finance 31
Supporting Oxfordshire's expanding economy
As confidence among Oxfordshire’s businesses continues to grow, Jim Heppell, NatWest’s director of commercial banking for the county, outlines how firms are capitalising on the improved climate and his own team of sector specialists is growing to support them
Oxfordshire is a vibrant and prosperous county in which the signs of recovery have been strong for more than a year now.
NatWest’s latest Regional Growth Tracker showed that Oxfordshire’s economy expanded at 3.6% during 2014, outperforming the South East as a whole at 2.8%, and the UK overall at 2.7%.
Current forecasts from Oxfordshire County Council are for continued growth, with 85,000 new jobs and 100,000 new homes in the county by 2031.
Eighteen months ago many businesses told us they were focused on cost control and efficiency; they were cautious or felt that it was just too early to invest.
During this time NatWest has been proactively contacting clients to discuss how we may be able to support them with funding, to improve efficiency or reduce risk – an initiative known as Statement of Appetite.
Since the beginning of last year we have seen a steady increase in businesses coming back to us with more confidence in the strength of the UK economy and in Oxfordshire’s economic outlook. Whether it is to fund increased capital expenditure, new acquisitions, higher levels of working capital or the purchase of new premises, we are seeing an appreciation that businesses need to invest, and to do nothing is no longer a viable strategy.
Unemployment is low in Oxfordshire, at 3%, compared to 6.5% across Great Britain as a whole. Thanks to this and the fact that the economic outlook is increasingly positive, businesses are keen to make sure that they don’t lose ground to their competitors and this creates the opportunity for NatWest to support them.
professionals, manufacturing, healthcare, agriculture and leisure. We have also recently grown the team following the appointment of David Buckmaster. Buckmaster has been with the bank for 30 years and takes up his position in Oxfordshire following 17 years in the Thames Valley where he has been successful particularly in supporting technology businesses.
Another of our sector specialists, Rebecca Watts, who focuses on healthcare, recently supported Deddington Health Centre with borrowing for a robot for its dispensary, and for the redesign of their surgery building.
The machine can store 70% of the medicines kept on the site and carries out jobs previously done by dispensary staff, freeing them up to serve patients more efficiently.
Practice manager Melanie Watkins said: “When deliveries arrive they are emptied into a hopper on the robot, which then puts the medications away. When a GP sends a new prescription through it stops all other work and collects the required medications and sends to a dispenser for issuing. For those prescriptions that are ordered for later collection the robot issues the medicines to a dispenser for checking and the complete prescription is then re- stored in the robot.”
NatWest’s Rebecca Watts and Dr Mike D’Souza of Deddington Health Centre with the new robotic dispenser
Our aim is to work with customers to enable them to achieve their ambitions. When local businesses flourish, our economy flourishes too.
That’s why we work hard to ensure that we have a team of relationship managers who understand the challenges and opportunities that business owners can face. Each of the team spends a minimum of three days each year working in customers’ businesses so that they can experience first- hand how it really is to run that business. NatWest is the only bank with relationship managers independently accredited by the Chartered Banker Institute. This means they have an endorsed level of professional excellence, allowing them to proactively meet a customer’s daily
THE BUSINESS MAGAZINE – THAMES VALLEY – APRIL 2015
challenges, explore new business opportunities and offer ideas for development.
We also recognise that there are certain sectors where, as well as strong banking experience and knowledge, there is a need for a wider appreciation of specific issues, opportunities or threats. We therefore have managers who not only have an interest in those sectors but have relevant industry training and look after a number of businesses in the same sector who may have similar factors to contend with.
In Oxfordshire we have specialists in education and not-for-profit,
Dr Mike D’Souza said: “Rebecca has been extremely helpful and supportive. Despite the general perception that it is difficult to fund projects of this nature, NatWest made this possible.”
Watts said: “NatWest has supported this large, rural GP practice for more than 30 years and we are delighted to assist with funding to relocate the dispensary and install a robotic dispenser which is providing great benefit to the staff and patients at Deddington Health Centre.”
To discuss how NatWest may be able to support your business ambitions contact Jim Heppell.
Details: Jim Heppell 01865-305176
www.businessmag.co.uk
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