How to fill in an application

An application is eleven steps. Most are one question. It saves after every pause, and you can do them in any order.

The app promises three minutes and the checklist on your applications page adds its steps up to about nine. Both are honest: three minutes is the typing, and the rest is finding your bank statements — which is why having them to hand is most of the battle.

The rail down the left groups them the way a person thinks about it rather than the way our database is shaped: the business, where it is, what you need, then who you are and the proof. A tick means the step is finished. An amber mark means you have been there and left something undone.

The eleven steps

1. Where the business is registered

Canada or the United States. It is the first question because it decides everything after it — what we can offer, on what terms, and which paperwork the later steps ask for. Continuing is also where you authorise us to take the application to lenders.

2. Average monthly revenue

A slider rather than a box, because most people know this figure roughly and not exactly. Drag it to the average of the last six months across the business's main account.

To qualify you need an average of at least $20,000 a month over the past six months. Below that the step says so and lets you carry on anyway — we would rather look than turn you away on a number you typed approximately.

3. Where it operates

The province or state first, then the street address. Choosing the region first is what stops the address lookup offering you eight Wellington Streets in four provinces.

Pick your address from the list and the city and postal code fill themselves in — which is also how they end up agreeing with each other. If the lookup cannot find you, Enter it manually opens the fields empty. A lookup that cannot find you must never be a dead end.

4. The business itself

In Canada, start typing the legal name and we search the public registries — pick your company and the registration number, incorporation date and registry status arrive with it, so you do not have to dig out the certificate.

Everything the registry gives us stays editable — it is a head start, not an authority on your own company. In the United States there is no registry to search, so the fields are the step.

Then: business type, date of incorporation, industry, business phone, and your business number (Canada) or EIN (United States). A website if you have one, and a checkbox if you do not.

5. How much you need

An amount and one line on what it is for. Neither is binding — the note says so — and the step tells you what businesses your size usually ask for, so you are not guessing at a range.

6. Your last six bank statements

One of the three steps you cannot walk past. Until at least one statement is attached, the Next button stays where it is and goes grey, with the reason beside it — moving the refusal to the end, after you think you have finished, would be worse.

PDFs straight from your bank, six months of them. See bank statements for what counts and what does not.

7. Your company paperwork

Proof the business is registered. The list depends on the country you chose in step one — see company paperwork. You can leave this one and come back.

8. About you

Your name and email came from signing up, so this asks the two things a lender wants next: where to reach you, and how you are connected to the company. The contact details go on your account rather than on the application, so applying a second time does not mean typing them again.

9. Who owns the business

Anyone with 25% or more. That threshold is not ours — it is the one every lender we place with works to, and they will all ask before they fund anything. Name, role, email, ownership percentage, phone and home address, then Add owner. Repeat for each one.

Like the statements, this step will not let you past it with nobody on the list.

10. Verify it is you

A photo of your ID, about thirty seconds, in a secure window run by our identity provider. Once it passes you are never asked again — not on this application and not on any future one. See verifying your identity.

11. Check it over and send it

Everything you have entered on one page, with what is still outstanding called out. Read it, then Submit application. See sending it to us — and note that only an owner can press the button.

On the web

The rail on the left is a map and a set of shortcuts. It groups the eleven steps into five headings — Business country, Monthly revenue, Business details, How much you need, and We need to get to know you — each with a rough time against it, and it opens the group you are in. Click any step to jump to it.

Skipping ahead is allowed on purpose, because information arrives out of order — the bookkeeper has last month's revenue, the accountant has the incorporation number. The rail marks what you left rather than refusing to let you leave: a green tick is finished, an amber mark is started and not finished.

Between the two buttons at the bottom, a quiet Saved appears when your typing has reached us. On a narrow window there is no room for it, so it is hidden — the saving still happens, you just do not get told about it.

In the app

The same eleven steps in the same order, one per screen, because the app asks our server what the steps are rather than carrying its own copy of them. The footer with Back and Next floats over the form.

What is different on a phone, step by step:

• Country, revenue, funding — identical, and easier: the revenue slider and the amount keypad are better with a thumb than with a mouse.
• Location — the same province-then-address lookup. Type the first characters of the street and pick yours; if it cannot find you, enter it by hand.
• Business — the same registry search in Canada, the same manual fallback.
• Statements and company paperwork — this is where the app is genuinely better. Each document row opens Choose a file (Files and iCloud Drive) and a button for your photo library. If the statement came in the post, photograph it in the Camera app first and pick it here. See bank statements.
• About you and owners — the same fields, with the keyboard type set per field.
• Identity — opens the same hosted check in a Safari window, and the phone's camera is the easier one to hold up a licence to.
• Review — the same summary; if something is outstanding the app prints it where the Submit button would be. See sending it to us.

Start one with the + at the top of the Applications tab — or Start an application in the middle of the screen if you have none yet. An unfinished one says so on its row: Not sent yet — pick up where you left off.

An application you started on the phone is the same one waiting at your desk ten minutes later.