Cost-Cutting: We All Need to Do Our Bit

Rising Costs

  Is anything going down in price these days? In August, the Bank of England noted that prices had risen by 10.1% compared to a year ago, with inflation predicted to rise to 13% over the next few months. In a masterpiece of understatement they also observe: “That is well above our 2% target”.  

Inflationary Pressure

The cynic in me wonders whether a few companies might have been jumping on the bandwagon of the war in Ukraine, sanctions against Russia, etc to squeeze through unjustifiably high price increases. Most companies however operate in competitive environments where they can’t just sneak through price increases without customers deserting them. It’s a dog-eat-dog world.  

Keep Profits Up

Arinite’s May blog made the point that there are two ways of improving the bottom line:

• By increasing profits externally
• Reducing costs internally

Right now, your accountant may be staring into the abyss, wondering how, in the present economic climate, your company is going to even avoid slipping into loss, let alone maintain or improve the bottom line? Well, it’s a lot harder to follow the first bullet point above by generating new customers/sales than it is to cut internal costs.  Accidents suck money out of a business and provide an obvious target for elimination – but don’t they cost a lot to prevent, too?  You need a team of health & safety experts, right?  

Outsourcing

We have become used to the idea of outsourcing catering, facilities, IT, security, vehicle fleets, stationery, and other functions.  You may have seen companies transfer whole groups of employees to new employers – and then buy back the very same services at a lower cost. This is covered by TUPE legislation - Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) – and can provide a win-win situation for everyone.  The transferred employees are legally entitled to maintain the same pay, pension, conditions, etc., and the new employer is able to assist the old employer with a broader offering as they have economies of scale and a wider talent pool to draw on. Is it possible therefore to effectively outsource health & safety without abdicating responsibility?  

Been There, Done That

Ten years ago, Arinite published a blog on Outsourcing the health and safety compliance burden which is as valid today as it was then. Choosing to outsource the H&S Dept gives you access to highly qualified expertise without the employee overheads. Arinite’s Operation Director Brendan Tuite who has been in the health and safety business some 32+ years, since January 1990, and after speaking with over 5,000 organisations seeking help with their health and safety says – “£40,000 is the minimum salary of a NEBOSH Diploma qualified person, add National Insurance 13.5%, pension, private medical, company car or salary in lieu plus other benefits, total costs of employing a health and safety professional is £50,000 plus. “Dependent upon what services are required the annual contract fee to outsource your health and safety to Arinite would be between £10,000+ VAT to £15,000+ VAT achieving a cost saving of between 80% £40,000 and 70% £35,000.” Arinite has an international footprint of clients including Shutterstock, Liberty Speciality Markets, Akamai Technologies, Verint Systems to name but a few. Our experienced locally based consultants have serviced individual and multinational clients in countries throughout Europe, the Americas, Asia Pacific and the Middle East.  

Contact Us

Arinite clients appreciate we provide practical, no-nonsense advice about what you need to do to establish and maintain a safe and healthy working environment. Our team of health and safety consultants take pride in keeping health and safety simple. If you need to call upon our expert assistance, or just for an informal chat, please call our office on 0207 947 9581, or contact us here. Jan Mirkowski