Funding Circle vs Fleximize: a cheap headline rate with a fee, or a dearer rate with none

Who Funding Circle actually is

Funding Circle Ltd was incorporated in July 2009 and its parent, Funding Circle Holdings plc, is listed on the London Stock Exchange with Lisa Jacobs as chief executive. It says it has helped over 135,000 UK businesses borrow £18 billion. The 2025 accounts show a business that has stopped being a fintech experiment and become a large, profitable lender: revenue £204.3 million, up 28%, profit before tax £20.3 million, £2.45 billion of credit extended, of which £1.64 billion was term loans. The first half of 2026 was stronger again, with revenue of about £138 million, up 50%. Retail peer-to-peer lending closed to new money in March 2022; the loans are now funded by institutions.

The product most people mean by “a Funding Circle loan” is the fixed-rate business loan: £10,000 to £750,000, six months to six years, from 6.9% a year, a one-off completion fee, no early settlement fee. Around it now sits a shelf that Fleximize has no answer to. A shorter-term Flexible Loan of up to 12 months, on a variable rate, with no completion fee if you apply directly and an instant decision up to £250,000. A Growth Guarantee Scheme loan of £25,001 to £250,000 from 13.4% a year. A cashback business credit card with limits to £250,000 (2% cashback for six months capped at £2,000, then 1%, from 14.9% a year, 34.9% APR representative). FlexiPay, a credit line to £250,000 that pays a bill for a flat fee per use and no interest; it has processed over £1 billion of transactions and, with the card, did £640 million in the first half of 2026 alone. And asset finance through a partner panel, £10,000 to £5 million over one to seven years.

The change that matters most for this comparison landed on 23 February 2026: Funding Circle now lends solely to limited companies and LLPs. Its own wording is that it “took the difficult decision to focus solely” on those structures after backing sole traders and partnerships for over a decade. Existing sole-trader loans run on unchanged. Our Funding Circle review covers the term loan in more depth.

Who Fleximize actually is

Fleximize is the smaller, narrower firm: Ipswich-based, lending since 2014 under co-founder and chief executive Peter Tuvey, part of the Alterium group. Its February 2026 release put 2025 lending at £149 million and cumulative lending at £688 million, so it writes in a year roughly what Funding Circle writes in a month. Its funding includes a £136 million securitised facility from Goldman Sachs Asset Management and Citi, agreed in 2023. It won Best Business Loan Provider at the Business Moneyfacts Awards in 2023, 2024 and 2025, Best Service from a Business Loan Provider in 2026, and LendTech of the Year at the UK FinTech Awards 2026.

It sells one loan in two lengths. The Flexiloan runs 12 to 60 months for businesses trading a year or more, at 0.9% to 2.9% a month. The Flexiloan Lite runs 3 to 12 months from six months of trading, at 1.9% to 3.9% a month. Either comes unsecured to £500,000 or secured to £1,000,000, sized at up to four months' revenue on the unsecured route. There are no set-up, application or arrangement fees on a direct application. Settle in full early and the interest is recalculated to the time you had the loan, which Fleximize says saves its early repayers an average of 44% of their total interest. Top-ups and repayment holidays open after three successful repayments, and a returning customer gets a cheaper rate or £100 cashback under its Loyalty Pledge.

There is no credit card, no bill-payment line, no government-backed scheme loan and no asset finance. For a business that only wants a term loan, none of that is a loss. Our Fleximize review has the detail, including the homeowner rule that decides most marginal cases.

What you actually pay

The first job is converting Fleximize's monthly rate into something you can hold against Funding Circle's annual one. Multiply the monthly figure by twelve for a rough nominal annual rate: 0.9% a month is about 10.8% a year, 2.9% is about 34.8%. Funding Circle's 6.9% floor is lower than anything Fleximize publishes. So far, so simple.

Then add the completion fee, which is where the 6.9% stops being the whole story. Funding Circle charges it once, when the loan is taken out, and does not publish it as a percentage; it says the fee depends on risk rating and term. Its own calculator does give a worked case: on £100,000 over 24 months the completion fee is £6,900, interest is £8,668, and the total repayable is £115,568, which is £4,815 a month. Two things stand out. The fee alone is nearly as large as the interest. And the £8,668 of interest is more than the 6.9% floor would produce, because the example is built on the average rate of its lowest-risk businesses rather than the floor. Funding Circle labels the fee “show breakdown” on that page, so it is easy to miss.

