“For bookkeeping alone, there are several new rules,” says Anita Roll, CEO for the Qtema consultancy. Ms Roll was one of many businesspeople to applaud three years ago when the government said it planned to cut administrative costs for business by 25 percent by the end of 2010. Now, with less than a year before the deadline, she is disappointed.
And she’s not alone. The Board of Swedish Industry and Commerce for Better Regulation (NNR) computation for 2009 indicates that 75 percent of businesses say the red tape load is the same as for last year.
“It feels like we’re marking time; nothing’s happening. It’s almost like there are even more regulations and they’re more complicated. I’ve spent a lot of time learning about tax law,” says Roll.
She estimates that keeping updated takes one day a week, attending courses and reading the literature, to be able to do her paper work. Labour law is an area she would like to see thoroughly shaken up.
“The rules and regulations are often unclear, and that makes me worry if I’m doing the right thing. I wish there were a business authority that could give us quick, clear answers,” says Anita Roll.
Dag Pettersson, CEO of medical carer providers Assistanspoolen in Järfälla outside Stockholm, agrees that the red tape mountain has grown.
“When I talk with business colleagues, the general feeling is that things are more complicated. Take the new cash register law, the new Value Added tax rules, even more bookkeeping rules and the decision to keep compulsory auditing,” says Pettersson.
He thinks the government has not tackled the issue comprehensively, merely poking at it here and there. Anita Roll has the same impression:
“They underestimated the problem of business red tape. The regulations are so intertwined that if you change things at one end, you get trouble at the other end,” says Roll.
Helena Jonsson is a horse breeder at Galtå Södergård. She is still drowning in paper work but believes that politicians are at least talking more about the issue. But when she hears that the government claims to have pushed through 460 red tape removers between 2007-2008, she shrugs.
“By the end of the year, the government will be able to statistically prove that they have cut the administrative burden by almost 25 percent. But in practice, this doesn’t mean much for us company owners.
“I think they’d get better results if the goal was to write rules that are easier for both overseers and clients,” says Helena Jonsson.
