URICA joins forces with PetQuip to provide details of new risk-free access to cash service
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URICA, the government-backed early payment network for SMEs, is one of the sponsors of the PetQuip Awards at PATS 2016 and will be joining forces with PetQuip to launch a new service to the association’s members at the show.
Through URICA, PetQuip members can use their online platform, enabling them to get their customer invoices paid in cash as early as the day after approval. URICA’s unique early payment offering means businesses can trade on the terms that suit their business.
All businesses need to do is select their invoices and send them online via URICA, and receive cash payment on those invoices once URICA has confirmed payment from the customer.
The customer then pays URICA the entire value of the invoice, up to 90 days after the original invoice date. In total, URICA is now in the position to pay PetQuip’s members a total of £6,400,000 in cash, tomorrow. For those businesses, there is no risk, zero debt, and no fear of late or non-payment of their invoices any longer.
A critical advantage of URICA’s support for PetQuip members is access to their global partners, and in particular Euler Hermes for credit checking of existing and new customers, helping protect their businesses from commercial risks. This partnership with URICA offers PetQuip members cutting edge solutions to finance, risk and credit insurance.
One pet care company that has already experienced the value of the URICA service is Hownd, one of the finalists in this year’s PetQuip ‘Marketing Campaign of the Year’ award. In 2012, Mark Hirschel and Jo Amit, old family friends and both dog lovers, decided to take the lead in creating gentle and natural grooming products for pets, and formed Butch & Bess, now re-branded as Hownd.
The company started using URICA when it began supplying Pets at Home stores with their products, in the autumn of 2015. Having explored using another finance product in order to get early payment on their invoices, Hownd found it to be too difficult to work with, lacking in flexibility and quite expensive.
The URICA service has proved to be just the opposite. As Mark Hirschel commented: “With URICA, it’s been a very good working relationship and more favourable for businesses. I would highly recommend them to anyone.
"We can adjust every invoice according to how strong or weak our cash flow is and URICA releases 100 per cent of the cash in the invoice. Everything with URICA feels almost immediate and there’s always a person there on the other end of a phone or email.
"The one thing that URICA is not, is complicated – that’s for sure. It’s an easy, flexible system which just makes sense. For the fee that I’m paying, which is such a small percentage of the invoice value, it makes sense, feels right, and I don’t feel bad spending the money on such a good service for the business. It’s all about cash flow for us.”
Members of the URICA team will be at PATS on the PetQuip stand (B60) to provide association members and potential members with details of the scheme.
Of the partnership, Lindsay Whitelaw, Founder & Chairman of URICA, said: “We are delighted to be partnering with PetQuip to help its members grow and thrive. In an increasingly tough and globalised economy, and with the banks unable to provide the support that is needed, we aim to make sure smaller businesses can grow, employ more staff, export and thrive, but freeing them from the burden of late payment.”
Amanda Sizer Barrett, Director General of PetQuip and Gardenex, said: “The PATS exhibition provides us with an excellent platform from which to launch our latest business service to the pet product industry. We expect that many of our members will wish to explore the same flexible cash flow benefits as Hownd and that the URICA arrangement will encourage other pet care suppliers to explore the many benefits of PetQuip membership.”
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