Eligibility checker: Government coronavirus business help

Eligibility checker

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How it works

It takes from just a few seconds to up to a minute to complete the eligibility checker.

Any business owner can use the checker: self-employed, sole traders, limited companies and larger organisations.

The chatbot will ask you questions

Before you get started, the chatbot will ask you to agree to the T&Cs.
Find out what coronavirus help you might be eligible for

The chatbot will give you helpful links for further information.
Review your chat later, if you like

When you finish, the chatbot will ask for your email address. We’ll then email you a link so you can go back to review your chat.

If you have two or more businesses, you can go back to complete the checker for your other businesses.

Summary: Government coronavirus help for businesses

The Government coronavirus support includes these measures for small businesses:

1. Bounce Back Loans for small businesses

Get from £2,000 up to 25% of your annual turnover to a maximum of £50,000, interest-free for a year and no repayments for the first 12 months.

2. Grants of £10,000 for small businesses

The Small Business Grant Scheme is for businesses who get Small Business Rate Relief or Rural Rate Relief.

3. Grants of £10,000 or £25,000 for retail, hospitality and leisure businesses

The Retail and Hospitality Grant Scheme is for businesses in these sectors with property which has a rateable value between £15,000 and £51,000.

4. Rates holiday for retail, hospitality and leisure

Businesses in these sectors and based in England won’t pay business rates for the tax year 2020-2021. You don’t have to do anything – it’ll be applied on your council tax bill in April 2020. There are rates relief schemes in the other nations of the UK but the details are different: Scotland | Wales | Northern Ireland

5. Job Retention Scheme

The Government will reimburse you for part of the wages or salary for your staff if you’d otherwise have to lay them off during the coronavirus crisis.

6. Statutory Sick Pay relief for SMEs

To allow employers to reclaim Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) they pay for sickness absence due to COVID-19. To be eligible, your business must have had fewer than 250 employees on 28 February 2020

7. Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme

This Scheme offers loans of up to £5 million for SMEs through the British Business Bank

8. Self Employed Income Support Scheme

For eligible self-employed workers who submitted a tax return for 2018-2019: a taxable grant worth 80% of your average monthly profits for the last 3 years, up to £2,500 a month

9. Coronavirus Corporate Financing Facility

For larger companies. The Bank of England will buy short-term debt to support companies affected by a short-term funding squeeze.

10. HMRC Time To Pay Scheme

For businesses and self-employed in financial distress, and owing money to HMRC. These businesses and individuals might be eligible for support, for example a longer time to repay what they owe.

If you have questions…

If you have questions about Government support for businesses during the coronavirus crisis, here are three steps to finding the answer:

1. Gov.uk: Financial support for businesses during coronavirus (COVID-19)

This page lists all the Government support with links to more detail who’s eligible and how to apply.

2. Business support FAQs

If the Gov.uk webpage doesn’t answer your questions, try this page with FAQs about everything from how to protect your staff and how to help fight and treat the virus, to insurance and how long businesses must stay closed. The FAQs are part of the Government’s new COVID-19 Business Support website.

3. Call the Government Business Support helpline

If the Gov.uk webpage or the FAQs don’t answer your questions, you can call the new Government helpline on 0300 456 3565 (national rate number, call charges apply). It’s open from Monday to Friday, from 9am to 6pm. Bear in mind it’s likely to be extremely busy.

If your business is based in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, you can call a dedicated Government helpline in your nation: list of all helpline numbers

Eligibility checker terms and conditions

Your results

We base your results on the information you give us and the publicly available guidelines issued by the UK Government.

We make every effort to ensure your results are accurate. However, Government guidelines may change over time and at short notice.
This eligibility checker is provided on an ‘as is’, ‘as available’ basis without warranties of any kind, express or implied.
We may update or change the eligibility checker anytime and without notice.

Your information

We don’t store your answers. We use them only to check your eligibility for Government support.

If you give us your email when you’ve completed the chat, we’ll use it to send you a link so you can go back to review your chat. We’ll also send you occasional emails with information useful for small business owners. You can unsubscribe from our messages at any time. (There’s always a link at the bottom of emails to ‘unsubscribe’).
For full details on how we manage your personal data, read our privacy policy.

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Eligibility checker:Government coronavirus business help