MORE kinds of business need coronavirus relief is the message from Oxford.

Oxford City Council is calling on the government to support businesses which are not covered by the coronavirus crisis funding relief it has announced so far, and to work with banks and insurance companies to provide more financial aid.

The city council wrote to business owners in the city two weeks ago to offer support and ask them for insight into the challenges that they are facing during the coronavirus outbreak.

Since then, the City Council has received more than 300 enquiries from businesses.

Ongoing issues include that some businesses are not covered by the support, including very small businesses and office tenants.

There have also been issues with insurance companies stating that coronavirus is not covered by policies and banks having conditions on access to government-backed funding that mean certain businesses do not qualify or cannot afford to take on a loan.

Although Oxford businesses can now access all the grants and rate relief that the city council has been given permission to sort out, some government support will not be available until June.

Susan Brown, Leader of Oxford City Council, called for an urgent review into the categories of businesses which are missing out.

She said: “While the range and scale of Government business support announcements have been widely welcomed, we’re still getting too many Oxford businesses contacting our teams with concerns that there’s no support available to them at all, or that they’re unable to access what’s been announced.