Back in 2015 the Government launched the BDUK voucher scheme giving business up to £3,000 to cover the costs of upgrading to a fibre broadband service, capable of delivering a minimum speed of 30Mb. We had a fantastic take up on orders and our clients that benefitted from the funding were able to look at other ways to streamline their business by moving on-premises servers and services to the cloud, looking at moving to VoIP telephony, and freeing up their staff to enable them to work from anywhere. Since the program closed the Government has calculated that for every £1 they invested in the scheme the UK benefitted by £8. Of all the businesses that received a voucher, one in 4 firms were able to employ an additional staff member, and they made an average of £1,300 more profit per annum, through being more efficient and effective, and providing more reliable and faster delivery of goods and services.

The initiative was such a success that the money ran out 18 months before the scheduled end of the scheme and what was so heart-breaking was seeing the number of businesses that called up to benefit and we had to tell them: “Sorry – Mother Hubbard’s cupboard is bare!”

On the back of the success of the program in 2015, the Government launched the Gigabit Voucher Scheme in April 2018 which gave businesses a £2,500 voucher to install Gigabit-capable broadband services. We have already allocated over £175,000 of funding to our clients and the Government expects that at the current run rate the £67m will be gone by the end of June. So don’t delay! If you are thinking about upgrading to broadband, or even want to understand the benefit and impact it would have on your business then we would be delighted to visit and run through the benefits of this with you. Please get in touch on 0131 3000103 or martin@2circlesconsulting.com to see how best we can utilise your £2,500 voucher before its too late!