We recently chatted with Peter Tuvey, CEO of Fleximize, about what they have been up to over this past year and how they have been helping SMEs. Since launching in 2014, Fleximize has won the ‘Best Business Finance Provider’ at the annual British Bank Awards twice, both in 2020 and 2018, and they are finalists for 2021.
Fleximize has been nominated for Unsecured Loan Lender of the Year at the SME Funding Awards 2021.
How has Fleximize been helping SMEs over the past year?
Over the last 12 months, Fleximize has taken several steps to support the UK’s community of SME owners. Along with a relaunch of its business loans and reducing its interest rates (outlined below), the lender has also taken steps to support SME owners with other aspects of business management.
When the first lockdown was announced, the team worked with industry leaders and specialists to create an online Coronavirus Business Advice Hub, providing business owners with detailed articles and guides exploring how to navigate the pandemic. There are currently over 70 articles, with more being added each week, covering everything from a detailed guide outlining all the financial support currently available to UK SMEs, to an article on how managers can support remote working staff with mental health during the crisis.
The lender has also hosted a number of webinars to support SME owners through the pandemic, covering topics such as ‘Protecting Your Business Beyond Covid-19’ and ‘Preparing for the New Normal’. Finally, Fleximize also opened its Member Marketplace to all business owners across the UK in order to help them access the wider business support they may need to weather the pandemic. This allows any business owner to access bespoke discounts and offers on b2b services and tools to help run their business.
Has Fleximize made any changes to their lending to accommodate the difficulties faced by SMEs?
At the start of the pandemic, the Fleximize team worked closely with existing clients to fully understand the difficulties they were facing and how the lender could adapt their service to provide additional support. Specifically, the team got in touch with the entirety of its client base to gauge what support clients were likely to need and then provided bespoke payment plans and repayment holidays to ease the financial strain many UK SMEs were experiencing.
As a secondary step, the Fleximize team also updated its products and processes to ensure its offering was meeting the needs of its customers in practice, especially the 50% of UK business owners who were being turned away from accessing government support. Whilst many other altfi providers pivoted to solely offer government support such as BBLS and CBILS, the Fleximize team worked on adapting their offering to provide finance to those who were being left behind.
This included a full relaunch of Fleximize’s Flexiloan product with reduced interest rates and increased flexibility, along with introducing a new product altogether: The Flexiloan Lite, designed specifically for short term lending.
The team also formalised their Penalty-Free Promise; a pledge to provide fair and honest finance to UK SMEs, and to not penalise those wanting to repay their loan early. Meanwhile, with over two-thirds of customers coming back to Fleximize for more funding after paying off their initial loan, the team introduced their Loyalty Pledge, which promises customers a better rate the second time they borrow, along with Gold Membership in the Member Marketplace.
What makes Fleximize unique as a lender?
Since the company’s inception in 2014, Fleximize has made a name for itself by going above and beyond to support UK SMEs with more than just finance.
Alongside its multi-award-winning business loans, the lender has also been recognised for its commitment to fostering transparency within the industry. Fleximize’s rate comparison tool, for example, helps business owners easily compare the overall cost of a business loan, in order to help them find the most cost-effective finance package for them, whether that’s a Fleximize product or not.
The award-winning tool is just one such initiative; the Fleximize website is also home to the largest collection of articles and guides by any UK alternative finance provider. The Knowledge Hub includes over 900 articles and guides covering everything a small business owner would need to know about running a UK SME, including articles written by experts at Sage, Xero and Nuffield Health.
In short, not only does Fleximize provide award-winning business loans tailored to the changing needs of UK SMEs, but it also strives to provide businesses with the additional support they need to prosper. This approach has led to the lender achieving a rating of 4.9/5 on Trustpilot and being named the UK’s Best Business Finance Provider, twice.
Do you have any advice for SMEs who are hesitant to take out funding?
With many finance providers presenting loan terms, repayment fees and interest rates in different ways, it’s understandable that many SME owners may find the industry difficult to navigate. This is why Fleximize strives to be as transparent as possible and collaborates with businesses such as Funding Bay, who work to demystify the financial support available to UK SMEs.
For SMEs hesitant to take out funding, Fleximize’s fully impartial and award-winning rate comparison tool is a good place to start as it allows business owners to compare rates and fees quickly and easily. It’s also worth looking out for any early repayment penalties and fees and factoring this cost into your overall loan.
Finally, if you’re unsure of which lender to go for, take a look at each lender’s Trustpilot rating and case studies. This will give you a good idea of how customers use their products in practice and what the application process is like. It’s also worth checking if the lender has won any awards voted for by customers, as this can often give you a good idea of the lender’s overall approach and whether their products and processes are user-centric or not.
What can we expect to see from Fleximize now that CBILS has come to a close?
As the UK moves into the next phase of the pandemic, it’s expected that many business owners will be looking for viable alternatives to government schemes such as BBLS and CBILS. As Fleximize demonstrated at the start of the pandemic, the team are always innovating and seeking feedback from customers so that they can implement any necessary changes to products and processes.
In particular, Fleximize’s revamped Flexiloan and brand new Flexiloan Lite have been designed as an alternative to government support schemes, or to sit alongside government initiatives such as the Recovery Loan Scheme. As business owners come out of lockdown and look ahead to implementing growth plans, Fleximize will continue to stay agile to meet the changing needs of the UK’s community of business owners.
In addition, Fleximize is looking to expand its product suite in the coming months to help more businesses. This also includes tweaks to the lender’s process, such as embracing technologies to make products even more convenient through continued use of Open Banking integrations and e-signing technology. The lender will also expand on its holistic approach to supporting SMEs with more than just finance, such as by adding more partners to the Member Marketplace and continuing to host webinars and virtual events to support businesses in the coming months and years.
Watch this space for the announcement of the winners. You can see the full list of nominees here.
