Your client's applying for a £200k working capital loan. The lender wants a business plan, three years of accounts, twelve months of bank statements, projections, and the directors' personal financial statements. They want it as one PDF, by Friday.
Loan applications are a paperwork test. Pass it and the loan goes ahead.
What lenders expect
Order: executive summary, business plan, last three years of statutory accounts, last twelve months of bank statements, forward projections (P&L, cash flow, balance sheet), directors' personal financial statements, supporting documents (key contracts, leases). Use merge PDF to combine in this exact order — lenders read in sequence.
Quality of inputs
The pack is only as good as its weakest document. Convert any Word documents via Word to PDF, Excel projections via Excel to PDF. Don't include screenshots — convert source files cleanly. A lender flicking through can tell a polished pack from a thrown-together one in thirty seconds.
Cover and index
Cover page with business name, application date, loan amount requested, and contact. Index page listing each section. Page-number the whole pack consecutively. This is what the credit committee reads first; make it clean. Annotate PDF to add a footer with the company name on every page.
Sensitive information
Loan packs contain everything sensitive — accounts, salaries, personal financials. Password-protect before sending. Send the password to the lender via a separate channel. Most lenders have secure portals — use them when available rather than email.
Version control
Lenders often ask for revisions or additional documents. Version every revision clearly — `LoanApp_v1.pdf`, `LoanApp_v2.pdf`. Never overwrite a previous version. Maintain a covering note tracking what changed between versions; lenders appreciate this and credit committees take notice.
FAQ
How long should a loan application pack be?
30-60 pages for most SME applications. Bigger applications run to 100+ pages with detailed projections.
Should accounts be signed or draft?
Signed audited or filed accounts where possible. If the most recent year is still in draft, include with clear labelling and a note on filing timeline.
Do I need to include personal financials of directors?
Most lenders require it for SME loans. Personal balance sheet, recent SA302s, recent P60s typically.
What's the right way to redact directors' personal info?
Don't redact what lenders need — personal financials are part of the assessment. Only redact information that's not part of the application.
A clean loan pack signals a well-run business. Build the pack in Flint and credit committees take you seriously.