The winners of this year’s NACFB Commercial Broker Awards have been announced at a ceremony held at Edgbaston Cricket Ground.
Hosted by comedian Ed Byrne, the awards sought to recognise excellence within the commercial broking community and enabled the NACFB to thank its Members for their ongoing commitment to supporting UK SMEs in their quest for finance and growth.
Inundated with entries from sole-traders, regional players and national brokerages, this year the 15 awards categories were hotly contested which made for a lively discussion and heated debate amongst the independent panel of judges who agreed that the standard of submissions was exceptionally high.
Commenting on the judging process, Norman Chambers, managing director at the NACFB said: “It was an extremely difficult task, despite having clear criteria against which to measure the entries.
“I am very grateful to all the judges for their time, commitment, and dedication to the task and would like to congratulate not just the winners and those who were highly commended but all the firms who took the time to enter.”
This year’s winners and highly commended are:
Asset & Leasing Broker of the Year
Winner: PMD Business Finance
Highly Commended: Newable Finance
Short-term Finance Broker of the Year
Winner: VIBE Specialist Finance
Highly Commended: LDNfinance
Broker Innovation Award
Winner: Funding Friends
Highly Commended: Asset Finance Solutions (UK)
Buy-to-Let Broker of the Year
Winner: South West Business Finance
Highly Commended: Mortgages for Business
Cashflow Broker of the Year
Winner: Pilot Fish Finance
Highly Commended: Halo Corporate Finance
Development Broker of the Year
Winner: Arc & Co.
Highly Commended: Finance 4 Business
Digital Broker of the Year
Winner: Pitch 4 Finance
Highly Commended: Think Business Loans
SME Champion Award
Winner: Think Business Loans
Highly Commended: HH Business Finance
Factoring & Invoice Discounting Broker of the Year
Winner: Goodman Corporate Finance
Highly Commended: Hilton-Baird Financial Solutions
Broker Network of the Year
Winner: AFS Group
Highly Commended: Alpha Asset Finance
COVID Recovery Award:
Winner: Synergi Finance
Highly Commended: Approved Business Finance
Sole Trader of the Year
Winner: Lime Consultancy
Highly Commended: Darkwood Commercial Finance
Deal of the Year
Winner: PMD Business Finance
Highly Commended: Christie Finance
Commercial Mortgage Broker of the Year
Winner: Arc & Co.
Highly Commended: Watts Commercial Finance
Rising Star of the Year
Winner: Emma Ross (Watts Commercial Finance)
Highly Commended: Nicki Cholefko (South West Business Finance) and Rob Williams (Cornerstone Finance Group)
The judging process
Each judge was assigned up to three categories and asked to rank their preferred entries for each based on strict criteria. In particular, the judges looked at where a broker had applied innovative structuring on a complex or difficult deal alongside taking into consideration the impact on the client’s business, the lender-broker dynamic, and the ability to get a deal over the line. The same criteria were given to Members who chose to submit an entry.
To determine the winners and the highly commended, the judges’ selections were combined with the votes from NACFB lender Patrons. To ensure fairness, a maximum of five representatives from each Patron were entitled to vote in each category.
The external judging panel included:
- Alex Waterman – Principal, Invoice Finance & Asset Based Lending; Commercial Finance, UK Finance
- Bob Lefroy – CEO & Group Editor, Business Money
- David Newborough – Specialist Director, NACFB
- Francis Evans – Head of Business Finance, BEIS
- Jennifer Tankard – Principal, Commercial Finance, UK Finance
- Jo Atkin – Senior Communications Manager, bClear Communications
- Lee Tillcock – Managing Editor, Moneyfacts Group
- Nicola Newborough – Independent Chartered Accountant, Ashgates
- Ray Cohen – Director, Jackson Cohen Associates
- Robin Skuse – Editor, BrokerWorld & Leasing World
- Russell Lewis – Specialist Director, NACFB
- Simon Goldie – Director of Advocacy, FLA
- Prof. Trevor Williams – Chief Economist, TW Consultancy/Co-founder FXGuard
- Vic Jannels – CEO, ASTL
The NACFB wishes to thank both Members and Patrons for their support and participation in this prestigious event.