Rishi has extended the amount of time businesses have to repay their Government backed loans, from six to ten years, under his ‘pay as you grow’ initiative.

Although these loans were interest free for the first year, repayments will be beginning to kick in soon and bearing in mind that we are still in lockdown with many businesses still closed, these repayments are going to be hard to make.

Rishi announced that to help businesses they would be able to:

• Extend the length of the loan from six to ten years
• Make interest only payments for six months, with the option to use this for up to three times during the length of the loan
• Take a payment holiday for up to six months

The banks, who have been the facilitators of the loans, will contact their customers from next week to inform them of the new options.

These options seem sensible in the light of reports that some 60% of these loans will never be repaid.