As the Bounce Back Loan scheme moved into week six, the number of approved loans once again dropped, and between the 8th of June and end of business on the 14th of June 2020 it was announced that some 81,338 BBL’s had been approved.
Keep in mind that the British Business Bank did everything in their power to stop the scheme going live, in fact it was during week six that Keith Morgan CBE announced that he would be standing down from the role of Chief Executive of the British Business Bank and as good as legged it out the door.
What was to come to light many months later was that he had sent a Reservation Notice to the Rt Hon Alok Sharma MP, Secretary of State, Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, in the days before the scheme went live in which he expressed all manner of concerns with the scheme and did not want it to go ahead when it did.
His job was filled by Catherine Lewis La Torre, who sadly appeared, as the weeks progressed, to be as opposed to the Bounce Back Loan scheme as Keith Morgan was, and sadly the British Business Bank offered no support to the many thousands of people who still could not access the scheme.
Not long after taking up her new position with the British Business Bank there was a noticeable number of tweets put out which had something of a “woke” feel to them, and no real help or support was forthcoming from the BBB regarding the many problems and complaints that were being reported to them.
It was as if the British Business Bank wanted to be proven right about their reservations about the Bounce Back Loan scheme and had decided to not offer any help or support to those experiencing problems with the scheme, as that way they could not be blamed for the failings of the scheme by the lenders THEY had accredited to offer BBL’s.
Anyway, as usual below is a video of some of the many messages I did receive during week six of the Bounce Back Loan scheme, and as you will see once again there were many people still getting nowhere.
Some people had been sent out EchoSign’s from HSBC that had incorrect bank account numbers on them, and as such they had been waiting for new documents to be sent out so HSBC could finally process their payments and send them to the correct account.
Many people had now been waiting weeks for HSBC to process their applications or open either a Business Account or a Feeder Account too. Some were also being declined for those types of accounts with no explanation.
Due to a mass decline email sent out to a huge number of people by Santander, that did of course mean many people who they declined then had to start hunting around for a new bank to apply for a Bounce Back Loan with.
Keep in mind many of the lenders that were approved would not allow new customers to sign up with them and/or had a cut off date in place, therefore even if someone did get a new business account with some of those lenders they were not “eligible” with that bank for a BBL due to those cut off dates.
Some people who had been sent out the mass decline email from Santander in week three did appeal that decision, and as you will see in the video above, they could re-apply and some also got compensation paid out to them too.
Having been approved for quite some time it was on June the 8th that Metro Bank finally made their Bounce Back Loan facility live, and as such many people did use their online application system to apply, which had a queuing system in place at busy times and appeared to also offer a hassle-free application process too.
There were some errors reported by those applying with Metro Bank, and for some of them those errors did stay in place for days which dragged on into weeks.
However, demand was so great for a BBL with Metro Bank and as it was quick and easy to apply for a business bank account using their online new account system, they soon got swamped and it was not long before they switched off that system and made applicants for a new account attend an in-branch appointment. But more of that later.
Many people were still able to open a Lloyds business account if they had a Halifax personal account which was opened and in use before the beginning of March and many of them reported a hassle-free journey onboarding and then applying for and getting paid out their Bounce Back Loans that way.
Barclays still had some errors that caused people to not be able to get their BBL applications in, and they took ages to respond to those complaining, it did cause many a stressful time for those with errors.
An increasing number of people were starting to see transfers out of the accounts they had their BBLs paid into with Lloyds being blocked, in some cases for days on end.
TSB pulled a trick during this week, and that was to allow those wanting a business account to open one up but only if they signed to say they would not go on to apply for a Bounce Back Loan with that account, you will see the email they sent out in the video above.
On the 10th of June, the Tide CEO announced they had used up their allocated funds they had set aside to land and were trying to raise more funds to lend out. They never did manage to do so and the tens of thousands of people on their waiting list ultimately never got a sniff of a Bounce Back Loan.
Tide Bounce Back Loans / Update 2 / A letter to all members from Oliver, our CEO
It was obvious from the huge number of tweets and messages I was getting that people had already sussed that fact. They had a waiting list of course, however that was going to go on to cause a huge number of problems for those on it who then tried to apply elsewhere.
Oh, and Barclays were making in-branch appointments for people to open business accounts, however many were either given dates weeks or months ahead or discovered their nearest branch with a business manager available was miles away.