Coconut, the smart banking, accounting and tax tool aimed at entrepreneurs and small businesses, has raised over £2.4m in its latest crowdfund – beating its target by 350% – and has launched a new service aimed at taking the pain out of filing accounts as part of its new RBS BCR Pool E bid.
The speed of the crowdfund shows an extraordinarily strong community and belief by existing and new investors in Coconut’s product and growth, even during one of the hardest periods for businesses.
Additionally, having onboarded 1,500 accountants since launch, the company is working in partnership with a growing number of accounting practices throughout the UK to launch it’s integrated and highly innovative accounting service offering.
Powered by Open Banking, along with a powerful new categorisation feature that will cut the time spent categorising transactions by 10 times, the Accounting Service is part of a raft of features that form part of Coconut’s bid for the share of the RBS BCR Pool E money.
Sam O’Connor, Co-Founder and CEO, Coconut, said: “We’ve seen first-hand just how limited the financial services offering is for the UK’s 5.3m self-employed and micro-SMEs in the UK. Despite the growth of challenger banks, only 3% of businesses switch accounts each year and branch closures are reducing the relationship between banks and business owners.
“Being owned by our customers keeps us connected to the community. We’ve not diluted our proposition by trying to cater to the larger end of businesses. We’re entirely focussed on the 93% of businesses that banks and accounting packages are actively rejecting.”