Fleximize has no fee to add, so what you see is what you pay, and the risk is priced into the monthly rate instead. Its representative example for loans under £25,000 is honest about how high that can go: 34.9% fixed a year, 41.1% APR representative, £15,000 over 18 months costing £19,479.60 in total. A strong, established, homeowner-backed borrower over a longer term sits near the 0.9% floor. A first-time borrower under £25,000 is more likely to see something closer to the example.

Early settlement is the second place the two diverge. Fleximize recalculates interest to the days you had the money when you settle in full. Funding Circle charges no early settlement fee either, but on its standard business loan contract an overpayment reduces your future monthly payments rather than shortening the term (on its Flexible Loan contract it does shorten the term), and the completion fee is not refunded. A business that plans to refinance or trade its way out in eighteen months keeps more of its money at Fleximize. Our factor rate versus APR guide walks through the conversions in more detail.

Who gets approved

Funding Circle's gate is age and paperwork. A year of trading is the published minimum, and it says plainly that a business trading for less than one year will not qualify. It assesses credit score, bank transactions and trading history, and it asks for bank statements covering up to the last eight months plus the latest full unabbreviated accounts including profit and loss and balance sheet; accounts over two years old may need refiling first. The application runs a soft search only, and repayments are reported to Experian and TransUnion. A personal guarantee is required, and on the shorter Flexible Loan it is set at twice the loan amount (a £50,000 loan over six months carries a guarantee limit of £100,000). Since February 2026, sole traders and partnerships are out.

Fleximize's gate is age and property. Six months of trading and £5,000 of monthly turnover for the Lite, twelve months for the Flexiloan. UK limited companies and LLPs, with sole traders and partnerships of fewer than four partners considered above £25,000. A personal guarantee from at least one director or shareholder on every loan, possibly a debenture, and an equitable charge on secured lending. Scotland and Northern Ireland get the unsecured products only, capped at £500,000. Documents are lighter than Funding Circle's: three months of statements, the latest management accounts, and a month-by-month revenue summary for the last year. And then the line in its FAQ that non-homeowners can be supported only after 36 months of trading and only to £20,000.

Put those side by side and the routing writes itself for the edge cases. A company aged six to twelve months has one door, and it is Fleximize. A company whose directors all rent, trading two years and wanting £80,000, has one door, and it is Funding Circle. Neither publishes a sector exclusion list or an adverse-credit policy, so the middle ground is decided by the offer. Our personal guarantee guide explains what both guarantees commit a director to.

How fast the money lands

Funding Circle publishes the faster numbers: apply online in seven minutes, decision in as little as one hour, funds paid out typically within 48 hours, and on the shorter-term loan an instant decision up to £250,000 with payment in as little as 24 hours once documents are in. Fleximize quotes decisions in as little as 24 hours and same-day funds on receipt of signed documents; on secured loans it uses an equitable charge so it can release funds the same day as approval.

In practice the two are closer than the headlines. Funding Circle's one-hour decision depends on the eight months of statements and full accounts being uploaded and readable; Fleximize's 24 hours depends on management accounts and a revenue breakdown that many small companies do not keep. The business with a bookkeeper gets the advertised speed from both. The business that has to go and find its accounts loses a day or two at either.

The bit nobody mentions

Funding Circle's homepage labels its business loan “Secured loan up to 6 years” while its product page says you can take an unsecured loan without putting down property or assets. Both are its own words. The safe reading is that the standard loan does not require property as security, a personal guarantee is required, and on some contracts that guarantee is capped at twice the loan. Read the security schedule in the actual offer rather than the homepage.

Fleximize's equivalent is the debenture. Its FAQ says it may need additional security in the form of a debenture depending on the state of the business. A debenture is a registered charge over the company's assets and it can complicate any later borrowing that wants a first charge, including the asset finance Funding Circle would introduce through its partners. For a business that expects to add more lines later, ask Fleximize up front whether a debenture is on the table.

Worked examples

Both lenders publish a rate, so both examples use published figures: Funding Circle's 6.9% floor and the £6,900 completion fee from its own calculator, and Fleximize's 0.9% Flexiloan floor with its 2.9% ceiling for the upper bound. Repayments are treated as 24 equal monthly instalments on a reducing balance. Your offer will differ; the shape will not.

Who fits where

Concrete cases against each lender's published criteria. The likely fit is where the case usually lands in the deals we arrange; the lender still makes its own decision.

General information on how the lenders differ, not a recommendation. We arrange finance; the lender decides, and you choose.