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With an unsecured Funding Circle small business loan, you can borrow between £10,000 and £750,000 over six months to six years. Funding Circle is not a direct lender but a lending platform, using institutional investors to fulfil loan requests.
The lack of early repayment fees means it might be a good option for businesses which think they can pay back the loan in full before the term ends. However, you should be aware that all Funding Circle business loans require a personal guarantee.
Funding Circle Business Loan
Available on application
£10,000 – £750,000
6 months – 6 years
Available on application
NerdWallet's Review Summary
With an unsecured Funding Circle small business loan, you can borrow between £10,000 and £750,000 over six months to six years. Funding Circle is not a direct lender but a lending platform, using institutional investors to fulfil loan requests. Find out more by reading NerdWallet’s Funding Circle Business Loans Review.
Funding Circle business loans key features:
- Borrow as much as £750,000: Funding Circle’s unsecured small business loans can stretch from £10,000 to £750,000.
- Terms vary: Funding Circle offers loan terms that stretch from a minimum of six months to a maximum of six years.
- Early repayment: Borrowers will not be charged for repaying their Funding Circle business loan in full early.
- Personal guarantees: Borrowers will need to provide a personal guarantee to obtain a Funding Circle business loan.
NerdWallet's Pros & Cons
Pros
- You can borrow up to £750,000 with an unsecured fixed-rate Funding Circle small business loan.
- The minimum term length is just six months, meaning you can pay your loan off quickly if you wish.
- There are no early repayment fees for paying your loan off in full before the end of your term.
- The customer service offered by Funding Circle has earned the company a very high Trustpilot rating, with particular praise directed at the loan application process.
Cons
- The maximum term length is six years, which is shorter than many traditional lenders.
- While you don’t need to provide an asset as a security to get a Funding Circle business loan, you will be asked to give a personal guarantee.
- While Funding Circle’s customer service has won praise from customers, the company offers no branch or app access.
This product may be one of a range offered by this provider. Always check terms & conditions for suitability before applying.
Learn more about how we bring you our review.
Key features
- Loans of up to £750,000Funding Circle offers unsecured small business loans from £10,000 to £750,000.
- Borrow from six months to six yearsFunding Circle offers loan terms from a minimum of six months to a maximum of six years.
- No early repayment feesYou will not be charged a fee if you want to repay your Funding Circle business loan in full early.
- Personal guaranteesYou are required to provide a personal guarantee when taking out a Funding Circle business loan.
Funding Circle business loans pros & cons
Pros
- You can borrow up to £750,000 with an unsecured fixed-rate Funding Circle small business loan.
- You don’t need a pre-existing account with Funding Circle to get a loan.
- The minimum term length is just six months, meaning you can pay your loan off quickly if you wish.
- There are no early repayment fees for paying your loan off in full before the end of your term.
Cons
- The maximum term length is six years, which is shorter than many traditional lenders.
- While you don’t need to provide an asset as a security to get a Funding Circle business loan, you will be asked to give a personal guarantee.
- Funding Circle offers limited customer service options, with no branch or app access.
The pros and cons featured here are chosen by us based on a combination of our expert, research-based opinions and an exclusive survey of UK business owners and decision makers. The survey was conducted on behalf of NerdWallet UK in December 2022 to identify the business loans features that people feel are most important. They are unlikely to be the only product features and restrictions that you should consider. Pros and cons are subjective and you should align them to your own personal and business circumstances. Information was correct at the time of publication but may have changed since.
Funding Circle business loans review
Founded in 2010, Funding Circle says that it has, to date, supplied over 103,000 businesses with £13.6 billion in total funding. The provider works differently, however, to a traditional lender – at least it does, behind the scenes.
Unlike a bank, Funding Circle is not a direct lender. It is a peer-to-peer lending platform. When you apply for a Funding Circle business loan, your application is presented to the platform’s institutional investors, who may then choose to fund the amount you want to borrow.
Funding Circle facilitates this transaction: You receive your loan through the platform, and Funding Circle directs your repayments back to the relevant investors. You will never interact with the investors who have funded your loan.
Small business loans
Funding Circle’s main product is an unsecured fixed-rate small business loan worth £10,000 to £750,000. The term length is six months to six years.
