Improving access to finance for Welsh businesses

More needs to be done to remove the barriers faced by businesses in Wales trying to access bank finance, according to an independent review published this week.

Earlier this year, Welsh Labour’s Economy Minister Edwina Hart appointed Professor Dylan Jones-Evans to review the availability of financing for Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs) in Wales. Today she published the findings from stage one of the review.

• In the review Professor Jones-Evans has provided a number of recommendations on how high street banks can better meet the funding needs of Welsh SMEs. These recommendations include:
• Ensuring Welsh businesses get a fair share of funding from the new Business Bank;
• Welsh Government using its purchasing power in Wales to encourage its suppliers to pay their own supply chain promptly;
• The banks allowing their Welsh regional managers to make final credit decisions for Welsh businesses;
• Ensuring better links between business support programmes in Wales and the banking sector;
• The banks establishing a covenant with their customers, moving away from decision-making based on simple credit scoring when a business provides a complete and robust application.

The Welsh Government has said that the report will help inform how it can best support SMEs to access finance.

Professor Jones-Evans will now work on stage two of the review looking at other sources of financing available to SMEs. This will include looking at micro-lending, government sources, equity investment, availability of trade credit and alternative sources of funding such as peer-to-peer lending and crowd-funding.