Only a few days before the first-half profit results are due to be released by the RBS and other such banks, the Edinburgh banks has reported some pretty interesting information.
According to the source, over the last fiscal year the amount of small business start-ups taking accounts with the banking organization has in fact risen by 11%. In Scotland, this percentage has even reached 18%–up to 11 thousand accounts opened.
Chairman of small business operations at RBS, Peter Ibbetson likes to equate this increase to the ever ascending number of jobless individuals during the current recession. He claims to “think we are seeing a growth in start-ups because more people are unemployed.
“They are picking up the entrepreneurial spirit and starting their own businesses.”
He points out that growth has been particularly prevalent in professional industry like IT and accountancy, as well as leisure and educational fields.
“This is people coming out of university with qualifications who do not see themselves getting mainstream jobs so are going into consultancy,” he declares.
Ibbetson says that the increase in Scotland small business is also likely due to various policy changes taking place at the RBS, and perhaps less involving the economic recession.
RBS currently lends two years of free banking to any new business, where previously it would only provide this offer for the English NatWest brand.
The biggest fields in which small business start ups were formed appears to be motor sales and repair businesses, which has increased by a whopping 58%. Additionally, IT has increased by 54% and even leisure by 53%.
Ibbetson vehemently rejects criticisms that the small business banking industry is any less competitive in the north due to it’s dual domination between RBS and Llloyds Banking Group, the owner of the Bank of Scotland.
“We are as competitive north of the border as south of the border and certainly do not get any message from our customers that we are not competing for them.”
–Peter Ibbetson
