Commercial Finance Broker UK

1. What is a commercial finance broker?

A commercial finance broker sources funding for businesses from lenders across the market, rather than lending money themselves. Banks can only offer you their own products, and will decline you if you fall outside their criteria. A broker knows which of the hundred’s of lenders operating in the UK will consider your situation, and approaches the ones that fit.

We handle business loans, invoice finance, asset finance, merchant cash advances, trade finance, commercial mortgages, bridging and property development finance. In practice that means we spend our time on two things: working out what a business actually needs, and knowing which lenders say yes to what.

2. How does a commercial finance broker work?

You tell us what you are trying to fund and give us a picture of the business like recent accounts, management figures and a few months of bank statements. We tell you which options are realistic, what they are likely to cost, and which lenders are worth approaching.

If you want to proceed, we package and submit the application on your behalf, deal with the lender’s questions, and stay with it through to drawdown. You are not filling in six different application forms or having six credit searches run against you.

If we do not think we can improve on what you have already been offered, we will say so.

3. Do you charge broker fees?

We are paid a commission by the lender if you go ahead with a business finance facility they provide. That is disclosed to you, and it does not increase the cost of your funding. If a particular case is ever an exception to that, we will tell you before you commit to anything.

For secured property finance deals, our standard fees are £495 and 1% of the lending amount, only upon successful completion.

4. Can I get business finance with bad credit or a CCJ?

Often, yes but it depends what the adverse credit is, how old it is, and what the business looks like now.

Lenders care about different things. A satisfied CCJ from three years ago is treated very differently from an unsatisfied one from last quarter. Some lenders will decline on any adverse credit; others price for the risk and lend anyway. Security changes the picture too, asset finance and invoice finance are secured against something tangible, so credit history carries less weight than it does on an unsecured loan.

If your own bank has declined you, that is not the end of it. A decline from one lender tells you about that lender’s criteria, not about whether your business can be funded. It is worth a conversation before you assume the answer is no.

5. How much can my business borrow?

It depends on the type of facility and what is backing it.

As a rough guide: unsecured business loans commonly run to around 25–30% of annual turnover. Invoice finance is driven by your sales ledger rather than turnover, typically advancing up to 90% of the value of unpaid invoices. Asset finance is set by the value of the asset. Commercial mortgages usually go to 70–75% loan to value.

Every one of those is subject to affordability and the lender’s own underwriting. The honest answer is that the number comes out of your accounts, not out of a table on a website.

6. How quickly can funding be arranged?

It varies a lot by product.

A merchant cash advance or short-term business loan can complete within 24-48 hours. Invoice finance and asset finance typically take one to three weeks. Commercial mortgages and development finance run to several weeks or months, because they involve valuations and legal work that cannot be rushed.

What slows most applications down is missing paperwork. If you have recent accounts, up-to-date management figures and bank statements ready, you remove most of the delay.

7. What size of business do you work with?

Most of our clients turn over between £150,000 and £10 million, though we work with businesses above and below that range.

We deal with limited companies, LLPs and partnerships. Some products, particularly unsecured lending, are easier to place for limited companies with a couple of years of filed accounts.

8. Can you help with government-backed business loans?

Yes. The current scheme is the Growth Guarantee Scheme, which replaced the Recovery Loan Scheme on 1 July 2024. It offers facilities generally up to £2 million through British Business Bank accredited lenders, for businesses with turnover up to £45 million.

One thing worth being clear about: the government guarantee protects the lender, not you. The borrower remains 100% liable for the debt. And a scheme-backed facility is not automatically the best option — if your business can be funded on ordinary commercial terms, that is often faster and cheaper. We will tell you which applies.

CBILS, Bounce Back Loans and the Recovery Loan Scheme are all closed.

9. Are you regulated by the FCA?

No, and we do not need to be for the work we do. We arrange non-regulated business and commercial finance, lending to businesses rather than to consumers, which falls outside the FCA’s regulated activities.

That means we do not advise on or arrange regulated mortgage contracts, consumer credit, or residential mortgages. If what you need is a regulated product, we will tell you and decline your enquiry.

Bolton Business Finance Ltd is a limited company registered in England and Wales, company number 12495909.

10. What areas do you cover?

We arrange finance for businesses across the whole of the UK. Most of what we do is handled by phone, email and video call, so being at the other end of the country is not an obstacle. If you would rather meet in person, we can usually arrange that in the North West.

We are based in Bolton and work extensively across Greater Manchester and Lancashire, Bolton, Manchester, Salford, Bury, Wigan, Oldham, Rochdale, Stockport, Trafford, Preston, Blackburn and Burnley among others.