Barclays partners with invoice insurtech Nimbla

One million SMEs that bank with Barclays will be able to use Nimbla, with the new ability to take out insurance against individual invoices, rather than the whole book

Barclays has partnered with fintech Nimbla to offer flexible invoice insurance to small- and medium-sized entities (SMEs).

One million SMEs that bank with Barclays will have the opportunity to benefit from the partnership, with the new ability to take out insurance against individual invoices, rather than the whole book.

Through UK-based insurtech Nimbla’s platform, customers can insure a single invoice from as little as £6, within a few minutes.

Nimbla and Barclays have an established relationship, with the insurtech graduating from the Barclays Accelerator, powered by Techstars in 2018.

As part of the partnership, Barclays relationship managers will be introducing the product to their SME clients in the northeast, Cumbria, Southeast London and Kent, before a full roll-out later in 2020.

Nimbla is available in the Starling Bank Marketplace for Business. The insurtech is also a delegated underwriting authority of QBE.

Flemming Bengtsen, founder and chief executive officer of Nimbla, said: “We are excited to be working with Barclays to introduce Nimbla to their customers. All too often it is SMEs that feel the pain when other businesses fold. They are least equipped to absorb the losses and don’t have access to the tools that larger corporates do.”

“Nimbla however, is as much about the opportunity as the risk. We are focused on helping SMEs grow as well as protecting their business. A survey by Barclaycard suggested 58% of smaller businesses turn away new business as they did not feel comfortable offering credit terms. That is holding them back.”

“Barclays recognises that we are offering their customers the tools to take on risk, safe in the knowledge they will be paid.”

Ian Rand, chief executive officer of Barclays Business Banking, added: “Working with industry disruptors is key to our strategy going forward as we look to innovate and provide the very best products on the market to our one million small business customers.”

Image: Nimbla

Mark Dugdale