Risk is an unavoidable part of business, particularly if you provide credit to your clients - even in the sense of invoicing for work done only once it has been delivered, let alone more complex credit arrangements that involve the lending of money.

The new year is always a good time to take a fresh look at things; for many companies it is the start of a new financial year too, while those whose accounting is aligned with the tax year have the first quarter of the new calendar year to put processes in place.

Read more: Make 2015 your year to resist financial risks

A fundamental characteristic of late payment legislation so far has been its voluntary nature - nobody forces big businesses to sign up to the Prompt Payment Code, and nobody forces SMEs to charge penalty fees on late payments.

Now one organisation is calling for this to change, with a policy paper that suggests making several aspects of late payment legislation unavoidable for creditors and debtors alike.

Read more: Payment terms over 30 days 'should be banned'

It doesn't matter how much you like a bucket; if it won't hold water anymore, it's time to get a new bucket, and that is just what the government needs.

They are now embarking on yet another review of the Prompt Payment Code to try and make it actually work, and their plan to do this is to take advice from organisations like the City of London Corporation, Aviva and Barclays.

Read more: Patching up the Prompt Payment Code

Premier Foods - owners of the Mr Kipling brand, along with several other household names - have encountered their fair share of negative press recently, since it emerged that they were demanding that suppliers should invest in the company in order to continue receiving orders.

Yep, that's right - suppliers to Premier Foods, many of them fairly small foodservice businesses, were apparently told that if they wanted to keep receiving future orders, they had to put their own money into Premier in the form of investment finance.

Read more: Premier Foods Named and Shamed on Exceedingly Bad Payment Practices