Your SME client opens an email from their bank. Inside is a long climate survey, three acronyms they have never seen and a two-week deadline. It goes to the bottom of the pile and stays there.
That is not a lack of goodwill. It is a design problem, and banks can fix it.
Why SME Climate Data Requests Stall
According to ACCA’s August 2026 report, Measure What Matters, SMEs are often asked for different information by various large organisations, leading to confusion and inefficiencies. The report, drawn from a roundtable with UK Finance, links this to confusion and inefficiency.
The data banks need for PCAF financed emissions and PRA SS5/25 risk work usually exists. It sits in energy bills, invoices and annual accounts, fragmented and not streamlined. The best requests go where that data already lives.
Five Questions That Get Answered
These work because the answer is a record, not a calculation:
- What was your annual electricity and gas use in kWh? It is printed on every supplier bill.
- How many sites do you operate, and where? Every owner knows this without looking.
- How many vehicles do you run, and on what fuel? A quick count, not a model.
- What were your turnover and headcount last year? Already in the accounts.
- Do you hold certifications such as ISO 14001? A yes or no, with an optional upload.
Five Questions That Never Get Answered
These stall because they ask an SME to do an analyst’s job:
- What are your Scope 3 emissions? Few SMEs hold the supplier data to calculate them.
- Please describe your transition plan. An open essay with no finish line.
- What share of revenue is taxonomy-aligned? Framework language most owners have never met.
- Calculate your footprint using the GHG Protocol. That is the bank’s analysis, handed to the client.
- Assess your physical climate risk over 30 years. Scenario modelling built for large corporates.
Three Rules for Better Requests
- Ask for records, not calculations. Let the bank do the maths.
- Pre-fill what you already know, so the client only confirms.
- Give something back. ACCA recommends ensuring that SMEs are provided with actionable insights for the data that they provide.
What This Means for Banks
A short request that gets answered beats a comprehensive one that never does. Every abandoned survey pushes banks back to proxy and sector-average estimates, when the client’s own evidence was there all along.
The strongest starting point is data clients already hold but rarely look at. Build from there, and the rest of the picture becomes far easier to complete.
About the Climate Action Platform
The Climate Action platform, developed and deployed by NatWest and National Australia Bank, is built on The Disruption House’s sustainability intelligence. It starts with information clients already have without realising it, such as their energy bills, and helps SMEs build their own sustainability data profile, with relevant actions. For banks, it collects energy information on SME clients to support transition finance decisions and help close the Data Gap.
Ready to Rethink Your Requests?
If your SME data requests keep coming back empty, let’s rethink them together. Click Contact Us to talk to our team.
