It’s the Little Loans That Matter Most

 

By Elise Tosun, ACCION USA Loan Consultant Have you ever had a day at work when it feels like everything falls apart, all at once? Recently, I began the day working with three potential loan applicants. Here at ACCION USA, our performance as loan consultants is partly measured by how many of these applicants get a loan. As the day progressed, I kept uncovering problems that each of these businesses had that I knew would stand in the way of them getting approved. Though I generally feel that my work at AUSA is The author with Sarahi and her newborn baby very meaningful, by 5 p.m., I was feeling pretty purposeless and frustrated. What did I deserve to be paid for, if my work was not translating to actual money in the hands of small business owners? Shortly after my mini-breakdown, my client Sarahi came in to the office to get her loan for $1,500. This is one of the smallest loan sizes we give, and Sarahi was using it to start her own Green Cart business. Green Carts were developed by the City of New York to sell fresh fruits and vegetables in areas of the city where access to these kinds of foods is very limited. Sarahi's loan would give her the initial investment she needed to buy a cart for her fruit so she could start selling in the Bronx. As a loan consultant it is easy to put emphasis on the bigger loans (AUSA's average is around $7,000) that help us reach our monthly lending goals. But the smaller loans are just as important. As my supervisor Wanda has repeated to me many times: every penny counts. That is exactly the right mentality that microfinance loan consultants need to have. When Sarahi came to our office at 5 p.m. on Thursday with her husband and her newborn baby girl, I was reminded that their loan really counted, even though it was smaller than the other ones I had been working on all day. Sarahi, while pregnant, had trekked from her home in Queens to Manhattan to attend evening workshops on managing her food business and to work with me on her application. She was one of the most hard-working, ambitious clients I've lent to yet. Spending the end of the day with her last week reminded me why I do what I do. Sometimes I need my clients' help as much as they need mine!

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