Member Article

Creative finance website offers self help to business owners

A new self-help finance website based in the North East is helping business owners struggling through the complex process of raising cash. The new site - www.creativefactoring.co.uk - has been created by Creative Business Finance, which specialises in raising cash for owner-managed businesses and SMEs.

The site is a free resource which offers business owners the information required to make the right choice of factor or invoice discounter for their situation - as opposed to being sold a commission-based recommendation.

Mark Blayney, co-director of Creative Business Finance, said: “As banks have become increasingly reluctant to provide SMEs with overdraft funding, asset-based lenders have become an increasingly important source of alternative and more flexible forms of finance. “However, it is a complex market with for example more than 50 active factoring and invoice discounting lenders and approximately 200 lenders active in the commercial property market, each offering a range of services. So it is an area where businesses need to take advice in order to arrange the right deal for their needs, particularly as businesses can fail as a result of choosing the wrong ‘solution’.”

The creativefactoring.co.uk website offers free downloadable guides to a range of funding options and has a free interactive ‘ready reckoner’ so users can find out how much their business can borrow. The company also provides a 24-hour helpline for those who may find themselves needing support.

Creative Business Finance is run by a small team of professionals working across the UK from offices in London and the North East. A similar site covering commercial mortgage and bridging lenders will also be launched on the creativefinance.co.uk domain this month.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .