Up to 90% of the value of the purchase order – the amount of PO finance depends on the size of the order (i.e. the amount owed to you) and the creditworthiness of the company issuing the order
Depends on your payment terms (e.g. 30, 60, 90 or 120 days)
Between 1.8% and 6% per month typically
1-2 weeks
Allows you to fulfil an order
Any product distributor or reseller needing finance to fulfil a specific order
Purchase order finance (‘PO Finance’) is funding advanced to a supplier (from a finance provider) secured against a confirmed purchase order. It removes some of the financial pressures of fulfilling an order – especially a large order – by helping finance a transaction up until the time you raise an invoice.
You can use purchase order finance if you are a product distributor or reseller and need finance to fulfil a specific order. You can’t use PO finance if you directly manufacture products or if you just want to build inventory.
How does purchase order finance work?
It’s interesting to compare PO finance to invoice factoring and invoice discounting, where the lender advances you cash after you’ve invoiced your customers – the cash advance is secured against these invoices (usually up to 90% of their value). In other words, this cash is advanced ‘post-delivery’ – once your customer has received your product or service. Once the customer has paid in full, your lender will send you the remaining balance minus their fees. By contrast, PO finance is ‘pre-delivery’.
You might want to consider supplier finance, which is also ‘pre-delivery’.
Supplier finance has two main advantages over PO finance:
However, supplier finance comes with a limitation: your finance provider can buy products on your behalf only up to the amount that your business can be credit insured. So you might not be able to use supplier finance for very large orders – this is where PO finance has the edge.
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