Credit Checks - Who's good to use for this?
Discussion
Afternoon all,
We are currently looking for a supplier/company to use for credit checks, most of our new customers will be asked to pay in advance or 50% in advance as a deposit, we are small company and would not be using the facility on a daily basis, but i believe it is valuable tool for our business. So who is out there for this kind of service? How in depth is there services? and more importantly How much?
Thanks In Advance
We are currently looking for a supplier/company to use for credit checks, most of our new customers will be asked to pay in advance or 50% in advance as a deposit, we are small company and would not be using the facility on a daily basis, but i believe it is valuable tool for our business. So who is out there for this kind of service? How in depth is there services? and more importantly How much?
Thanks In Advance
We use Credit Focus through Barclays bank, powered by Experian I think.
As a Barclays customer it costs us £10pm, we don't rely on it much but it's worth a tenner.
Keep meaning to sign up to DueDil too, keep hearing people mentioning it, think that's free?
To be honest, we extend £1000's in credit to customers with very poor credit ratings, almost every bad debt we've had has been a customer with a good rating. Intuition works far better in our game, we may turn down the odd good one but it keeps our bad debts right down.
As a Barclays customer it costs us £10pm, we don't rely on it much but it's worth a tenner.
Keep meaning to sign up to DueDil too, keep hearing people mentioning it, think that's free?
To be honest, we extend £1000's in credit to customers with very poor credit ratings, almost every bad debt we've had has been a customer with a good rating. Intuition works far better in our game, we may turn down the odd good one but it keeps our bad debts right down.
Edited by LordHaveMurci on Wednesday 8th October 13:21
We currently use duedil at the moment as "guide" and make a calculated decision based on that, however duedil are due to start charging users for the privilege of this service, so if we are to pay anyway its worth taking a look at the other companies out there.
We currently bank with Santander so maybe worth giving them a call to see if they offer a service to existing customers.
We currently bank with Santander so maybe worth giving them a call to see if they offer a service to existing customers.
Chrisoldskool said:
So who is out there for this kind of service? How in depth is there services? and more importantly How much?
I use http://www.matrixlegal.co.uk/collect/ for all such stuff. Their website's in the priocess of overhaul & I know they've got more packages than are mentioned on there - geared just for your sort of scenario.They'll work with you & do a combined package where if you use their recommended T&Cs/procesdures then you get cheaper rates on searches or collections if they have to go that far. They're currently working to recover my one & only bad debt - I don't get many but it naffs me right orrf!
Give Colin a call & see what he can do.
VEIGHT said:
We use credit safe.
Is £200 - £300 a year I think?
We have all of our best customers and supplier details uploaded. If a ccj is registered or their credit rating changes it emails us.
It also has director links so you can see other companies people have been directors of etc
They finally seem to have taken the hint & stopped calling us every few months (touches wood)...Is £200 - £300 a year I think?
We have all of our best customers and supplier details uploaded. If a ccj is registered or their credit rating changes it emails us.
It also has director links so you can see other companies people have been directors of etc
just to comment. when these companies are trying to sell you their info, they usually let you see/discuss reports on some of your customers, and the information they have on them. it's a fair bit to take in immediately, and always sounds great. to judge how good & up to date the info is, I have always given my own company as one of the 'clients'. much easier to judge the validity of info when discussing what I know. I do use the free version of duedil, which gives enough basic info to spot a potential shyster. (as an aside, a couple of years ago, one of these companies said that my company was at danger level, and should be traded with 'cash up front'. at the same time I had insured limits with suppliers in excess of six figures elsewhere. when pushed, the reason given was that my accounts were late. they were not. when pushed again, they conceded that as the accounts were due in the next couple of months, and hadn't been submitted earlier, the matrix said there might be a problem! so a danger I was. I didn't sign up. and yes, this information was sent to any of my suppliers that had signed up with them).
best of luck
best of luck
WE use WWW.CHECKIT.CO.UK for basic credit search, its about £200 per year for the mid level pack.
Our experience is the opposite of the poster above to the extent that we no longer extend credit to anyone unless we can insure their debt, its just not worth it otherwise.
Our experience is the opposite of the poster above to the extent that we no longer extend credit to anyone unless we can insure their debt, its just not worth it otherwise.
nikaiyo2 said:
WE use WWW.CHECKIT.CO.UK for basic credit search, its about £200 per year for the mid level pack.
Our experience is the opposite of the poster above to the extent that we no longer extend credit to anyone unless we can insure their debt, its just not worth it otherwise.
If you insure your debts do you have a need for a separate credit checking service? Genuine question.Our experience is the opposite of the poster above to the extent that we no longer extend credit to anyone unless we can insure their debt, its just not worth it otherwise.
LordHaveMurci said:
If you insure your debts do you have a need for a separate credit checking service? Genuine question.
To be honest we use it when looking into new leads, it gives a guide without having to pay to add risk to the insurance, and its instant, we get calls from our reps, they have just driven past "Joe Blogs" is it worth calling in? With checkit we can get an instant indication of their credit worthiness. For £200 a year its great!Also for small regular (less than £1k per month) or non regular customers if they have a £2 or £3k "one off" job, we don't insure, but use the instant report to decide what payment terms to offer.
nikaiyo2 said:
LordHaveMurci said:
If you insure your debts do you have a need for a separate credit checking service? Genuine question.
To be honest we use it when looking into new leads, it gives a guide without having to pay to add risk to the insurance, and its instant, we get calls from our reps, they have just driven past "Joe Blogs" is it worth calling in? With checkit we can get an instant indication of their credit worthiness. For £200 a year its great!Also for small regular (less than £1k per month) or non regular customers if they have a £2 or £3k "one off" job, we don't insure, but use the instant report to decide what payment terms to offer.
Great response, makes sense now, thanks
We use risk/disk now known as Experian Business Express which costs us 3 or 400 per year I think.
Perfect for our needs, although you weren't clear OP - is it companies or individuals you need to check?
ALl the ones mentioned are, to my knowledge, fairly s
t for individuals unless they are very well established sole traders.
Perfect for our needs, although you weren't clear OP - is it companies or individuals you need to check?
ALl the ones mentioned are, to my knowledge, fairly s
t for individuals unless they are very well established sole traders.LooneyTunes said:
LordHaveMurci said:
If you insure your debts do you have a need for a separate credit checking service? Genuine question.
answer to lordhavemurci. no, except for routine 'fact' finding, as if the risk is bad, you won't get insurance. but as said in this thread before, it does give a view on potential of company.What do you think happens to your credit insurance if you start claiming?
from my point of view insuring takes away the risk, and saves me time and money in credit control. not ideal for everyone, but for about 0.5% of turnover, still cheap. and I have claimed a few times, no more than 25k/instance, and never noticed any disparity with previous years cost of insurance.
vcm said:
if you start claiming, it means you needed credit insurance. and you didn't lose any money (except for excess). the following year, the 'bad' company probably doesn't exist, so no increased risk for insurer. and each year you would do a cost v risk calculation anyway.
from my point of view insuring takes away the risk, and saves me time and money in credit control. not ideal for everyone, but for about 0.5% of turnover, still cheap. and I have claimed a few times, no more than 25k/instance, and never noticed any disparity with previous years cost of insurance.
Agreed claiming does not inflate the premiums significantly, the insurers are more likely to reduce limits etc on less secure risk.from my point of view insuring takes away the risk, and saves me time and money in credit control. not ideal for everyone, but for about 0.5% of turnover, still cheap. and I have claimed a few times, no more than 25k/instance, and never noticed any disparity with previous years cost of insurance.
For us it is a bugetable cost, so can be planned for, someone just popping cant be
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