BEF Group comprises of:

Business & Enterprise Finance Ltd t/a Business Enterprise Fund (Co no. 1792109); Business & Enterprise Finance (NE) Ltd t/a BEF (North East) (Co no. 09360892); Goole Development Trust (Co no. 3383475); BEF BSC Ltd (Co No. 11609382) and BEF-NPIF LTD (Co No. 10638308) as General Partner of the NPIF YHTV Microfinance LP.

Registered Office: The City Hub, 9 - 11 Peckover Street, Bradford BD1 5BD

These Terms of Engagement and the information therein apply to all BEF Group companies and associated funding providers.

Telephone Number: 0800 080 3145.

1) Who We Lend To

Limited Companies, Sole Traders, Partnerships. All applicants, including the Directors of limited companies must be resident in the UK, on the Electoral Register and subject to our standard due diligence checks.
If a Loan is offered it is on the condition that the money will be invested in the nominated business as proposed in the Business Plan & Application Form. If the borrower is a limited company, the loan will be to the limited company. If the borrower is a sole trader / unregistered partnership the loan will be a personal loan for business purposes.

2) Application Process

The application process is semi-automated and approval will be based on a credit scoring system. You will be contacted within 48 hours from the submission of your initial application.
An Investment Manager will be appointed to support you in the application process but cannot provide financial advice or complete the financial documentation required for the application.
Applicants will be informed of the decision by the appointed Investment Manager and these decisions are final with no right of appeal.
Loan offers may be subject to conditions being met.
Loan offers remain valid for 30 days from credit sanction. Should this period expire and the loan contract has not been entered into through no fault of BEF Group then you may need to reapply for the loan.

Any advice, information, guidance or support you receive from an investment manager (or other BEF staff) during or after the application process, does not in any way to constitute the giving of professional advice and BEF Group accepts no responsibility for any reliance you may place on any such information or advice given, which is done entirely at your own risk.

Arrangement Fee

The Arrangement Fee is the amount you must pay for the cost of the preparation and administration of your loan application and loan agreement. The fee is calculated as 3.5% of the drawdown amount in the loan agreement for standard term loans.
Additional Charges are made for the arrangement of security under the loan agreement.
The Arrangement Fee must be paid prior to your loan being drawn-down, if for any reason it is not the fee may be claimed via your direct debit payments.
If you do not draw down the loan funds following the preparation and approval of your loan application you will still be charged and must pay the Arrangement fee and we reserve the right to take legal action to recover the fee from you. (There is no arrangement fee for loans approved under the Start-Up Loans program.)

3) Securities

Personal Guarantees – may be required on some loan products. This is determined by our credit committee in advance of any offer being made.
Tangible Security - We reserve the right to request tangible security as part of our conditions for lending. This is also determined by our credit committee in advance of any offer.

You can find out more about Personal Guarantees in the Legal Information section of our website.

You are strongly advised to obtain independent legal advice on all securities required

4) Repayments

Repayments are made on a monthly basis by Direct Debit.
There is a charge of £25.00 for late payment if an instalment is not paid by the due date unless this has been agreed in advance of the due date.
Early Settlement: Full repayment of your loan before the end date is permitted but a charge of 3.5% of the balance owed will be applied to the settlement figure.
Overpayments: In any one year overpayments are permitted up to 5% of the original amount of capital advanced. Over payments above 5% will be subject to a 3.5% charge against the payment made.

5) Performance Monitoring

The Borrower agrees to provide BEF Group promptly with such financial or other information as BEF Group may from time to time reasonably request to enable BEF Group to understand and assess the financial position and performance of the Borrower’s business. These include access to bank statements and the provision of management accounts to a satisfactory standard.
The borrower agrees to provide BEF Group with job creation, employee segmentation and other non-financial information which may be required from time to time by our funders.

6) Financial Recovery and Admin Fees

You must pay all reasonable costs and expenses incurred by BEF Group as a result of you defaulting on your repayments or breaching the loan agreement. In the event of non-payment, BEF Group may use a debt recovery agent, our in-house legal team / external solicitors to recover any monies owed by you and you will be required to pay the full amount of any fees charged, costs, expenses or disbursements incurred as a result of your non-payment.
If you fail to respond to communications sent to you or in the course of Recoveries work, BEF Group may instruct Trace Agents or carry out credit checks on you to confirm your address and situation. (See Section 8 - Disclosure Declarations for further information on Credit Checks.)
In the event that a Court judgment is obtained any costs incurred by BEF Group after obtaining judgment may be added to your total judgment debt so that you may have to pay us both the amount of the judgment and our further costs and expenses until you have paid these in full. This means that even if you pay off the whole amount of the judgment you may still have a further sum to pay. In the same way, interest may be applied at the statutory rate to any outstanding balances after judgment has been obtained.

