Client Support
Interim COVID-19 Relief Package
Likely to Pass House Tomorrow
The U.S. Senate unanimously passed legislation to provide comprehensive funding for small businesses, new assistance for health providers, and resources to provide additional testing, surveillance and contact tracing of the COVID-19 virus.
The legislation provides an additional $370 billion for SBA’s small business relief efforts and ensure that $60 billion of those funds will be reserved for smaller lending institutions, such as credit unions, community banks, Community Development Financial Institutions and Minority Depository Institutions that can better reach underbanked and underserved businesses. Beyond the $310 billion provided to PPP, this latest bill provides $50 billion for SBA’s EIDL program, which will allows the agency make more than $350 billion in direct, low-interest, long-term disaster loans. This bill also provides an additional $10 billion for the EIDL grants program, which will provide small businesses with a quick infusion of capital worth up to $10,000 each.
Please be on the lookout for more information coming as funding is appropriated.
Opened on Tuesday: Real-Time Mentoring Platform
Yesterday, Tuesday April 21, marked the inaugural opening of the Real-Time Mentoring platform. During the 4-hour window, mentors were available to answer questions and provide advice to clients seeking information about their businesses, especially during the COVID-19 crisis.
For the first launch day, a small group of clients were invited to the platform as a soft launch. Clients mostly used the Mentoring Hall rooms to get their most urgent questions answered, with traffic heaviest in the Funding & Financial, eCommerce, and Business Strategy rooms. However, clients also spent time in the other mentoring hall rooms and participated in chat discussions in the Peer Discussion Hall. Mentors who joined the platform on Tues moved through the rooms, helping mentors with their questions and advice.
To all the mentor volunteers who supported our inaugural open hours:
a hearty thank you!
Volunteer for the Real-Time Mentoring Platform
Thursday, April 23, 2-6pm ET
Join us for the next live session of the Real-Time Mentoring platform on Thursday, April 23, 2-6pm ET. Marketing has invited a larger group of clients to the Thursday session as the platform continues to ramp up!
If you are new to the platform, be sure to complete the training and preparation steps so you are ready to help:
- Contact us if you plan participate on Thursday and have not already signed up for a time. Include your specific hours of availability between 2-6pm ET, and you mentoring areas of expertise: marketing@score.org
- Complete the Mentor Volunteer Training. (1.5 hour training)
- Register for the online platform. Once you login, take a moment to create your profile on the platform.
- Review key materials about frequently-asked questions related to Covid-19: COVID-19 Information and Resources for Volunteers and Coronavirus Small Business Resource Hub.
