checking a firms credit risk

[hairyben]

Probably obvious to many of you, but as a small fry tradesman this is something I've only just had to worry about, I know there are tools and services for businesses who need this all the time.

Do a lot of work for a medium sized retail chain (maybe 30 stores many in prime locations) which I'd rather not name openly, often with a fair bit of money owing, was chatting to one of their staff the other day who told me everyone had both pay rate AND hours cut and the firm wasn't meeting it's sales targets.

What can I do to find out whether this is belt tightening or a company about to fail and knock everyone, and if poss monitor this?

[davepoth]

Dun and Bradstreet are the biggest name in the field, and they have a product for small businesses.

http://www.do-business.net/sbc/?_ga=1.37362405.437...

Doesn't seem to be particularly bad value either.

[VEIGHT]

I use Creditsafe - PM me the name and I can send you the results if you want?

[hairyben]

Thanks for the advice. how easy to understand and relevant is info from D&B etc?

EG I work for several different branded store chains of which store A is the one I'm concerned about, store "group" B owns the operation and sometimes share retail premises but are in turn owned by a consortium including an investment group. I could credit check one part of the company and it come back fine while another part is in severe trouble.

[Terminator X]

D&B Report will tell you who owns who etc so you can always get another done on the company that sits at the top of it all. Some company structures are insanely complicated, wonder why that is

TX.

[matjk]

We use riskdisk who are now part of experian, the big problem will all these services is their data is always out of date, they normally get wind of any problems after its all to late, for example they find out about CCJs or if a company files late but by then it's often to late! We use it as a guide to the size of the company and it gives us a bit of info and is better than nothing. A good example is if you looked at City link or phones4u or GAME the day before they went under they had great credit scores, (I know I looked) Nearly all of their data comes from companies house and the accounts they file, a lot can go wrong in a year between filing accounts

[matjk]

We use riskdisk who are now part of experian, the big problem will all these services is their data is always out of date, they normally get wind of any problems after its all to late, for example they find out about CCJs or if a company files late but by then it's often to late! We use it as a guide to the size of the company and it gives us a bit of info and is better than nothing. A good example is if you looked at City link or phones4u or GAME the day before they went under they had great credit scores, (I know I looked) Nearly all of their data comes from companies house and the accounts they file, a lot can go wrong in a year between filing accounts

[CYMR0]

I use these through work and while they are not foolproof, they do increasingly report actual payment experiences from customers.

So if people aren't paying their bills then it will be highlighted, although of course that will work right up until it doesn't...