How Trade Ledger Transformed HMRC Payment Uncertainty Into Predictable Working Capital
For CEO Martin McCann, HMRC payment delays weren’t just an inconvenience; they were a constant source of stress that made financial planning feel impossible. Then he discovered he didn’t have to wait. Here’s how one conversation transformed uncertainty into the most predictable capital his business had ever seen.
“Rocking Horse made what seemed like a challenging process incredibly simple. Their team is professional, efficient, and genuinely understands the needs of businesses like ours. If you need to access your R&D funding without delays, Rocking Horse is the way to go.”
— Martin McCann, CEO and Founder, Trade Ledger
Case Study
Q1. What is your name, title and workplace?
A1. Martin McCann, CEO and Founder of Trade Ledger.
Q2. What problems were you having before you used R&D Finance?
A2. We struggled to get timely payments from HMRC for our R&D claims. This delay made cash flow forecasting extremely difficult and created unnecessary uncertainty.
Q3. Why did you choose Rocking Horse over other providers?
A3. Rocking Horse stood out for their expertise in R&D financing, their streamlined processes, and their excellent customer service. They offered a solution that was quick, reliable, and tailored to our specific needs.
Q4. How did you use Rocking Horse’s R&D Finance?
A4. We used Rocking Horse’s R&D Finance to access funding ahead of receiving our HMRC R&D tax credit payments. This allowed us to maintain smooth cash flow and continue investing in our projects and business without interruptions.
Q5. What advantages did you see for using R&D Finance?
A5. It significantly improved our cash flow predictability, eliminated the stress of waiting for HMRC payments, and allowed us to plan and execute business strategies with greater confidence.
Q6. On a scale of 1-10, how likely are you to recommend Rocking Horse to a friend, family or colleague?
A6. 10.
Q7. What would you tell someone if you were recommending Rocking Horse?
A7. Rocking Horse made what seemed like a challenging process incredibly simple. Their team is professional, efficient, and genuinely understands the needs of businesses like ours. If you need to access your R&D funding without delays, Rocking Horse is the way to go.
Q8. How would you rate your overall experience with Rocking Horse?
A8. Exceptional. Rocking Horse exceeded our expectations and provided exactly what we needed when we needed it.
Our Innovative Solutions
Predictable Cash Flow That Enables Strategic Planning
HMRC R&D tax credit payments arrive on uncertain timelines. For Trade Ledger, this created a fundamental planning problem. How do you build quarterly forecasts when a significant receivable might land in three months or eight? Martin describes the impact as making “cash flow forecasting extremely difficult” and creating “unnecessary uncertainty.”
Rocking Horse eliminates that unpredictability entirely. Access your R&D funding ahead of HMRC payments on a schedule you control. The transformation Martin reports is immediate. Significantly improved cash flow predictability that allowed Trade Ledger to plan and execute business strategies with genuine confidence. When you know exactly when capital arrives, financial planning stops being guesswork and becomes an actual strategy. No more hedging quarterly projections around HMRC processing timelines. Just the certainty needed to make
R&D Financing Expertise That Simplifies Complexity
Martin chose Rocking Horse for three specific reasons: Our expertise in R&D financing, our streamlined processes, and our excellent customer service. But what does that expertise actually mean for your business?
We’ve structured hundreds of R&D advances across multiple tax jurisdictions. We understand exactly how HMRC processes claims, what documentation they require, and the real timelines involved. That institutional knowledge translates into what Martin describes as making “what seemed like a challenging process incredibly simple.” No learning curve on your end. No unexpected requirements. No opaque timelines. Just professional, efficient execution from a team that has solved this exact problem dozens of times before.
The result is a financing process that’s quick, reliable, and tailored to your specific needs, not a generic lending product awkwardly adapted for R&D tax credits.
Maintain Operational Momentum Without Interruption
Trade Ledger used our R&D financing to achieve something critical: maintaining smooth cash flow to continue investing in their projects and business without interruptions. This distinction matters.
The real cost of HMRC payment uncertainty isn’t just waiting; it’s the operational decisions you defer. Hiring timelines that get pushed. Platform improvements that get postponed. Investment velocity that slows in ways your competitors don’t. When HMRC processing backlogs threaten to pause critical expenditure, you’re not just losing time. You’re losing momentum.
Our structure ensures your earned R&D tax credits fund operations when your business needs them, not when HMRC happens to complete processing. The result? You execute your strategic plan according to your roadmap, not a tax authority’s timeline.
Service That Exceeds Expectations
Martin rates his experience as “exceptional” and says we “provided exactly what we needed when we needed it.” That precision is deliberate. We don’t offer generic financing products adapted for R&D. We built this specifically for businesses facing tax authority payment uncertainty. The result? A 10/10 likelihood to recommend rating because the service solved the actual problem, transforming stress and uncertainty into confidence and predictability.
The Real Cost of HMRC Payment Uncertainty
Trade Ledger struggled to get timely HMRC payments for their R&D claims. The result wasn’t just inconvenience; it was a strategic constraint. Cash flow forecasting became extremely difficult. Unnecessary uncertainty plagued financial planning. Stress accumulated around questions that shouldn’t require guesswork: When will earned capital actually arrive?
Consider the decisions affected by HMRC payment uncertainty, such as hiring timelines, infrastructure investments, project commitments, and growth initiatives. Each deferred decision compounds. Every quarter spent hoping for payment clarity is a quarter where competitors who solved this problem are executing with confidence.
Martin eliminated that constraint by accessing Trade Ledger’s earned R&D funding on their timeline instead of HMRC’s. The cost of our financing is transparent and quantifiable. The cost of strategic paralysis caused by unpredictable receivables? That erodes value invisibly until you realize how far ahead businesses with predictable capital have moved.
Certainty Shouldn’t Be This Hard to Find
You’ve completed qualifying R&D work. You’ve filed your claim. You’ve earned this capital. HMRC will eventually process your claim and issue payment, on their timeline, following their procedures, when they get to it.
Or you could access that funding next week.
Martin McCann chose the latter. His experience? A process that was quick, reliable, and tailored to Trade Ledger’s specific needs. A team that was professional and efficient. Service that exceeded expectations and delivered exactly what was needed when it was needed.
The question isn’t whether you can continue waiting for HMRC payments. You can. The question is: What’s that uncertainty costing in deferred decisions, constrained planning, and unnecessary stress? For businesses with qualifying R&D expenditure, predictable access to earned tax credits isn’t complicated. It’s a straightforward solution to a problem that shouldn’t exist.