Irish businesses are at risk of losing millions of euro every year due to sophisticated scams and fraud.

Enda Kenny made big claims five years ago. Yet businesses, and particularly SMEs, are facing the same old problems, writes Peter O’Dwyer

The soaring cost of insuring a car was the stand-out feature of the latest monthly inflation report.

A Government agency tasked with improving SME access to credit has recommended that business owners whose loans have been sold to vulture funds should tap friends and family for cash.

Ireland’s black economy is booming even as legitimate enterprises are enjoying record increases in sales.

Business lobby group Isme has called on the new Government to reappoint a minister with direct responsibility for small business.

A conference later today will call for the regularisation of thousands of undocumented people living in Ireland and will hear the majority are working and have been living here for more than five years.

The country’s next government needs to prioritise the small and medium-sized business needs and create a “truly entrepreneurial culture” to bolster the economic recovery, according to a business group.

It is vital that ongoing negotiations on the formation of the next government deliver a clear, comprehensive agreement that will ensure the next administration is in a position to run its full term.

Confidence amongst small business owners deteriorated significantly during the first quarter of the year, with both domestic and external factors feeding their economic uncertainty, a new report shows.

Late payments are continuing to threaten the future of many SMEs, while the change in examinership laws is not having the desired effect on smaller businesses either, two separate studies have found.

Irish retail sales remained impressively strong amid a darkening European outlook last month with annual growth surging 11% in February.

Gardaí are retiring with average lump sums of €100,000 on top of their pensions, which shows taxpayers are paying “over the odds” to fund generous packages.

Irish SMEs still face higher-than-average interest rates, despite slight decreases over the final quarter of 2015.

The Irish Small and Medium Enterprises Association says there has been a slight improvement in the rate of refusals for loans to small businesses.

Irish internet users are being charged almost twice the EU average for crucial broadband services as consumers continue to pick up the tab, despite rip-off rates being repeatedly exposed in the past.

The end of each year invariably has us thinking of the future and what it has in store for us, personally and in a business sense.

Thousands of fathers could be forced to forgo the new paid paternity leave entitlements being introduced next year after employers warned they will not pay them their wages while off work.

Small and medium business group ISME say most of their members cannot afford pay rises for workers.

Small business group Isme has welcomed Central Bank plans to give small business owners more power in their dealings with their lenders.

The Small Firms Association has submitted a list of 28 measures on which it wants government action to help create the next 100,000 jobs across the economy.

Retails sales figures published yesterday show that shell-shocked retailers are beginning to see signs of increased consumer spending, analysts say.

More expensive education costs coupled with rising motor insurance policies and rents ended a series of eight months of deflation, in August.

Almost half of loan applications from small and medium-sized business were rejected in the past three months, according to new figures.

A select group of local authority workers are set to lose the ‘rain’ allowance they have been receiving for lifting bins in wet weather.

The number of people signing on the dole fell by almost 2,000 last month.

The number of people signing on the Live Register climbed for the first time in more than two years last month, pointing towards slowing job creation.

As the level of unemployment continues to fall, new figures indicate the number of people currently working is the highest it has been in six years.

Owners of small companies have no faith that criminals who target their trade will be brought to justice, at a time when the total cost of crime against businesses amounts to €1.62bn per year.

The Government has been called on to increase the number of so-called ‘activation schemes’ in a bid to tackle long-term and youth unemployment.

Eleven secondary school teachers last year received pension lump sums of between €150,000 and €165,000 on retiring in a pensions bonanza, new figures show.

A generous childcare package to extend parental leave, pre-school care and to pay private creche fees for parents is being considered by the Government.

A targeted tax credit for firms employing fewer than 10 people could create 80,000 new jobs at no net cost to the exchequer and reduce the current unemployment rate to 6%.

Business and consumer groups have called on the Government to launch a probe into the grip that Allied Irish Banks and Bank of Ireland have over Irish banking and to consider the possibility of breaking up AIB to boost competition.