Arranging merchant cash advances across Greater London
Merchant Services Cash Advances is a broker. We do not lend our own money and we keep no office in the capital. Enquiries from the 32 boroughs and the City of London are read and placed by Matt Lenzie, who has spent 25 years arranging commercial finance and much of that time on the funder side of the table.
What we bring is judgement about which funders price hospitality fairly and which will look past a thin credit file when the terminal data is strong. Our page on merchant cash advance lenders sets out the panel we take deals to.
How funding from daily card receipts works in England's capital
An advance is not a loan. A funder buys an agreed amount of your future card sales at a discount and pays you a lump sum up front, generally between £5,000 and £500,000. Repayment is collected as a holdback: a fixed percentage of every card transaction taken through your terminal, typically 5 to 20 percent of daily card takings.
In a flat week in January the funder collects less. Through a busy December it collects more. There is no fixed monthly instalment and no maturity date written into the agreement, which is the whole point of the structure for a business whose till is uneven. Our guide to what a merchant cash advance is covers the mechanics in full.
The cost of a card turnover advance for a business in London, UK
Cost is set as a factor rate rather than an interest rate, and it typically falls between 1.1 and 1.5. Take £50,000 at a factor rate of 1.3 and you deliver £65,000 in total, however long the takings need to get there. Because that sum is fixed at the outset, clearing it faster does not reduce it, and that is the single most important difference between an advance and a term loan.
The band is wide. Where a business lands depends on its sector, its card volumes and how steady those volumes look across a full year of acquirer statements.
Who qualifies for future card sales funding in Central London
Funders generally want around three months of card processing history and monthly card takings of roughly £2,500 or more. Personal credit carries far less weight than it would at a bank, because the underwriting reads the terminal rather than the credit file. That is why the product often suits an operator who has had a hard year but still trades well over the counter.
Trading districts we fund across the capital
London is not one trading market. Card takings behave differently street by street, and the areas below produce most of the enquiries that reach us.
The West End
Theatres, restaurants and late bars with heavy evening card volumes and sharp seasonal swings. A holdback that flexes with the takings suits a trade that rises and falls with the run of a show.
Soho
Small footprints, high turnover, independent operators. Kitchen replacements and fit-outs come round quickly here, and an advance is often the fastest route to funding one without pledging property.
Borough Market
Independent traders taking small card payments in volume. Consistent daily receipts of that kind read well to a funder, even where the business is young and the margins are thin.
Camden Market
Retail and street food stalls with weekend-weighted takings. Because collection follows the till, a quiet Tuesday does not create the arrears problem a fixed monthly instalment would.
Oxford Street retail spine
Fashion and gift retailers buying stock ahead of Christmas and the January sales. Advances are commonly used to fund that stock and then cleared out of the season that follows it.
Canary Wharf
Coffee shops, lunch trade and services built on office footfall. Volumes are predictable Monday to Friday, which underwriters like, though August and the Christmas fortnight are noticeably thinner.
Regulation and the honest position on advances in the UK capital
We should be plain about this. A merchant cash advance is a purchase of future card receivables, not a loan, and where the agreement is with a limited company it is an unregulated commercial contract sitting outside the Financial Conduct Authority's consumer credit perimeter. Agreements with sole traders and small partnerships can in some circumstances fall within the Consumer Credit Act, and where authorisation would be required we refer the case to a regulated firm.
We are a finance arranger and introducer, not a lender. Every figure quoted here is indicative and varies by funder, by business and by card turnover.