A financing information page

Why this page is different

Most website content is covered by general advertising rules. Anything about credit is covered by those, plus a separate set of rules about how finance may be described. Those rules are detailed.

Those rules usually apply to the business doing the advertising, not just to the lender. Naming a payment plan on your own site can bring you within them, even when somebody else provides the credit.

That is the reason to be careful rather than a reason to say nothing. Customers genuinely want to know, and a vague page loses work in search and in an answer engine alike. Take advice on what applies to you. Nothing here is legal advice.

The risk is not usually a complaint from a customer. It is that these pages get reviewed as a group, and a page that looks like an advert for credit will be read as one.

What is usually safe to say

That finance is available, who provides it, what kinds of arrangement exist, and who to speak to. Plain statements with no numbers in them rarely trigger the detailed rules about how figures must be shown.

You can usually say that terms depend on the applicant, that approval is not certain, and that details come from the provider. Those are honest and they manage the expectation.

Once you publish figures, rules about worked examples and how prominent they must be usually apply. That is the point to use the lender's own wording rather than your own.

Say who to talk to by name or by role. Finance questions produce hesitation, and a page that ends with a person rather than a form removes more of it than any amount of reassurance.

What needs care

Any rate, any monthly figure, any comparison, and anything that reads as a nudge to borrow. Each one brings its own rules about how it must be shown.

Phrases implying easy or certain approval are a particular risk, because they suggest an outcome that depends on an assessment nobody has done yet.

So is anything about what a customer can afford. Telling somebody what they can afford is advice, and credit advice is a licensed activity in most places.

What the page should contain

The list below is a shape that informs the customer while leaving the regulated representations to the party equipped to make them.

• That finance is available, stated plainly
• Who the provider is, named
• What kinds of arrangement exist, described generally
• That approval depends on an assessment
• Where to get the actual terms
• Any fee you charge, if you charge one
• A route to ask a person a question

Link to the provider

The lender has wording that already meets the rules for their product. Using it is safer than writing your own. Link to their page for the terms rather than repeating them.

Keep your description consistent with theirs. A difference between the two is the thing most likely to be treated as misleading, and it usually happens by drift rather than on purpose.

Recheck whenever the arrangement changes. Our page on keeping content current covers the routine, and a finance page needs it more than most.

Alternatives that carry less risk

Staged payments, deposits and instalments you offer yourself may be treated differently from credit. It depends on how they are set up and where you trade.

Saying what a job typically costs and how payment is usually spread is often enough for the customer's real question, which is whether they can manage it.

Our page on pricing claims covers presenting figures generally. Take advice on whether your arrangement is credit. Nothing here is legal advice.

Say what you will not do as well. A short line saying that you do not advise on which option suits somebody, and that they should take their own advice, is honest and protects both sides.

Keeping records

Keep a copy of what the page said and when, along with the lender's approval of your wording if they gave one. That record is what answers a question about a page you changed a year ago.

Note who checked it and against what. This is exactly the kind of page where being able to show a process matters as much as the wording itself.

And review it on a fixed schedule rather than when something prompts you. Finance arrangements change quietly, and a stale rate on a live page is the worst version of this.