Invoice Finance

The amount of finance available will typically be stated as a percentage of your outstanding debtor book or sales ledger, but may be constrained by specific terms such as limiting exposure to a single large customer.

Typically, payments from your customers will go into a bank account controlled by the factoring company, and your customers will be aware that you use factoring. Some factoring providers will give you the option to credit insure particular customers or your entire sales ledger to minimise your exposure to bad debt (this is known as recourse and non-recourse factoring).

Factoring is a subcategory of invoice finance. Other types of invoice finance are invoice discounting, where you remain in charge of your credit control, and selective invoice finance, where you can choose which customers or invoices to finance.

One of the main things to consider about any form of business finance is risk. From the lender’s perspective, factoring is lower-risk because they’ll have more control over ensuring your customers pay you on time. That means that factoring is often what lenders favour for companies with low turnover, a short trading history, or any other challenging circumstances.