Business credit at your cooperative: lines and cards for your business

It is a widening of what a savings and credit cooperative may offer a business. Until this Act, the financing list in Article 2.02 included collateralized commercial loans, but did not name commercial lines of credit or commercial credit cards. Now it names them, and says they may be secured by a real or personal guarantee.

Members of a savings and credit cooperative, and also non-members and for-profit entities, under Article 2.03. For non-members, the law sets additional conditions that the cooperative itself fixes through its risk policy.

• That the cooperative have adopted and keep in force credit evaluation policies and procedures specifically adopted for commercial financing, implemented through duly trained commercial credit officers. That condition appears in subsection (8) of the same Article 2.02(b), on collateralized commercial loans.Verified against the official source
• If you are not a member: that the credit exposure limit on the commercial line or card be set by the cooperative under its risk policy, not exceeding the maximum granted to its members for similar products, unless justified by your repayment capacity, solvency and profile.Verified against the official source
• All of the above is subject to the rules of Article 6.03 of Act 255-2002, as the heading of Article 2.02(b) itself says. We did not read that article.Verified against the official source

• The law publishes no document list or form. The concrete requirements are set by each cooperative through its commercial credit evaluation policies and its risk policy.

1. 1

   Step 1: What the Act added to the list

   Article 2.02 lists the financings every cooperative may grant. Act 15-2026 inserted a new subsection, (9): “commercial lines of credit and commercial credit cards. These financial products may be secured by a real or personal guarantee.” What were (9) and (10) — financing of movable property lease contracts and loans to municipalities — became (10) and (11).

2. 2

   Step 2: The personal guarantee is the substantive change

   That the law says “real or personal guarantee” is what opens the door. The Statement of Motives says it plainly: the amendment seeks to allow these products “using duly evaluated personal guarantees, instead of requiring liquid collateral only”, so the business’s viability and economic impact can be evaluated. For a small merchant with no collateral to pledge, that difference decides whether there is credit at all.

3. 3

   Step 3: You need not be a member, but the ceiling changes

   Article 2.03 lets the cooperative offer non-members all the financial services available to members under Article 2.02. For commercial lines and cards, the law adds a ceiling: the credit exposure limit is set by each cooperative under its risk policy, not exceeding the maximum granted to its members for similar products — unless justified by the applicant’s repayment capacity, solvency and profile.

4. 4

   Step 4: A tension in the text we will not resolve for you

   We prefer to point it out rather than paper over it. That same Article 2.03(a)(2), in the same sentence, keeps the condition that loans offered to non-members “not exceed the amount of the liquid assets the debtor keeps at the cooperative guaranteeing one hundred per cent (100%) of the loan”, and refers to a list of liquid assets which the enacted text elides as “(i)…”. The Act does not explain how that condition fits with the new personal-guarantee authorization, and we are not going to invent the reading. If you are a non-member and are told you need deposits guaranteeing 100%, that is the clause being cited: ask the cooperative and, if needed, COSSEC.

5. 5

   Step 5: Who decides the terms

   The law authorizes the product; it sets no rates, limits, charges or terms. All of that is set by each cooperative within its commercial credit evaluation and risk policies, and under the rules of Article 6.03 of Act 255-2002. So the answer to “how much will they give me and at what interest?” exists only at your cooperative, not in the law.

At the savings and credit cooperative where you want the product. The Public Corporation for the Supervision and Insurance of Cooperatives of Puerto Rico (COSSEC) is the body that supervises and insures savings and credit cooperatives. The law publishes no address, phone or portal.

• Believing a cooperative cannot issue a commercial credit card: since Act 15-2026, Article 2.02(b)(9) names it expressly.
• Thinking you must be a member: Article 2.03 lets non-members be offered all the financial services available to members, with added conditions.
• Supposing the law sets the limit: the credit exposure limit is set by each cooperative under its risk policy.
• Taking a non-member’s ceiling as absolute: the law allows exceeding it if justified by the applicant’s repayment capacity, solvency and profile.
• Assuming the personal guarantee removes every collateral requirement: the same subsection keeps a condition on liquid assets guaranteeing 100% of the loan, and the Act does not explain how the two fit.

These are the government pages this guide is based on.

• Corporación Pública para la Supervisión y Seguro de Cooperativas de Ahorro y Crédito (COSSEC)

  COSSEC

  bvirtualogp.pr.gov