specific exclusions. This initially included self catering accommodation, but updates have now been released to include them. Full details in our short article here.
In addition, anyone who works from their own home would not be expected to qualify for this grant, as this is trading from a domestic property (which is already included in your Council Tax bill, rather than subject to business rates).
£25,000 grant
This is specifically aimed at the retail, hospitality and leisure sectors. Again, the application form contains a fairly clear list of who will be eligible to claim this grant.
For this grant, your business premises must have a rateable value of between £18,001 to £50,999 as at 17 March 2020. Only one application can be made per organisation regardless of the number of qualifying premises you hold.
The link to the application form is here
It is anticipated that the money for these grants will become available from 1 April 2020, and the application window for the grants will only close on 31 March 2021, so plenty time to claim this yet.
For businesses outside Orkney, you will have to check your local authority's website for details on application forms for these grants.
What's next?
There is always new guidance being released, and we're constantly keeping our eyes peeled for each government press release. Therefore, if you are not eligible for either of the above grants, we will be sure to keep you posted on any other assistance which might become available over the next few days.
Don't forgot, we are still hosting our Coronavirus webinar for all business owners tomorrow at midday (Wednesday 25th March 2020, 12.00). You can find out more here, and then register here.
