COVID-19 Initial Financial Support to Investee Social Enterprises

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4 July 2020

COVID-19 Support Update

During the pandemic Resonance has offered considerable financial support to our investee social enterprises. In summary:

Six month capital repayment holiday – available to all investees;
Interest payment holiday period - available on a case by case basis to investees

It is our expectation is that there will be additional financial support made available to social enterprises in the near future. We will provide an update on how investees could potentially access this, either through Resonance or by other means, as soon we are made aware.

Many of our social enterprises have asked us for some non-financial support, and we are working closely with a number of individual enterprises where we can, to develop additional services and provide bespoke support. Examples of support we have been able to provide range from making introductions, whether that is connections between investees in order for them to discuss potential collaborations, or introductions to low-bono advisors who can offer expertise in areas like marketing, operational and financial. Our investment managers have also been effective sounding boards for several CEOs who have found it helpful to have someone to discuss their concerns about the challenges their businesses face during the crisis and in the future. Signposting to the government’s support packages and grant providers, has also been part of the ongoing support process.

We’d like to reaffirm our promises made at the beginning of the crisis:

We will provide specific support and continue to adapt our specific support for investees;
We will keep lines of communication open and keep in regular contact, being here when our clients need us to be;
We will facilitate ways to help each other. We have an amazing network of social enterprises and investors. We believe that working together and sharing ideas/resources will help us to minimize the impact of COVID-19 as much as possible.

We would recommend that you keep up to date on the latest news on how to access the package of government support which can be found at: Government Support

For the latest news on how the social investment sector is responding to support social enterprises please our Industry Support page.

Whilst our physical offices remain closed, all the team at Resonance have the ability to work from home and we are fully functional. We would therefore reiterate - please do get in touch if there is absolutely anything the team at Resonance can help you with.

Stay safe.

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6 April 2020

COVID-19 Update & Additional Financial Support to Investee Social Enterprises

As the rapidly developing Coronavirus (COVID-19) and government response continues to unfold, here at Resonance we wanted to set out the initial financial action we are taking to support our social enterprise investees. Over the last week we have reached out to many of our investees and are actively feeding their thoughts, comments and situations into our approach. We have also been heavily engaged with the sector and government in order to understand the wider response and interventions.

We have informed all our investees personally, as well as outlining here our initial specific financial support:

We previously announced that with immediate effect all enterprises that we have invested in, that are already repaying capital or due to start capital repayments in the next six months, will be able to access a six month capital repayment holiday. This means that we will suspend capital repayments that they are due to make, if any. This measure has already been pre-authorized, so should they wish to take advantage of it, they have been asked to get in touch with their Resonance investment manager directly to discuss how this affects their loan.

In addition to this, we would also like to announce the following additional support which we have been developing this week:

On a case by case basis we are introducing an interest payment holiday period for those that need it at this time. This means, if applicable, that we will suspend all interest payments that are due to be made for a certain period of time. The length of the interest free holiday period is dependent on the type of investment that was made to an investee. If an investee takes advantage of this we will defer the payment of that interest to a later agreed date, without charging further interest on the deferred interest or charging any fee, ensuring that they won’t pay any more interest than they would have done with their existing agreement. If an investee would like to take advantage of this or require more information, please get in touch with me.
We have been actively involved in sector level discussions and have raised awareness of the urgent requirement for additional patient finance to be made available to social enterprises. Our expectation is that there will be an announcement made at an industry level in the couple of weeks on the financial support available. We will provide an update on how investees could potentially access this, either through Resonance or by other means, as soon as the relevant measures are in place.
Many of our social enterprises have asked us for the non-financial support that we could offer, so we are currently developing a package of tools and services that they will be able to access from Resonance. Again, I will update you on this during the next week.

We are very aware that the support we offer you may need to extend further over the coming weeks and months, and we are keen to work with each of you to understand exactly what additional support is required, whether that’s additional financial or non-financial support.

During these challenging times we’d like to reaffirm our promise that:

We will provide specific support as further announced today and continue to adapt our specific support for investees;
We will keep lines of communication open and keep in regular contact, being here when our clients need us to be;
We will facilitate ways to help each other. We have an amazing network of social enterprises and investors. We believe that working together and sharing ideas/resources will help us to minimize the impact of COVID-19 as much as possible.

We would recommend that you keep up to date on the latest news on how to access the package of government support which can be found at: Government Support

For the latest news on how the social investment sector is responding to support social enterprises please visit the Good Finance website.

Stay safe.