Name: Squint/Opera
London: London
Website: www.squintopera.com
Squint makes animation and CGI films, images and interactive installations for the architecture industry, and runs events with clients worldwide. These projects take a few months to complete and have a value of between £30 and £300,000.
Cashflow has been stressful over 12 years of steady expansion. Within the past year there have been three positive developments in our business, with negative cashflow implications. These are as follows:
a) We have more work from non-commercial clients, such as government agencies and museums. These bodies cannot make advance payments, but usually pay 60 days after the invoice - often when all work has been completed. So we advise HMRC that due to these payment policies we are unable to pay our corporation tax when due and agree on a deferred payment programme.
b) For a new cartoon production project we had a sudden large capex bill. This was covered very efficiently by a Funding Circle loan. Our bank did not respond at all.
c) Our expanding event business involves collaboration with others, such as software and hardware suppliers. If they fall behind the schedule, the project is delayed and so we were not getting payments due when expected. We have worked with a lawyer to improve our contract wording to obtain compensation payments.
Finally we have regular disciplined meetings between the two accounts staff and the producers to review all outstanding projects, so that at any moment we are right on top of projected payments in and out.
David Jenkins is chief financial officer at Squint/Opera.
