The biggest change will see an amendment to the definition of a medium-sized company for corporate reporting so that the threshold for the maximum number of employees is increased from 250 to 500, aligning the employee threshold to a level that reflects what the government considers to be a medium-sized business.

This move is expected to save SMEs an estimated £145m due to deregulatory requirements.

A typical small company that takes advantages of the benefits of these changes could be expected to save around 10 hours of reporting and accountancy time a year, the Department for Business claimed.