Who Are Dun and Bradstreet
Dun and Bradstreet is a merged company of two of the most well known business credit agencies in the US. They work to provide companies with credit information for a business loan, as well as tips for how to run your business guided by the statistics that they have gathered over a period of over 150 years. You can meet with a Dun and Bradstreet associate at one of their locations or on the web.
The company began in 1841 when Lewis Tappan, the great grand nephew of Ben Franklin, started The Mercantile Agency in New York City. He gathered information from businesses that became the first source of consistent data to help businesses grow. Later the company was given to Benjamin Douglass and afterwards his brother-in-law Robert Graham Dun, whom the company was renamed after.
In the beginning years the company serviced some of the best known and respected companies known today, and has employed people including William McKinley, Grover Cleveland, Ulysses S. Grant, and Abraham Lincoln. It expanded across the US and later on across the globe.
In 1849 the Bradstreet Company was founded in Cincinnati, which would become one of the biggest rivals to Dun & Company. By 1933 the two companies had merged together to form D&B. Together they invented The D&B D-U-N-S® Number which is now the standard way to identify each business in the U.S., United Nations, and in the European Commission.
Together Dun and Bradstreet have gathered information on about 140 million records for businesses. This information is used to give business owners advice on the best decisions while running their business. It is also used to compile records for keeping track of your business credit score, which is used by banks and other lending companies when determining which businesses they should give credit to. Some business use Dun and Bradstreet to learn their paydex score as well. A paydex score is given based off of how long it takes you to pay past due balances.
Banks don’t want to extend corporate credit lines to businesses they feel won’t be able to keep up with the payments. Companies like Dun and Bradstreet work to provide these companies with business credit report information so they can make decisions based off of a reliable and consistent source. Just like personal credit, business credit is only established when financial activities are reported to the credit agency. If you are seeking to build your business credit score you will have to make sure that the company reports your payments, otherwise it will take no effect on your score.
The first step to establishing business credit is to get a business credit card. For this you will need a secure a good personal credit score and obtain all of the necessary documents to prove you own a business. Very few banks will lend small businesses money right away because they don’t have any corporate credit.
After a couple years of on time payments you should have no problem getting a business loan from a bank or lending company. As a business owner it is your responsibility to make sure that your business credit report is maintained with all of the major business credit companies.
Tags: business credit report | corporate credit | business credit | business loan | business loan | paydex score | paydex score