The government announced its Start Up Loans scheme last week, promising £82.5 million to fund start-up businesses over the next three years.

Over 2000 young entrepreneurs have applied already and will be receiving mentoring, training and start-up capital from the fund.

Seven Hills‘ client, Intuit, has partnered with Start Up Loans to offer recipients of the scheme 24 months’ free access to QuickBooks Online Essentials, Intuit’s cloud-based accounting software, worth more than £1 million.

Up to 3,000 loan recipients will be eligible for QuickBooks Online, giving them crucial access to financial management software that will enable them to monitor their accounts effectively.

Sally Revell, UK Business Manager at Intuit said: “Small businesses are the lifeblood of our economy and StartUp Loans is a fantastic initiative to give people access to the critical funding they need to get their business off the ground, but it’s vital they also get the right systems in place to help them survive and grow.

“We are happy to offer additional support to the loan recipients by providing free access to QuickBooks software, which will allow them to simplify business management, monitor cashflow in real-time, get instant business reports and manage VAT automatically.”

Former Dragons’ Den entrepreneur and Start-Up Loans chairman, James Caan, said, “ The Start Up Loans Company aims to stimulate entrepreneurship across England and highlight starting a business as a viable career option for young people. I know from personal experience both how exciting and challenging it is to start a business but with the mentoring advice we provide and the corporate support we have from Regus and PayPal we can make a huge difference to these new businesses.

I encourage everyone aged 18-24 to apply and see where their business idea can take them.”