Cashflow is the lifeblood of every business but paying large, annual bills can put a strain on even the healthiest of balance sheets. PromptPay is a flexible finance solution from AIB which is designed to help.
Every year predictable but chunky bills can stretch resources, whether it’s preliminary tax, annual pension contributions, commercial property rates or annual audit fees.
PromptPay helps you take them in your stride, smoothing out big payments with the comfort of a fixed interest set of repayments, spread over a period of between six and 11 months.
It means no more stressing over late customer payments, unforeseen events and the impact they have on your cashflow, or your ability to pay your bills in a timely manner. With a minimum application of just €5,000, budgeting for the year just got easier.
“Cashflow management is the active management of the money coming in and going out of your business. It’s more than what you currently have in the bank, as it also considers the money you are owed by others, any unpaid debts, or scheduled payments you may have,” explains AIB’s business advisor for Cork, David Cotter.
“In addition, it involves taking actions to maintain the financial health of your business, both now and in the future.”
Cashflow management is important all year round of course but at this time of the year, with annual tax filing deadlines in mind, it is critical.
“This can be a busy time for many business owners, however effective financial forecasting, cashflow management, and early tax planning can help reduce and relieve the stress,” says Cotter.
PromptPay makes annual budgeting easier, with no unexpected changes in terms. It is simple to set up and, once approved, easy to draw down. As such, it helps businesses to plan effectively.
“We understand that business customers value certainty and PromptPay provides just that. It’s an effective and cost-efficient way to help business customers manage their short-term working capital needs by spreading large annual bills into manageable monthly repayments. This means customers can plan and budget for the year ahead without the added requirement to have significant cash reserves available to pay large annual bills in one payment,” says Cotter.
“It’s quick and easy to set-up and the ability to sign via DocuSign is a major plus for busy customers. We regularly get feedback on the how quick the turnaround is and how easy the draw down process has become,” he adds.
How Cool Running keeps cool about cashflow
David O’Donnell, commercial director at Cool Runnings Events, knows the benefits of PromptPay firsthand.
The company is responsible for some of the country’s best loved ice rink and skate trail experiences in Munster and Leinster, under its brand IceSkating.ie. It is also the owner of Zipit Forest Adventures, the exhilarating high ropes experiences available in Dublin, Cork and Roscommon.
This Christmas its experiences promise to be the company’s best yet, including a fantastic Alpine skate-trail through SuperValu Pairc Uí Chaoimh in Cork, the first experience of its kind in a sports stadium. It will also see a return of its fabulous festive rinks in Blanchardstown and Dun Laoghaire, in Dublin.
While the family business has been running such experiences since it was set up in 2007 by husband-and-wife team Bill Cremin and Orla O’Neill, David O’Donnell joined the business three years ago.
An accountant by profession who previously worked with Grant Thornton, when the opportunity to join the experience management company arose, he jumped at it. What’s not to love? “We’re in the business of fun and we look at that from the perspective of both our customers and our own team – we want them to have fun working with us and that’s hopefully reflected by the fact that we were recently certified as a Great Place to Work,” he says.
As with any organisation however, managing cashflow is a serious business, he points out. “It’s particularly important here because Cool Running Events is on a growth path, with a number of new locations on its radar. We’re at various stages of planning on a number of sites and we are always on the look out for new locations or landlords.”
Growth can put pressure on cashflow in any business but by its nature Cool Runnings has to plan for such challenges as seasonality. For example, casual staff numbers can triple at peak times of year, alongside its team of 24 permanent staff.
The seasonality of its business brands makes forecasting a challenge too, with revenues peaking in July and August for Zipit, and in November and December for the ice rinks.
On the other side of the ledger, August to October is when outgoings spike. “It’s when we start to put down-payments with our suppliers and landlords, and when we invest in equipment. We are constantly improving the experience for our customers, and putting in new experiences too, and we need to invest in that, so we have a really significant cash outlay at this time of year,” he explains.
Payments with aplomb
AIB’s PromptPay solution helps the business manage its cashflow constraints with ease. “It’s a really good, easy to access facility that we can draw on. It has a very straightforward approvals process, with no massively cumbersome information requests. We can draw from it quickly once it’s approved and as a result can reasonably forecast all our cash outgoings accurately,” says O’Donnell.
“For example, when our insurance bill comes in soon, I’ll use some of our PromptPay facility for that, and spread it over 11 months. I can decide quickly what to draw it down for. It’s the flexibility of PromptPay that makes it a high priority for me. For us its essentially an 11-month facility but if we choose to repay it when cash inflows are high, we can do so.”
Having the facility gives him peace of mind, O’Donnell says. “As an accountant I’m ultra prudent and for a business like ours, it’s just the comfort of knowing that if we need to draw something down at short notice, we can.”
Find out how AIB’s PromptPay could help your business’s cashflow run more smoothly