You will be charged a one-off completion fee when you take out a loan. This completion fee will be determined by your risk rating and the term length you choose.
However, there are no early repayment charges if you want to pay the loan off in full before the end of your term.
Other products
Funding Circle offers a couple of other business finance products, including:
- FlexiPay: This is an interest-free line of credit, with limits of £1,000 to £250,000. You can charge an invoice through FlexiPay, and then pay it back over three months, with a flat fee from 1.5% per invoice depending on the number of instalments you choose.
- Asset finance: Funding Circle asset finance allows you to use the asset you want to purchase, or already own, as security for a loan. You can apply for asset finance up to £5 million, with a term of one to seven years.
Funding Circle business loans: at a glance
| Amount borrowable | £10,000 to £750,000 |
| Term length | Six months to six years |
| Web-based customer service | Online contact form X (formerly Twitter): @FundingCircleUK |
| UK customer service number | 0800 048 2467 (9am to 6pm Monday to Friday, 9am to 4.30pm Fridays) |
| App | No |
| Face-to-face customer service | No |
| Access to loans without pre-existing account | Yes |
Where Funding Circle business loans stands out
Maximum amount borrowable: You can borrow up to £750,000 with a Funding Circle small business loan.
No early repayment fees: With Funding Circle, you can pay your business loan off in full, at any time, without incurring early repayment fees. This means you can save money on interest.
Customer reviews: At the time of writing, Funding Circle has very positive reviews from customers, including an ‘Excellent’ rating on Trustpilot.
No need to create a new business account: Since Funding Circle isn’t a bank but a lending platform, you will not need to open a specific business account in order to get a loan.
Eligibility requirements: While you will need to pass Funding Circle’s credit checks, the only eligibility requirements are that your business has been trading for at least one year, and that it is based in the UK. This means there are no minimum turnover requirements for your business to meet.
Where Funding Circle business loans fall short
Personal guarantees: Funding Circle requires you to make a personal guarantee when taking out a business loan. This means that, if your business is unable to make the loan repayments, you as the business owner will be responsible. You are essentially acting as a guarantor for your business.
Completion fee: Funding Circle will charge you a completion fee when you take out a loan, based on your risk rating and term length.
Maximum term length: The maximum term length you can get with an unsecured Funding Circle small business loan is six years. This is shorter than the maximum terms offered by many traditional lenders.
Loan requests can be withdrawn: If your business loan request is not fully funded by investors on Funding Circle’s lending platform, it may be withdrawn.
Limited customer service options: If you want to get in contact with Funding Circle, your only options are an online contact form (where the response time is usually three working days), social media or over the phone. There is not live chat support, in-branch access, or mobile app.
Funding Circle business loans customer reviews
Funding Circle has an ‘Excellent’ Trustpilot rating of 4.6 out of 5, based on over 15,400 reviews. This is for the brand as a whole, and not any one specific product.
This information is correct as of 5 December 2024.
Funding Circle business loans eligibility
As the most basic point of entry, to be eligible for a Funding Circle business loan, you must:
- have been trading for at least one year
- be based in the UK
Funding Circle will also run a hard credit check – i.e. one that appears on your credit history – on all shareholders and the business itself in order to make sure you can afford the loan.
How to apply for a Funding Circle business loan
When applying for a business loan with Funding Circle, you will likely need to complete the following steps:
- Complete the initial eligibility check, which should take around 30 seconds, to see if you qualify for a Funding Circle loan.
- Fill out the online application. If you are a limited company, a director will need to be present when applying to answer verification questions and electronically sign the documents.
- Once the form has been completed, you will also need to send Funding Circle the required documents. This includes business bank statements for the last eight months, and your latest full unabbreviated accounts.
- You may hear back a decision on your application in as little as an hour.
- If your application is approved, it will typically take 2 days for you to receive the funds.
Warning: The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is warning there are clones of this firm, where fraudsters use the details of the genuine, authorised company to mislead customers. If you are not sure you’re dealing with the genuine company, its official website and contact details can be found at https://www.fundingcircle.com/uk/
» MORE: How to get a business loan
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