Specialist in business recovery and restructuring Begbies Traynor is offering print and packaging companies access to financial information about customers, competitors and potential new clients, through a system designed to measure levels of corporate and financial distress within UK businesses.
Until now Red Flag Alert, which covers sales, credit control, collection, risk and compliance, has been used as an internal resource and a source of media information. Its commercial launch makes it available as an online annual subscription service supported by a dedicated helpdesk.
A bespoke ‘health rating’ system helps businesses identify bad payers and thus reduce risks to operating cash flow, says the company.
According to Red Flag Alert, 1,916 companies in the print and packaging sector were experiencing ‘significant problems’ in the third quarter of 2009, and 77 companies were experiencing ‘critical problems’.
Nick Hood, partner at Begbies Traynor said: "The print and packaging sector has had a tough recession, reflecting not just the usual slashing of discretionary expenditure by customers but much deeper and more fundamental cost cutting. Despite this, there remains too much capacity and margins are painfully thin.”
There will be difficulty in raising the extra working capital needed to fund growing order books as and when the recovery finally takes hold, he added,
