Case Study – Human Resources
Flexible finance has been the key to success for a small
Tasmanian specialist labour hire company that is finding
work for some of the miners and other trades staff retrenched
after the Beaconsfield mine accident.
Bart’s Labour Hire has established a reputation
as a valuable trouble shooting operation in the mining
and energy sectors but rapid growth of the business put
a strain on the finances.
Bart’s principal Shane Gill has recently won valuable
maintenance contracts with some of Australia’s
blue chip miners from his one-man office in Beaconsfield.
His company specialises in contract maintenance and
shut down work and has rapidly made a name for itself
in what’s acknowledged as a tough industry. It
has grown from four employees earlier this year to a
crew of more than 45 – and is still growing.
But the success of Bart’s Labour Hire was built
on a combination of Shane Gill’s talented crew
and a flexible cash flow management solution.
“It’s quite confronting to go from a wage
bill for four people to having to find the funds for
more than forty!” he says.
“We need to pay our people as they work – either
weekly or fortnightly, but we don’t invoice the
client until the job is completed – and we get
paid in line with normal trading terms, often 30 days
after the end of the current month. That presents a real
cash flow challenge for a small business.”
The solution was provided through debt finance.
Says Shane: "We were growing, quite rapidly,
and we needed a financing option that guaranteed our
cash flow and was flexible enough to grow with us.
"We could have gone back to the bank and increased
our overdraft but they would have wanted bricks and mortar
security; in other words putting our property in the
facility. It just isn't flexible enough."
"From the outset it was obvious the factoring and
discounting company we went to wanted to learn about
our business and work with us. They made the effort to
understand the specialist nature of our services and
the reasons behind our invoicing system, and then they
designed a facility that worked perfectly for us.
“In terms of future growth, the possibilities
are pretty well limitless,” he says.
Bart’s Labour Hire is now looking at contracts in
Western Australia, the Northern Territory, Queensland and
New South Wales and New Zealand.
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