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The EMA in partnership with ATEED and the Regional Business Partner Network has this week launched a free web series to help all businesses get through the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.

The combination of videos and live webinars this week featured mental wellbeing for employers, retention and redeployment, employee leave and payroll.

Each week the EMA will be adding three 20-minute sessions to the series on its dedicated COVID-19 site on topics businesses are most asking about.

The EMA’s AdviceLine, is still fielding an unprecedented number of calls – up to 600 a day compared to the usual 120 – but is coping with the extra resources that have been added.

In the wake of the Government’s Business Finance Guarantee Scheme announced on Wednesday, the EMA has added an additional session to its web series for this week.

The Government scheme aims to help businesses with their cashflow and operating expenses in particular, and applies to those with annual revenue between $250,000 and $80 million.

They can apply to their banks for loans up to $500,000, for up to three years, with the Government guaranteeing 80 per cent of the risk, and banks 20 per cent.

Today the BNZ’s Karna Luke GM Growth and Performance, Partnership Banking at BNZ talks people through the scheme and how banks can help businesses and their people through this time.

One of the sessions in the web series next week features the EMA’s Head of Legal, Matthew Dearing, on restructure and redundancy and keeping your people at the heart of this process.

Available to all businesses, the web series will continue to respond to what businesses most want to know to help get them through the COVID-19 pandemic.