Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 15 April 2014

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation

Access to Finance for SMEs: Bank of Ireland, Ulster Bank and AIB

4:10 pm

Mr. Ken Burke:

Absolutely. Typically, the process is a customer of another bank would come to us and say he or she may be able to do a deal and ask what he or she can raise. We run the numbers, go through the cash flows because it is important that we do not replace a customer that might be in difficulty with another bank with an unsustainable debt level and we also want to make sure that the customer has enough money to trade and to continue to invest in his or her business. Typically we issue a heads of terms to say all things being equal this is the type of funding we are likely do to. They would go back to the exiting bank and negotiate and then the deal would be cemented. That often comes back quickly. An exiting bank might have an end of year or end of quarter date by which it is prepared to do a deal with a particular customer.

Comments

No comments

Log in or join to post a public comment.