Published By Janet Gershen-Siegel at June 15th, 2018
Start a business credit history with Experian and build business credit.
We can help you to start a business credit history with Experian, and show you how to do it yourself if you would prefer that.
Experian is one of the big three credit reporting agencies. The other two are Equifax and Dun & Bradstreet’s PAYDEX. CreditSafe is also important as a great deal of data comes from them.
Experian keeps business credit profiles on 99.9% of all United States firms. It has the credit industry’s most exhaustive data on small and midsize companies. The fact is; your business is most likely already has a listing on Experian.
According to Experian, all their information arises from third party sourcing. Accordingly, you cannot add any facts to your business credit profile Having said that, you can still peruse your profile and obviously advise Experian regarding any inaccuracies.
Improving your business credit history with Experian starts with your business owner profile.
Furthermore, for a smaller firm, Experian will add a business owner profile to indicate the relationships between you, the individual, and your business.
Experian’s Business Owner Link can automatically link the credit history of over 5 million business owners to the business credit history. This makes it easier for your creditors to access a Business Owner Profile on small business accounts.
It also makes it easier for your creditors to appraise your overall creditworthiness.
Experian sells a variety of products which can be used to oversee your business’s credit.
This $149 monthly and features mobile-friendly alerts and score improvement ideas.
So this $49.95 and it includes detailed financial payment details and predictive information on payment behavior.
And this $39.95. This basic report features detailed company and credit information, and summary financial payment information.
Finally, this $99. It shows the market value of your company and features Key Performance Indicators. It also shows your business’s fair market value.
Experian also provides (for a charge) premium corporate profiles. These enhanced profiles include added information, for example, sales figures, size, contact details, products and operations, credit summary, any Uniform Commercial Code (UCC) filings, fictitious business names, plus payment and collections history.
In addition to the data supplied in their standard low-risk corporate profiles, these premium profiles have information on credit inquiries made in the last nine months, UCC specifics, and also Standard & Poor’s financial details.
Obviously, you can register for business credit alerts. Experian’s Business Credit Advantage program serves as a kind of self-monitoring service. You get limitless access to your company’s business credit report and score. You can use this resource for proactively handling your company credit. Alerts are sent out for:
There are several different Experian report sections. We will look at them in turn.
The report divides into sections. The first, as you might expect, contains basic identifying data. So this includes company name and address. But it also includes any ownership information. This section also lists key personnel and the type of business. It also includes how long it has been operating, and the number of employees. And it shows the amount of annual sales.
Next is an abridged section with the current days beyond terms. So those are late payments. It also shows predicted days beyond terms.
This section also provides an overall trend along with data points like the lowest and highest balance for the past six months. It also includes the current balance.
By including the highest amount of credit extended, the report gives an idea of the highest credit utilization rate for your company.
This portion also shows the number of payment trade lines (lines of credit) your business holds. It also includes the number of times any business entity has made an inquiry into your credit history.
It also includes any UCC filings. These are liens on file to support loans. The summary also contains a relative percentage. So this shows the percent of businesses doing worse than yours. It also includes the number of bankruptcies you have. Further, it includes the number of liens and judgments.
Find out why so many companies are using our proven methods to improve their business credit scores.
Next is the credit summary This shows your company’s Experian credit score. And it also links to information on what goes into the score. Further, it contains tips on how to improve your score.
The next part is the payment summary. The section includes line graphs for monthly and quarterly payment trends. And it conveniently shows where the numbers come from. The monthly payment trend is even graphed versus the industry average.
Just below this pair of graphs (and their supporting data) are three bar charts with continuous payment trends. So this is a trade line on report for over six months. They also show newly reporting payment trends. So this is a trade line on report for the first time in the last six months. And it shows combined payment trends.
So this is the account balance for those combination trade lines.
The next part is about how your company has done with its payments. So it is broken down into credit card and leasing accounts. It also has trade lines on file for at least six months. And it also has updating activity from the last three months. Another part is aged trades.
So the last are accounts not updated within the last three months. This information is broken down by supplier category. And it has payment trends at the bottom.
Inquiries
Next up are inquiries into your business’s credit. There is a summary by type of institution doing the asking. The report shows this data by the month when they asked.
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If your business has any collection filings, the listing is here. So the listing is by date, collection agency name, and status. And it is also by amounts disputed and collected. It also includes the closed date, if applicable.
So this is just below the collection filings section. The summary is fairly self-explanatory.
This piece shows whatever Experian knows about your business. And it includes its relationships with these types of institutions. The data include what any credit was extended for. It also shows how much credit was extended. And it includes when the loan began, and the remaining balance if applicable.
Next the report shows basic legal information. Hence this includes the court where a judgment was filed, and the date. And it shows how much it was for.
Tax lien filing information is similar to judgment filings. This is except that it shows a filing location, rather than a court.
These filings just show the date and the filing number. They also show the jurisdiction and the name of the secured party. Finally, they also show the activity on the filing.
Just below that is the UCC filings summary. So it is broken down by filing period and number of certain types of filings. Note: this includes ‘cautionary’.
Finally, Experian provides a handy list of ways to improve your own, specific report.
Find out why so many companies are using our proven methods to improve their business credit scores.
You can get your company’s real Experian report and can dispute any errors on your company’s Experian report by following the directions on their website.
Now that you know what goes into it, you can see what some of the more important pieces of data Experian looks into are. These include payment history and credit utilization. And they also include the amount of time in business. Or at least they show the amount of time your company has had an Experian listing.
Beyond anything else, improving your payment history will improve your Experian credit scores.
Keep your credit utilization within reason. So this is because less than 30% of your total available credit is best. Clear your debts as rapidly as possible. And don’t go delinquent. Also, avoid any late payments. Then, you should be able to improve your Experian score over time.
Stay on top of your Experian business credit profile and keep your credit reports accurate. Every chance you get, work to improve these scores. And the best part is, improving your business credit history with Experian goes even further. It also improves your business credit history with the other two big business credit reporting agencies. So they are Equifax business and Dun & Bradstreet. And it helps you with CreditSafe as well.