The chamber operates the regional business partners programme that was given $40million from the Government last week to continue supporting businesses.
It was not clear how much of that money the Otago chamber would get to dole out to businesses in the form of vouchers for business services.
The chamber said it would go a long way to getting support to about 580 business on its wait list.
"This is a well-needed and timely support for business during these incredibly difficult times," Otago Chamber of Commerce chief executive Dougal McGowan said.
The boost in funding would bring five new business advisers for the chamber to deploy and support businesses in need.
It would help a lot of businesses facing issues they had never had to deal with before, Mr McGowan said.
"They’ve got markedly decreased incomes. If we just take cashflow for a start — many have never had to do cashflow forecasting before.
"They need help with that. We’re able to put them in touch with an accountant and then they can support them through that so they understand what cashflow means to them and how they’re going to keep paying people.
"It’s just simple things like that which make a massive difference to whether people sleep at night or whether they actually retain their jobs and we don’t get the kneejerk reaction."
There would be "considerably more" voucher funding between now and October, Mr McGowan said.
The vouchers help businesses with strategic work such as cashflow forecasting and marketing.
"They run through a business engagement process, which is like a conversation and assessment our business advisers do with them."
The business would then get options about what support they need and which firm they should go to for it. They would get up to $5000 to go towards the cost.
Mr McGowan said he recently helped a woman with a small business who was stressed about cashflow.
"She’d never had to go through this before so I worked her through it.
"She was in tears when we started to chat about — she didn’t know whether she was going to have enough money to pay staff at the end of the week or anything like that."
Mr McGowan explained what she needed to do to work out a cashflow forecast.
"... by the end of the conversation we’d made her a time with an accounting firm."
When she got her cashflow forecast it was not as bad as she thought it would be, he said.
"Thus she was able to keep those staff employed and keep food on the table."
Businesses that are in need of support can contact the chamber’s regional business partners programme.
