3 ways to check your business credit score

Keeping tabs on your business credit score, important for understanding your business’s credit health, is typically straightforward and simple. This score gives potential lenders, partners and investors an idea of how well your business is doing financially, and having a better score can often mean better deals with vendors or better rates for financing and credit. Business credit scores are publicly available to key parties you might do business with, so knowledge of where your business stands is important.

There are three main commercial reporting bureaus—Dun & Bradstreet® (D&B), Equifax® and Experian®. The criteria for determining—and checking—your business credit score can vary depending on the reporting bureau. Keep reading to learn more about how to check your business credit scores.

What you’ll learn:

• Three major commercial credit bureaus are D&B, Equifax and Experian, and they compile information about your business’s financial performance, which can be accessed by lenders, investors, suppliers and others.

• To check your D&B business credit score, you can use their Credit Insights feature, which offers three tiers or plans: free, basic and plus. 

• To check your Equifax business credit score, you can fill out information on their contact page and a sales representative will contact you.

• To check your Experian business credit score, you can choose from four different plan options: CreditScore Report, ProfilePlus Report, Business Credit Advantage and Business CreditScore Pro.

D&B provides business credit scores, ratings and additional company-specific insights regarding growth, risk reduction and cost control. You can use this information to make informed decisions that can help improve your company. D&B offers different credit scores and ratings depending on the area of business performance being measured. When you check your D&B credit file, here are the scores and ratings that are included:

• PAYDEX® Score

• Delinquency Predictor Score (DPS)

• Failure Score

• Supplier Evaluation Risk (SER) Rating

• Maximum Credit Recommendation

• D&B Rating

• Cyber Risk Rating

You can check your D&B business credit score for free, but you must first have a D-U-N-S® Number—a unique nine-digit number that identifies your business. You can check your business credit score with D&B Credit Insights using one of the three available tiers:

• Free: This free plan includes risk range indicators for your PAYDEX Score, DPS, Failure Score and SER. It also shows basic company information, payment history, financial ratios and number of inquiries, and it provides a summary of legal events and business operations. With the free plan, you can also integrate your business bank account with the D&B Credit Insights tool.

• Basic: The basic plan is $49 per month or $499 per year. It includes all the benefits in the free plan, plus 24/7 access to all the scores and ratings in the free plan, as well as your Maximum Credit Recommendation and your D&B Rating. Additional features include more detailed legal events and payment history information, historical trends, an organizational family tree, company financials, inquiry details and dark web monitoring for three selected business email addresses.

• Plus: The plus plan is $149 per month or $1,499 per year. It includes all of the benefits in the free and basic plans, plus dark web monitoring for five selected email addresses, insights on up to five chosen companies for business comparison purposes and the option to submit expanded information related to your business to potentially improve your scores.

Equifax separates business credit scores into three components that can signal how well a business is financially performing:

• Payment Index Score

• Credit Risk Score

• Business Failure Score

To request a copy of your business credit report, you can contact Equifax directly on their contact page. From there, a member of their sales team will reach out to further discuss your business’s needs. When you use the contact page, Equifax will request certain information, such as your:

• Name

• Company name

• Business information, such as email address, phone number and country

• Title, job level and role

• Business’s industry

• Reason for a contact request 

The fee for getting an Equifax business credit report can vary, but it’s typically $99.95 for one report or $399.95 to obtain five credit reports.

Knowing your Experian score can help you learn where you stand financially in the eyes of lenders, investors and others as you work toward expanding your business. Experian compiles business information to assign your company a credit score and a risk class. Your Experian credit score shows a variety of information, such as:

• Background information

• Financial information

• Banking, trade and collection history

• Credit score and risk factors

• Uniform Commercial Code (UCC) filings

• Negative information, such as liens, judgments or bankruptcies

Reviewing your Experian business credit score can help you stay up to date on any changes that may impact your business. Experian offers different plans you can use to obtain your business credit report, depending on your business’s needs:

• CreditScore Report: For a one-time fee of $49.95, you can access your Experian CreditScore Report, which shows a summary of your credit, public records, credit scores and payment summary trends. 

• ProfilePlus Report: You can access your Experian ProfilePlus Report for a one-time fee of $59.95. More comprehensive than the CreditScore Report, ProfilePlus shows detailed data regarding trade lines, information about any business inquiries and UCC details.

• Business Credit Advantage: For $199 per year, you can get unlimited access to your report and scores, daily monitoring, notifications on any changes, alerts on business inquiries and three months of score trends and tracking.

• Business CreditScore Pro: This plan is $1,495 per year and allows you to view multiple Experian reports, public records, credit scores and summary trends. With this plan, you can check up to 30 companies per month, and you can choose a monthly or annual subscription.

You can check your business credit reports from the three major commercial bureaus—D&B, Equifax and Experian—to learn how creditworthy your business is and better understand the type of financial products you might be eligible for. One way to potentially boost your business credit score is by opening—and making regular payments on—a business credit card. If you’re in the market for a new credit card, you might consider partnering with Capital One to help you get business done. Capital One offers a variety of business credit cards, and you can get pre-approved today—with no harm to your credit.