- Leading onboarding platform has helped more than 20,000
small businesses across the country
TORONTO, Dec. 22, 2020 /CNW/ - BMO's leading small
business onboarding platform, BMO Business Xpress, has extended
over $1 billion in credit
authorizations to small businesses across the country, saving them
time and helping them access capital more quickly. The onboarding
platform has significantly reduced the time it takes to apply for a
loan, from several days to roughly 20 minutes.
Since launching in October 2018,
BMO Business Xpress has helped more than 20,000 small business
customers. As well, the number of approved loans has jumped over
350 per cent in slightly over a year.
"Small businesses across this country have never needed us – all
of us – more than they do right now," said Mike Bonner, Head, Canadian Business Banking,
BMO Bank of Montreal. "We need to
ensure that these critical businesses have the support they need to
grow. With BMO Business Xpress, we have introduced a solution that
is tailored to Canadian small businesses and the response from
clients continues to be incredible. We will continue to find ways
to help all small business owners access capital and support them
as they grow."
To help Canadian businesses, BMO Business Xpress offers the
following:
- Data analytics technology that takes into account the specific
needs, complexities and risks of a small business enterprise –
significantly reducing the approval period for small business
loans.
- Best-in-class automatic adjudication strategies, designed to be
completed by one person in branch, from initial customer
conversations to document generation and signing in roughly 20
minutes.
- Specialized support for specific industries, with agriculture
customers able to secure a loan for up to $1,000,000 at their farm or home via BMO Business
Xpress in under a day.
As Canada's bank for business,
BMO is committed to supporting small businesses. The bank recently
introduced a new, dedicated business banking team to help ensure
that small and emerging businesses in Canada have the support and resources needed
for long-term growth. BMO also committed to doubling small business
lending in Canada to $10 billion by 2025. As well, the bank is
increasing its support of women entrepreneurs. As part of that, BMO
has introduced Women Client Strategy teams to provide holistic
support and has earmarked $3 billion
in capital for women entrepreneurs. BMO also pledged $100,000 in grants to women-owned businesses to
help them better position themselves coming out of the
pandemic.
To learn more about how BMO is supporting small businesses,
please visit: https://www.bmo.com/main/business/.
About BMO Financial Group
Serving customers for 200
years and counting, BMO is a highly diversified financial services
provider - the 8th largest bank, by assets, in North America. With total assets of
$949 billion as of October 31, 2020, and a team of diverse and
highly engaged employees, BMO provides a broad range of personal
and commercial banking, wealth management and investment banking
products and services to more than 12 million customers and
conducts business through three operating groups: Personal and
Commercial Banking, BMO Wealth Management and BMO Capital
Markets.
SOURCE BMO Financial Group