Dun & Bradstreet – Who, What, and Why?

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[/frame]Dun & Bradstreet Credibility Corp., or D&B, was founded in 1841 as a provider of credit information on businesses.  Any business that seeks credit is under the radar of D&B.  Its primary sources for list data are public records — from court documents and corporate filings to fictitious business-name statements that capture the formation of sole proprietorships.

Now the big question here always is – do I need a Dun & Bradstreet number? You are in no way required to register with D&B, however this will make obtaining credit lines with other businesses fairly complicated. Consider it like this: if you are an individual & you want to get a credit card, use a checking account, buy a car, house, whichever – the seller may seek out info on your age, job, money in the bank, information about your history of paying bills & so forth.

With business to business it is the same kind of thing, they want to know things about the business that might not be relevant about an individual person, for example:

• How long have they been in business?
• Who owns this outfit & what are their records?
• When they pay their bills, do they do so on time & if not how far behind do they get on the average?
• List some credit references.

Furthermore D&B gives you access to a series of great tools to help you when doing business with other businesses. Their most recent products include the Credit Evaluator Report and Business Information Report, which provide various depths of information related to the credit worthiness of a company you may be considering doing business with. Obtaining a copy of these reports for your own business is a good idea as-well – keeping you in the loop of how your report looks to other businesses.

So in the end – it’s totally up to you whether or not you decide to register with D&B or not; do I suggest it? Yes, heavily, to all of my clients; but are you required to do so? No. Choose wisely.