Alignable’s Latest Pulse Poll taken among 38,500 small business owners from April 17-20, 2020, shows only 8% have received money, and another 14% were approved for it, but aren’t sure when or if it’s coming.

Beyond that, 72% of small business owners who applied for the loans haven’t been approved yet. They’re in a state of limbo, not sure if they’ll ever see the money they were counting on to weather the coronavirus quarantines.

“There’s no excuse for banks keeping 72% of business owners in the dark for weeks on end,” said Alignable’s Co-Founder and CEO Eric Groves. “According to senior SBA officials, the approval process is instantaneous upon submission of a completed application. So, why aren’t banks coming clean with their customers? It’s a question we’re going to dive deeper into in the weeks to come.”

While 44% of business owners have applied for the loans, among those who didn’t, some 22% said they wanted to apply, but didn’t make it under the wire before the $349 billion ran out. And another 5% said their banks were not ready to process their applications.

“The need for this funding is great and becoming more pronounced as the days and weeks go by,” added Venkat Krishnamurthy, Alignable’s co-founder and president. “More than 45% of the businesses we polled have been forced to shut their doors already.”

The impact of the quarantines is staggering with 98% of small businesses reporting that revenues have dropped by at least 25%, and 47% have already lost half of their revenue.

Hopefully, Congress will be able to offer small businesses another large infusion of funds soon — earmarked for the very small businesses and solopreneurs that drive the American economy and need the money to stay afloat.

Survey Methodology
This survey was conducted via email with a random sample of Alignable’s membership database of 4.5 million+ small business owners. It includes results from April 17-20, 2020 — 38,500 responses from small businesses throughout the U.S. with 1-50 employees.