Referred, approved, signed, or none of the above?
The customer applied for finance in the showroom on Saturday. The designer submitted it on the lender's portal and it came back referred. On Tuesday it was approved, but the email went to the designer, who was on a survey. The customer was waiting for the signing link. By Friday they rang to ask whether their kitchen was still going ahead.
Later in the job, a different gap: the kitchen is fitted, but the satisfaction note that releases payout was never sent, so the money arrives weeks after it could have.
Why finance jobs are harder to follow
Finance adds a set of steps that happen outside your systems: application, decision, signing, deposit, delivery or completion confirmation, and payout. Each is visible only on the lender's portal, which one or two people log into. The job plan in your office does not know any of it has happened.
- Decisions and signature requests arrive by email to whoever submitted the application.
- Orders are placed before the agreement is signed, or held longer than needed.
- Completion confirmation and payout are not linked to the handover stage of the job.
- Nobody has a list of all live finance applications and where each stands.
What your showroom may say about finance, and how applications must be handled, is set by your lender and your own regulatory position. This article is about the admin around it, not the rules.
What limbo costs
Customers who hear nothing after applying start to doubt the purchase. Orders placed too early carry risk if the agreement is never signed. Orders held too long push back the fit date. Payouts that wait for a forgotten confirmation keep the money for a finished kitchen off your bank balance for longer than necessary.
How we connect finance to the job
- Each finance application is recorded on the job with the lender, the reference and the amount.
- Status updates are taken from the lender's notification emails by an inbox parser, or through an integration where the lender offers one, and the job shows the current state.
- Each status sets the next task: call the customer on a referral, send the signing reminder, confirm the deposit, release the supplier order.
- Supplier ordering on a finance job waits for the status your process requires, with a manager's override recorded if used.
- At handover, the task to confirm completion with the lender is created automatically, and payout is tracked until it lands in your accounts.
- A single list shows every live application, oldest first.
| Finance step | Where it happens | What the job shows |
|---|---|---|
| Application | Lender portal | Submitted, with reference |
| Decision | Lender email or portal | Approved, referred or declined |
| Agreement signed | Customer, via lender | Signed date, order released |
| Completion confirmation | Customer or showroom, via lender | Task at handover |
| Payout | Lender to your bank | Received in accounts |
The difference for the showroom
Designers do not have to watch their inbox for decisions. Customers hear back promptly at each step. Orders go in at the right point, not early and not late. The office can see at a glance which finance payouts are due and chase the ones that are late.
Managers also get a view they did not have before: how many applications are open, how long decisions and payouts take with each lender, and how many finance jobs are sitting in each state. That makes it easier to plan fitting slots around finance jobs and to spot a lender whose process is slowing your jobs down, without anyone logging into several portals to piece it together.
Checklist before you get in touch
- Finance decisions are sitting in individual designers' inboxes.
- Customers have rung to ask what happened to their application.
- You cannot list all live finance applications without logging into the portal.
- Payouts have been delayed because completion was not confirmed.