BEF Group will pursue all avenues available to secure repayment of the loan in the event of default or business failure.

7) Fees and Charges

In addition to the arrangement fee, other fees and charges may become due either in arranging securities as part of our conditions for lending to you or during the life of the loan. A full list of these charges can be found on our website www.befund.org in the Fees and Charges section. If you are unable to access our website or would prefer a printed copy for your records please ask either your Investment Manager or a member of our admin team.

8) Disclosure Declarations

Introducer Fees

If you were referred to us by a Broker / Accountant / Introducer and your application for a loan is approved the Broker / Aaccountant / Introducer who referred you may receive a fee of 1% the value of your loan (BEF Group Loans only). This fee may be payable to them even if you made an on-line application yourself. Your referrer should clearly advise you what that fee is. If you would like confirmation of any fee BEF may pay your referrer please ask your Investment Manager who will be able to confirm this fee payment.

Personal Credit Checks

By signing the Terms of Engagement you agree to BEF Group completing a credit check on you.
A credit assessment and Credit Check will be carried out on both the company and all directors and applicants as individuals. Credit searches may also be carried out at a future date as part of our trace and recovery work or in the prevention of fraud. The credit reference agency will hold a record of any search we make on your credit file which may be seen by other organisations if you apply for credit in the future.

Providing False or Misleading Information

By signing the Terms of Engagement you are accepting that the information you give may be used for the purposes of preventing and detecting crime and that any misleading statements (whether deliberate or accidental) given at any stage during the application process may render the Application invalid and the Applicant(s) may be liable to return any money already paid out.

Your Personal Data and how it will be used

As part of your application and the lending process BEF will collect personal data about you and your business.
Your information is needed to assess, manage and monitor your loan arrangement and contract with us, we may also need to approach your bankers and/advisors for clarification should the need arise.
It will be used to confirm your identity and creditworthiness and for the prevention and detection of crime, fraud or money laundering.
It may also be shared with a limited number of trusted finance partners, organisations and associates that BEF works with to support the provision of loan finance to you and other businesses.
By signing these Terms of Engagement you are accepting that BEF Group will use your information in this way.

Sensitive Personal Data

Some of the data we collect from you may be sensitive personal data, that is information about your health, gender, ethnicity or sexual orientation.

By signing the Terms of Engagement you are giving us your consent to process any sensitive data.

More details on how your data is used and managed can be found in our Privacy Notice on our website, www.befund.org.
We make every effort to ensure that your personal data is always protected, stored securely and used safely.

Complaints Procedure

It is our policy at BEF to Treat Customers Fairly at all stages of the process of applying, receiving and repaying your loan. The Business Enterprise Fund will fully investigate any grievance you may have about the service we provide and your experience of receiving loan finance from us, whether this relates to issues of procedure, client handling, financial administration or contract terms. The full policy can be found on our website (www.befund.org) Complaints.

Statement of Truth

By signing these Terms of Engagement you confirm that all the information you will provide will be a true and honest reflection of your business and personal finances. By misleading or giving false information in the process of this application you may be guilty of a criminal offence. If you are in the process of or intending to begin insolvency proceedings, such as an Individual Voluntary Arrangement (IVA), Company Voluntary Arrangement (CVA), Bankruptcy or have been recently issued with a Statutory Demand or Winding Up Petition or any similar process or are negotiating a Time To Pay Arrangement or similar with HMRC and do not disclose this fact at this stage then you may also be guilty of a criminal offence.

BEF Group’s policy is to pursue prosecutions in such situations vigorously

WE STRONGLY RECOMMEND YOU SEEK LEGAL ADVICE BEFORE SIGNING OR CONFIRMING ACCEPTANCE OF THESE TERMS OF ENGAGEMENT

BY SIGNING THE TERMS OF ENGAGEMENT YOU AND YOUR COMPANY AGREE TO BE BOUND BY THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CONTAINED IN THE TERMS OF ENGAGEMENT OF BEF GROUP