3 Things You Should Know About Small Business: September 20

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- What's happening in small business today?

1. Sales not enough to avoid small business cash crunch. Weak sales as a result of lackluster consumer spending is causing cash flow problems at many small businesses, according to the latest Citibank Small Business Pulse survey. According to the survey, half of the respondents experienced a sudden cash crunch in the last 12 months.

Managing cash flow is particularly difficult when there are slow or delinquent receivables and bankruptcies. About 24% of Citi survey respondents blamed late or non-payments for their sudden cash crunch in the last 12 months. Yet 23% described making a collection call as the most uncomfortable business finance challenge (behind firing staff.

Despite the cash flow crunch that many small business owners find themselves in, more than three quarters have agreed to payment extensions for customers.

Maintaining and increasing sales is the most important short term business issue for 74% of small business owners, the survey found.

The survey was conducted between August 9 and August 30 among a national random sample of 750 small business owners and operators.

2. Twitter's Jack Dorsey on his latest startup, Square. Jack Dorsey is hoping he can shake up the mobile commerce space just as much as he did with the social media industry when he co-launched Twitter. Two years ago, Dorsey launched Square, which lets merchants process debit or credit cards by using a square-shaped card reader for their smartphones or tablets and a flat 2.75% swipe fee. Currently, Square is used by 2 million merchants and will be rolled out at Starbucks' (SBUX) U.S. locations.

This week, the startup closed its fourth round of funding, raising more than $200 million. The company is now valued at more than $3.2 billion, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Still, the mobile payments space is crowded with the likes of eBay's (EBAY) PayPal, Intuit(INTU) , the major credit card processing companies, and on Wednesday, even Groupon (GRPN) getting into the act, launching a payments service.

In an interview with the WSJ, Dorsey shared that even he gets caught off guard at times with potential competitive threats.