March 2018
By Adam Tyler, executive chairman, FIBA
Since the financial crisis of 2008 we have seen an unprecedented rise in the number of lenders across the UK. However, it is known that 80% of borrowers will still approach their local high street bank as the first port of call. While access to finance should not be a problem, awareness and confidence is still holding UK SMEs back from seeking the right kind of investment. How can we make a change to ensure that the overall UK economy benefits from this great business lending landscape?
As always, at the heart of this is the broker and intermediary community which, for many years, has served business in providing that vital link between borrower and lender.
Right now, we are in one of the most exciting periods in the history of the lending market. The confluence of technology, regulation, but also of demographic change and funding presents extraordinary challenges and opportunities for lenders and customers alike.
We have never had so much choice and so much competition from our lending community. Yet the end user – the customer – is still not aware of the choice they have among the lending community and many may choose to use their own funds, despite the opportunity to source investment against a backdrop of record-breaking low interest rates.
How can our customers become more aware of the plethora of lenders that are now available to them? At FIBA, we want to help your customers recognise that there is an opportunity to source the right kind of funding, and that the best way to do this is through an intermediary, whose expert knowledge and connections will lead them to the right lender for their project.
Access to new sources of finance through various methods of social media is going to inevitably grow as well. But this alone will not solve the issue and more work is required to raise the profile of the intermediary and broker community with the right customer base.
At FIBA, the work continues on behalf of our members in Westminster, at BEIS, the British Business Bank and the Bank of England to try and ensure that the best way to access the wide range of lenders and funders is through intermediaries, who know and understand the choice that is available to customers.