The Retailer Journey to be able to offer finance
Before you decide whether to offer finance to your customers, please read the following. The most important thing to remember is that we are compliance experts and will ensure you offer finance to your customers in a professional and compliant manner. For it to work, you must have the appetite to follow the process and engage with us and all our lenders in a positive manner.
Register your company
Once you have gone through the following steps you will be good to offer your customers a finance option, subject to their circumstances.
Initial application
Begin your application by clicking here or on the FinanceWorks home page. We will then carry out all the FCA required background checks on you and your business.
Relationship manager
You will be assigned a Relationship Manager, who will call you to arrange an online meeting to discuss the full application process and help complete the relevant forms.
Information request
If you wish to proceed we will forward a contract that can be electronically signed and a full application form that can be completed online (takes about 5 minutes). We will also need proof of ID and address.
Introducer Appointed Representative
If our checks show you are what the FCA call a fit and proper person and company, we will apply to them to add you to our Network, as an Introducer Appointed Representative (IAR) or an Appointed Representative (AR), using the information you provided to us.
This takes around 30 days for approval.
Firm Reference Number
The FCA will issue you with your Firm Reference Number (FRN) usually within 30 days. This will allow you to use our marketing resources to offer finance options to your customers and give you access to our large panel of lenders.
Integrate our application journey
Integration with FinanceWorks is pretty straightforward, we will supply you with all the marketing material for your website when you have been given your FRN by the FCA.
Lender approval
While this is all going on, we apply for approval with our lender(s) to see if they are happy for you to offer their loans through them. If not, we can still go ahead, with personal loans, which still increase sales.
Bespoke Calculator for your website
We will supply you with your very own bespoke quotation calculator, which enables your staff and customers alike to see what loan they can apply for, this increases sales.
To our knowledge, we are the only Broker that offers this service currently.
Staff Training
We will train all customer facing staff, to use the calculator and to send a link to the customer. As an IAR, you are limited in what you can and cannot say and do for the customer. If you become a full AR then you have more freedom to discuss finance. We will provide all the relevant training and information to enable you to be and remain compliant.
Oversight
After you have been approved to offer finance through us, that is not the end of it. Monthly, we will monitor your regulated activities. We check your website for compliance, handle any complaints from your customers, relating to any product purchased on finance. We will update you with any changes from the regulator or our lending panel. We will check if any staff have left or joined, and any newcomers are trained before they offer finance.
Your customers experience is as follows...
Once you have gone through the following steps you will be good to offer your customers a finance option, subject to their circumstances.
Customer applies
We will provide you with a link to our application form that contains a tracking ID that we use to track your customer's applications. You can request a report on this at any time.
Customer receives offers
On completion of an online application, your customer will receive an instant response with offers from a number of banks or lenders. It is up to them to select the best deal for themselves.
Customer accepts offer
If they choose to proceed the customer completes the application with the lender directly. The lender will usually pay out to the customer within 24-48 hours of the completed application.
You invoice for your service
You then treat that customer as you would treat a regular cash customer.