- Virgin Money joins six existing lenders: HSBC, Santander,
Barclays, Lloyds, NatWest and Newable, making the General Export
Facility even more accessible.
- Oxfordshire based Westminster Group, which provides security
equipment and services worldwide, is the first to benefit from a
Virgin Money GEF.
- Accreditation and deal announced during a UKEF-Virgin Money
roundtable event during International Trade Week, discussing how
both organisations can collaborate to support more SMEs in
challenging economic times.
Samir Parkash, interim CEO of UKEF, has today announced that
Virgin Money is the latest financial institution to be onboarded
onto the General Export Facility
(GEF), opening up access to financial support to their business
customers.
GEF was launched in March 2021 and is designed to provide
access to flexible finance for SME exporters.
It has been a game-changing product unlocking almost £250 million
of working capital loans.
Samir Parkash, interim Chief Executive Officer at UK
Export Finance, said:
The General Export Facility provides vital hands-on government
support to British small businesses. Since it was introduced last
year it has unlocked almost £250 million of working capital loans
and underpinned (the liquidity requirements of) hundreds of small
businesses.
We want more businesses to have access to this support from UKEF
which is why I am delighted to announce that the clients of
Virgin Money can now use the scheme.
Virgin Money and UKEF’s first collaboration under GEF is to
provide support to the Oxfordshire based company Westminster
Group. The backing has enabled the business to win new export
contracts to supply X-Ray security machines to two international
airports in Southern Africa.
Sharon Ellis, Head of Business Networks at Virgin Money,
said:
Virgin Money is committed to supporting businesses with their
growth ambitions at this key time for the economy.
We are pleased to be fully operational with the General Export
Facility in conjunction with UKEF, as it enables us to increase
access to financial support for businesses like Westminster
Group, which is a great example of our relationship teams and
trade finance specialists working together to find exactly the
right solution to meet the customer’s needs.
To be eligible for support, businesses must meet several
criteria, including showing that in any one of the last three
financial years at least 20% of annual turnover has been made up
of UK export sales, or that in each of the last three financial
years at least 5% of annual turnover has been made up of UK
export sales.
