Monday 24 April: East Anglia’s Complete Commercial Finance, an independent business finance brokerage based in King’s Lynn, has launched its third annual Business Survey. The survey, which was first launched in 2021, invites companies across the region to share their views on business confidence and trading conditions. In this year’s survey, participants are asked to rank the challenges currently affecting them, including rising costs, taxation, staffing and finance. In previous years, the survey has shown how the pandemic, Brexit and spiralling fuel costs affected trading. While the pandemic prompted many to use a business loan for the first time, in the form of government-backed schemes such as the Bounce Back Loan Scheme (BBLS) and Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS), previous surveys revealed low level usage of other finance products. This year’s study will map changes in borrowing over the three-year period. “We are interested to see whether attitudes to commercial finance have changed during this time,” says Complete Commercial Finance director Karl Lanham. “There are always challenges for businesses to contend with, but the current cost of living crisis and labour shortages have peaked pressure on cashflow. This is leading more companies to look at finance solutions to bridge the gap and it will be interesting to see how this shapes views this year.” Businesses can participate in the survey here by Monday 31 July.