Free Financial Today

As outlined by EnableFinance.com, UK SMEs are generally failing to capitalise on the weakness of the pound in order to export their particular services and goods, as a consequence of fears over how late payments coming from international partners could possibly effect their own cashflow.

The alert comes after information unveiled from the Office of National Statistics preceding month, which unfortunately showed that the trade deficit in services and goods, grew in December to its highest level since August 2005. This suggests that most companies are actually less ready to do business outside the UK.

The weakened pound has made UK goods less costly to international marketplaces owing to the economic downturn in recent years, presenting significant growth possibilities for British businesses with the methods to export.

Even so, according to EnableFinance.com, worries around bad debt from international partners additionally, the administrative pressure in trying to get hold of overdue payments from foreign creditors are fuelling SMEs’ desire not to export.

Phillip Evans, managing director at EnableFinance.com, said: “Late payments negatively impact SMEs’ cashflow and may establish confines to business enterprise growth. The problem continues to be enhanced by the slowdown with more and more corporations struggling to pay their creditors.

“Taking into mind the issues many companies experience with domestic accounts, considerations around delayed payments are increased if the customers are based overseas. Those people in charge of credit control or business debt control commonly encounter the extra pressure of having to conquer language barriers or synchronize working hours in a variety of timezones.”

EnableFinance.com is urging enterprises to consider working with invoice finance and credit insurance products, similar to factoring. This permits corporations to draw down money on their issued Business to business invoices and commonly include accounting characteristics where the supplier of your service queries unpaid invoices with the debtor on the actual customer’s behalf – even when they may be based foreign. Invoice finance also bridges the gap between your goods being sold, supplied abroad and payment being acquired, making it possible for businesses to trade offshore with the assurance their own working capital will never be impacted.

Debtor insurance, a policy set up by EnableFinance.com, additionally presents protection against both domestic and international debtors.

EnableFinance.com, said: “Credit insurance gives businesses the assurance to exploit global desire and develop abroad, secure in the knowledge that they’re protected in the event that a customer should be unable to pay its invoices punctually or, in extreme cases, files for liquidation.

“In the current financial climate, United kingdom SMEs can easily realise sizeable growth in new overseas markets and should not be discouraged by payment worries. However, we would advise all companies to look at their cashflow position when beginning to export and consider debtor insurance as a safety net should the worst happen.”

About the journolist : Phillip Evans writes for EnableFinance.com who supply SME business owners with invoice factoring for their cash flow and business insurance for their business protection.