A small business owner who was forced to close because of the coronavirus lockdown has spoken out about delays in receiving money promised by the government.
John Harwood, who runs a small holiday let in King’s Road, Brighton, said that he found the entire process frustrating.
He spoke out as Brighton and Hove City Council has started a publicity campaign calling on small businesses to get in touch.
The campaign is aimed at hundreds of eligible businesses that have not applied for government support, leaving tens of millions of pounds unclaimed.
Mr Harwood said that he received an email on Friday 3 April to say that he was entitled to support and that more details on how to apply would follow.
But after two weeks, Mr Harwood emailed the council because he had heard nothing.
Three weeks after the initial email he called the council’s helpline – on Thursday 23 April – and was told “it’s online” in answer to every question that he asked.
Mr Harwood emailed an official from the council who guided him through the process but then, more than two weeks after applying, he still had not received any money.
It was only after the Local Democracy Reporting Service contacted the council that money landed in his account the same day.
The Labour administration’s lead councillor for finance Daniel Yates said: “We’d like to apologise to Mr Harwood for the delay in getting his grant through to him.
“We are handling over 5,000 claims and, unfortunately, a clerical error occurred in this case.
“I’m pleased to say that Mr Harwood has now been paid.”
The council said that it had staff working seven days a week to process grants and had employed an extra 30 people.
Conservative group finance spokesman Joe Miller said that he had heard about a similar problem from an Old Steine business with five staff.
He said: “This business was keen to apply for the small business grants funding to help keep financially afloat during the covid-19 crisis and says that it contacted the council the day it was announced by the government.
“However, despite efforts to engage with the council and follow its processes, including promptly applying through the council’s portal, this business has still not received the grant.”
After applying for the grant, the business owner, who did not wish to be named, received an email this month inviting him to apply. It came after weeks of trying to get information from the council.
Councillor Miller has written to the council’s chief executive Geoff Raw to ask him to look into the problem.
He is concerned that the council was discussing keeping unspent funds when many small businesses were still waiting on grants to be passed on.
Councillor Miller added: “Small businesses and self-employed workers in the retail, leisure and hospitality sector underpin our city’s local economy – and supporting these businesses and the local jobs they create must be a priority for the council.
“We know that there are many Brighton small businesses in financial stress that are waiting on payments and the focus should be on expediting these as soon as possible, not on lobbying the government to keep parts of this grant for other uses.”
Last month the British Beer and Pub Association said that Brighton and Hove City Council was one of the slowest in the country to pay grants to qualifying businesses.
The association said that – at that time – only 22 per cent of 251 eligible pubs had received the urgently needed government cash from the council.
The council said late last month: “Since the government announced its business grants scheme, we have paid out £28.4 million of the allocated funding.
“Getting the money out as quickly as possible is an absolute priority and we have trained 23 additional staff to join our business rates team so we can operate seven days a week to clear the applications.
“Our current projection is that we will clear all the requests received, to date, by the end of next week (Friday 1 May).
“We are concerned that although we have now contacted every business we believe is eligible for a grant, there are still over 1,000 businesses who are yet to apply.
“We urge anyone who fits the government’s criteria, to please get in touch via our dedicated business grants portal.”
For the latest information on the council’s business grants portal, click here.
