Protect Your Company's Credit

Happy New Year! As we look forward to a new year and a new decade, it is a good time to put your credit house in order. With stricter lending practices, obtaining credit and financing has become increasingly difficult and, consequently, protecting your good credit and improving your credit score has never been more important. Below are several steps that you can take to improve you company's credit worthiness:

1. Register with Dun and Bradstreet (D&B), the credit reporting agency and business equivalent of Equifax, TransUnion and Experian, which are personal agencies. Banks, lessors and other creditors will often verify your company information with D&B. The website link is http://smallbusiness.dnb.com/establish-my-business/12305207-1.html and the cost is $149.

2.       Pay your bills to large companies first. Businesses like Federal Express or UPS will report late payments immediately to D&B, whereas small companies generally do not.

3.       Check your UCC filings with the Secretary of State to identify inaccuracies. Creditors often fail to remove liens once the obligation has been satisfied. The link is at http://www.sos.ca.gov/business/ucc/.

4.       The Federal Government offers many resources to help obtain financing and the Small Business Administration (SBA) website is one of the most helpful. Their link is at http://www.sba.gov/localresources/district/ca/la/financing/index.html.

If you have questions regarding credit and financing please call us. We will be happy to assist you in protecting your credit and banking relationship during these challenging economic times.