FNB in collaboration with Empowerdex, the leading verification agency in South Africa, has launched ‘Instant BEE’, an innovative broad-based black economic empowerment tool and value add which allows businesses of all sizes to determine and improve their BEE rating, as well as acquire certification.
 
Sanjeev Orie, CEO of Business Value Adds for FNB Business says ‘Instant BEE’ takes away the administrative challenge of BEE compliance and helps businesses to better understand requirements through scorecard, scenario planning, documentation and verification capabilities offered by the innovative tool. This value add also ultimately helps professionalise businesses and provides them with growth opportunities as well.
 
The key features of the value add include the following functionalities:  

• Scorecard - estimates what the BEE score and level could be after verification and takes into account all the rules and guidelines of the BEE codes.
• Scenario Planner - assists the businesses by quantifying the impact of certain business decisions on the BEE score. This allows the business to plan its score well beforehand.
• Document Storage – businesses are made aware of what documentation is needed for verification. These documents can be stored in the system. 
• Verification – after the scorecard is completed correctly and all required documents are uploaded on the system, businesses can obtain a verification of this information and on completion of this process, receive a BEE certificate from Empowerdex.

Orie says the importance of BEE compliance cannot be overstated enough. BEE certification helps companies qualify for government projects, compete in the private sector and professionalise their businesses. Every business, regardless of its size, can benefit from having a BEE certificate.
 
“A BEE certificate should be updated annually and the ‘Instant BEE’ solution helps to simplify this process. Information from the previous year is already loaded and just needs to be updated to reflect the business’ current position. Most documents will still be relevant and only those that have changed would be uploaded.”
 
There are three thresholds which all businesses fall into:
 

• EME (Exempted Micro Enterprise): R0-10m turnover: Only requires an affidavit – a template is provided on the system.
• QSE (Qualifying Small Enterprise): R10-50m turnover: If a company is 51% or more black owned only an affidavit is required – a template is provided on the system. If a company is less than 51% black owned, an audit is required.
• Generic: R50m+turnover: A full audit is required. Generic includes listed companies.

“’Instant BEE’ is currently available in the FNB Instant Solutions suite, which is a platform that offers businesses added value products such as generating financial reports and invoices, preparing monthly payroll and managing business’ cash flow,” concludes Orie.