Why small firms suffer from unavailable bank loans

I had an interesting conversation with a very senior member of the AQA Business examining team recently. The examiner was adamant that AQA will give candidates no credit whatsover for refering to the credit crunch - even in the context of writing about how small firms can finance their businesses. Perhaps we ought to send this article to the examiners to ask when the specification will be brought up to date with the economic downturn! Maybe they’re hoping that the economy has turned around by the time the 2nd editions of their textbooks go to print

There is some super business studies material in this short article. It brings home just how important bank finance is to SMEs, particularly in terms of providing working capital for day-to-day trading. The attitude of the banks concerned is, quite frankly, appalling. There has never been a better time to teach sources of finance with business students, but for how much longer will we have to illustrate the key concepts with such depressing stories like these?