April 2025

May Day Payments, Housing & Energy Costs, and Employment by Irish Businesses

Drew Shiel
April 29, 2025

Welcome to the April edition of HTH Accountants’ monthly newsletter! We send this out once a month with information for our clients and friends about financial news in Ireland. The annual “grand stretch in the evening” is under way, and between Easter and May, bank holidays abound. See below for some details of upcoming business and economic matters in Ireland, and give us a call on (01) 541 1446 if you need any help with any of them!

May Day Payments May Cause Delays

BPFI’s Manager of Payment Schemes, Leah Donnelly, says “This year the annual European May Day holiday falls on Thursday May 1 and European institutions including the European Central Bank, which operates the banking settlement system across Europe, will be closed. While banks are open in Ireland on that day, the European holiday means that electronic payments in Euro cannot be made to bank accounts in Ireland or anywhere else across Europe. Essentially this means that anyone expecting a Euro payment into their bank account on this date may not receive the payment until Friday 2 May,” she said.

So send your payments before that deadline this month!

Multinationals Cite Housing and Gas Costs as Biggest Downside to Doing Business in Ireland

The 2024 client survey by the IDA scored 20 different factors out of 10 on Ireland’s competitiveness with the corporate tax regime again rating highest at 7.44. However, housing for staff continues to be a major problem for companies doing business in Ireland, with satisfaction falling since the last survey in 2022.

Three out of Four Workers are Employed by Irish Owned Businesses

Three out of every four workers in the State are employed in an Irish owned business according to new data from the Central Statistics Office. Irish-owned enterprises accounted for 74.9% of total employment and 65.2% of total earnings in 2023.