As we enter the second stage of the Economic Resilience Grant Fund, Mike Fenwick of Verde Corporate Finance brings us the latest information on the business support being made available.
The Welsh Government has made a significant amount of funding available to support businesses in Wales during the Covid 19 pandemic as set out below:
- £1.4 billion of funding through the Non-Domestic Rates Grant
- £500 million of funding through the Economic Resilience Fund
The Non-Domestic Rates grant, which is being administered by the Local Authorities in Wales, is closing to new applications on 30 June 2020. Grants of up to £10,000 are available to all eligible businesses and grants of up to £25,000 are available to eligible businesses in the retail, leisure and hospitality sector.
The first £100 million of the Economic Resilience Fund was allocated to the Development Bank of Wales’s loan scheme. That scheme is now closed and fully subscribed after more than 1500 applications were received within the first week of the scheme opening.
A further £300 million of funding was allocated to Round 1 of the Economic Resilience Grant Fund. Approximately 9,000 applications were received and the scheme was paused whilst Welsh Government processed these applications.
The remaining £100m will be allocated to Round 2 of the Economic Resilience Grant Fund. The eligibility checker will be available from mid-June 2020 and the Welsh Government expects to open the fund for applications before the end of June 2020.
As in the previous round of funding, the fund will be open to applications from micro businesses, small and medium enterprises and large businesses however unlike Round 1, applications will be open to micro businesses that are not VAT registered.
Other than that, Round 2 will be subject to the same criteria as Round 1 and businesses will need to have suffered a reduction in turnover of 40% for micro businesses and 60% of SME’s and large businesses from 1 March 2020 as a result of Covid 19.
With the phasing out of the furlough scheme over the next couple of months grant funding could be an extremely useful source of funding to assist with cash flow during this period.
