Page 39 - 25148.pdf

Ten Greatest Ideas for Planning Your Business • 27

All this is to defend the generalised forms that banks make their potential busi-
ness borrowers fill in before they will consider their case. If the ideas in this section
seem reasonable preparation work then I have made the point. I have used the
headings and order of one of the major banks' startup forms.

We should take them seriously for a number of reasons:

• You need to manage carefully your relationship with the bank, and this is their
first taste of the new boy's professionalism.

• Whatever business you are going into, the grand majority of the form is com-
pletely relevant.

• Filling them in ensures that you have thought through the points above and
then converted them into a profit and loss account and cashflow statement.

• They are comprehensive. If you have filled them all in apart from bits that
genuinely do not apply to your business, then you can rest assured you have
covered all the angles.

• They are the first and probably the last bit of free consultancy that the bank
will give you.

Now don't forget the point about negotiation. If you find it difficult to fill in one set
of bank forms, you may not relish the thought of doing two. And yet, that is what
you must do if you are to get the best deal. You need to play one off against another.
If, for some reason, one turns your case down, then go to a third and try again. You
might that way find that you have two offers to compare after all, and you may just
find, if the second bank turns you down, that there is a flaw in your plan that you
need to address.

Idea 17- Plan for a lucky break-even

Finally, your business plan should include, certainly for your use, a break-even analy-