Do I Get An Award

I’m really proud of myself today. That’s because my bank called and told me that the ARC loan I started applying for 6 months ago was approved. It only took about 30 hours of my time and 4 meetings with my banker.

An ARC loan is the equivalent of the government bailout for small businesses. Except that they are only willing to bail you out a maximum of $35,000, place unbelievable restrictions and conditions on who qualifies, and run you through hoops for the loan.

I qualified for a whole $26,000 that goes to paying off credit card debt. The debt I have is on a 3.99% card that Chase Bank decided to increase the minimum monthly payment  from 2% of the balance to 5%. This meant that even though I have never been late on a payment for the 5 years I’ve had the loan, Chase raised the monthly payments from $400 to $1,000. I wonder if Chase did that because they didn’t get enough of the government bailout.

In over 25 years of doing business, I’ve never received any financial help from the government. This loan that gives me six years to repay at no interest, was so complicated and so hard to qualify for that most business owners would have to pay an accountant to apply for it.

The government always tells us that small business is the backbone of the American economy. It really seems odd to me that so little help is available to such an important part, while billions are handed over to the financial institutions responsible for so much of the mess that has caused small business owners to seek loans that prove to be too hard to get and too little to make any difference.

My recommendation is to skip the ARC loan, it isn’t worth the effort.