Practical writing on business finance from a chartered accountant who brokers it — what lenders look at, what funding really costs, and how the deal is actually done. Every article lists the sources it was written from, with the date they were read.
Since 22 May 2025, a New Zealand business can deduct 20% of a new asset's cost immediately and depreciate the rest as usual. Inland Revenue is explicit that this changes nothing about the total deduction over the asset's life — only when you get it. Hire purchase buyers are treated the same as owners for this purpose; an operating lease usually leaves the benefit with the lessor, not you.
Read →Importing stock means paying an overseas supplier up front while your own customers take 30 to 90 days to settle. Letters of credit, payment against documents, and import finance lines each cover a different piece of that risk, and trade finance can be paired with invoice finance so one facility repays the other. New Zealand Export Credit sits on the opposite side of the trade — built for exporters and their foreign buyers, not importers.
Read →Since 5 October 2023, retention money on New Zealand construction contracts must sit in trust, in a dedicated bank account, protected if the head contractor becomes insolvent. What that regime doesn't do is speed up when the money is actually released, or fund the weekly wage bill while progress claims sit on 30-90 day terms. Debtor finance and dedicated progress-claim facilities exist for that timing gap — standard invoice finance often doesn't fit staged claims at all.
Read →Invoice finance is priced and underwritten against the customer who owes the money, not just the business borrowing against it. When one customer is most of the ledger, that underwriting concentrates entirely on a single relationship. No New Zealand funder publishes a fixed percentage limit for this, but selective financing, recourse structure and upfront disclosure are the real tools for managing it — and for presenting a concentrated ledger honestly rather than hoping it goes unnoticed.
Read →An overdrawn shareholder current account is money the company has effectively lent the director. Left on interest-free or below-market terms, it can trigger a deemed dividend or fringe benefit. Charging interest at the prescribed rate removes that exposure entirely, though it brings its own RWT and reporting questions. A credit assessor reads a large balance as cash already extracted from the business, not as a routine bookkeeping entry.
Read →Almost every secured business facility ends with a financing statement on the Personal Property Securities Register, and the registration date decides who ranks first if two lenders claim the same assets. A prior registration doesn't have to block a new facility — subordination handles that — but it does mean checking your own record before you apply. If a lender won't discharge a repaid facility, you can force it yourself, at no cost.
Read →An IRD instalment arrangement turns an open-ended tax debt into a defined, scheduled obligation a lender can actually assess. It reduces the penalties you end up paying, but it does not stop use-of-money interest — that keeps accruing and gets folded into your instalments. Getting the arrangement formally agreed before you apply for finance, not while arrears sit unaddressed, is what actually changes how a credit assessor reads the file.
Read →An unsecured business loan skips the charge over assets but almost always still takes a personal guarantee from directors. Trading history and turnover thresholds vary by lender and even by product, published loan caps range from around $100,000 to $500,000 depending on which page you read, and neither major non-bank lender in New Zealand publishes an actual interest rate. Speed is the genuine selling point.
Read →A commercial finance broker is typically paid by the lender, built into the deal rather than billed to you separately. In 2025 the UK Supreme Court's Johnson v FirstRand decision set out exactly what disclosure has to look like when that happens. New Zealand business lending sits largely outside consumer credit law — which makes it more important, not less, to ask your broker three specific questions before you sign.
Read →A personal guarantee makes a director the lender's last resort if the company can't pay. 'All obligations' wording can quietly cover debts you never discussed. The family home sits outside the PPSR system entirely — it's taken by mortgage, not a financing statement. You can ask for a guarantee to be limited or capped. The independent legal advice certificate protects the lender's position as much as yours.
Read →Hire purchase, finance lease and operating lease split ownership, depreciation and GST timing differently, and Inland Revenue's own technical statements show the common assumptions are wrong more often than not. Hire purchase lets you claim GST upfront and depreciate an asset you don't yet legally own. Genuine operating leases spread GST payment by payment. The balance sheet question is one for your accountant, not a generic comparison.
Read →A decline letter rarely says why. Underneath, credit teams are usually working through a short, checkable list: security that's already spoken for by an existing general security agreement, a director who fails a legal eligibility test, trading history too short for the product applied for, or simply the wrong product for the job. Each has a specific fix and a realistic timeframe.
Read →Invoice finance advances 80–90% of an unpaid invoice within a day or two, with the balance released (less fees) once the customer pays. Funders quote the fee flat per invoice, not as an annual rate — a 2–4% charge on a 30-day invoice works out to roughly 24–48% annualised. It suits B2B businesses waiting 30–60 days on creditworthy trade customers, not retail or consumer sales.
Read →Most of what decides an application happens before you apply, in the numbers you already carry. Serviceability, add-backs, gearing, debtor concentration and guarantees — read the way a credit team reads them, from the accountant's side of the desk.
Read →Deplexifi's founder is a Chartered Accountant. Every case is prepared and read the way a credit team reads it before it's put in front of a lender — and you pay nothing; the lender pays our commission on completion, confirmed to you in writing.
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