The eligibility checker at /check-eligibility is a routing tool, not a credit decision. This page sets out exactly how it works so you can decide how much weight to give the result.
Inputs
The checker collects a structured business profile. Fields are deliberately high-level — we do not ask for personal financial detail, full addresses, or account numbers. The profile covers:
- Business structure (limited company, sole trader, partnership)
- Months trading and home country within the UK
- Sector
- Average monthly turnover
- Card-sales share of turnover
- Whether the business raises invoices on credit terms
- Funding amount sought and intended use of funds
- Asset or property need, and whether security is available
- Director credit position at a high level
- Urgency window for funding
- Faith-finance preference (e.g. Islamic finance)
Routing engine
The engine is fully deterministic. There is no machine-learning probability model and no opaque weighting trained on outcomes. Each of the eleven product categories — including unsecured business loans, secured business loans, asset finance, invoice finance, merchant cash advances, revolving credit, bridging finance, commercial mortgages, development finance, R&D advances and Islamic business finance — has a published rule set. The profile is scored against each lender's public criteria, and products are ordered by fit, not by any commercial arrangement.
What the readiness score actually means
The readiness score is a measure of profile completeness and alignment with typical lender-published criteria. It is not a probability of approval, not a credit score, and not something a lender will see. A high score means we have enough information to route confidently. A low score means we have applied conservative defaults and you should treat the suggestions as a starting point for conversation, not a decision.
What we deliberately don't do
- No credit pulls. We do not perform searches against your credit file — soft or hard.
- No rate quotes. Pricing is set per-application by each lender; we do not display indicative APRs as if they were offers.
- No "best lender" ranking. We surface fit against published criteria. We do not declare a winner.
- No application submission. We do not arrange finance and we do not pass your details to a lender. You apply directly.
Data refresh cadence
Provider profiles are reviewed quarterly. Product hubs are reviewed every six months. The glossary and calculators are reviewed annually. Material changes — a lender pulling a product, a new minimum-turnover threshold — are applied as soon as we see them, with a note logged at /corrections.
Open methodology
Our lender dataset and routing rules live in this site's repository. If you believe a criterion is out of date, or that a lender should be added or removed, email hello@duesmith.com with the source. Editorial standards are documented at /editorial-standards.