Nedbank details how small firms can tap Oppenheimer fund to cover employee wages

The Oppenheimer family have set up a new trust, the SA Future Trust (SAFT), to disburse the family’s R1-billion that it has pledged to assist employees of small businesses, and which was announced by President Cyril Ramaphosa last week, Business Day reported in an article today.

Business owners can apply to access the fund via the country’s four main banks, the trust will disburse interest-free loans to employees over a five-year term.

Nedbank, in an announcement today, said applications will be processed from Friday (3 April).

It said more detailed information, including the application forms and supporting documents requirements will be published over the coming days.

The Oppenheimer family’s R1bn SA Future Trust (SAFT) will lend directly to employees from small businesses

It said there are no minimum monthly payments requirements attached to the loan and that it only needs to be settled in full at the end of the term. Employees carry no liability for the repayment of the loan, it said.

Qualifying small businesses will get a R750 per qualifying employee per week, over a period of 15 weeks, or R11 250 per permanent employee. The total loan amount is a function of the number of employees to be included, Nedbank added.

Nedbank said to qualify, a small business must:

• Have an annual turnover of less than R25-million.
• Have been be trading for two or more years.
• Must be in good standing with its bank, statutory creditors and with the bureaus as at the end of February 2020
• Be able to prove that revenue has been impacted by Covid-19 and therefore requires assistance to pay their permanent staff salaries.

Business owners must lodge an application at their respective bank. Nedbank said it will only consider applications from its client base.

“We are busy finalising the application template, client declaration and supporting document requirements with SAFT and will publish these over the coming days in time to allow processing applications from 3 April,” Nedbank said.