You can check your business credit score for free in limited ways. Dun & Bradstreet offers a free plan with a limited view of your file, and Nav shows free summary grades from all three business bureaus. Full reports usually cost money. Unlike personal credit, there is no federal right to a free annual business credit report, so what you can see for free depends on each provider.
Below is what is available at each bureau, how they differ, and what to look for once a report is open. That last part is where most owners find the problems behind their denials.
Why check at all
There are three major business credit bureaus: Dun & Bradstreet, Experian, and Equifax. They do not share one file. Each can hold different information about your business, and different lenders and vendors pull from different bureaus. That creates three situations worth catching early:
- You may have no file at one of the bureaus.
- Your file may exist but have the wrong name, address, or industry.
- A vendor you pay on time may not be reporting at all, which means that history is not helping you.
You cannot fix any of these until you look.
Dun & Bradstreet
Your PAYDEX score lives at D&B. To see anything there, your business needs a D-U-N-S number, which is free. D&B offers a free account called Credit Insights. The free version gives a limited view of your file, including score indicators and alerts when something changes. Seeing the full detail, such as the individual payment experiences behind your score, requires a paid plan.
For most people building from zero, the free view answers the first big question: does D&B see my business correctly, and is anything being reported yet? Some banks also show a D&B score inside their business banking dashboard, so check whether yours does before you pay for anything.
Experian
Experian's business score is Intelliscore Plus, from 1 to 100. Unlike PAYDEX, it looks at more than payment timing, including balances, the number of accounts, and public records. Experian does not offer a free full business report directly. Its one-time reports start at roughly $40, and the detailed report shows individual tradelines and inquiries. If you are about to apply for a business card or line of credit, a one-time report can be worth buying because it shows what an Experian-based lender is about to see.
Equifax
Equifax is the hardest of the three to check directly. How it sells business reports to owners has changed over time, so check its business page for current options. In practice, many small business owners see their Equifax business data through a monitoring service instead of buying the report from Equifax itself.
Nav
Nav offers a free account that shows summary grades from all three business bureaus in one dashboard, alongside your personal credit. It is not the full report, but it is the quickest way to see whether each bureau has a file on you and whether it is moving in the right direction.
Six things to check on your report
Check these in order.
- Your business name, exactly as it appears on your state filing, including "LLC."
- Your address and phone. They should match your bank, your EIN records, and your Google Business Profile. A mismatch is one of the most common reasons automated systems flag an application.
- Your industry code. Bureaus classify your business by industry, and some industries are rated as higher risk. Make sure the code reflects what you actually do.
- Trade experiences, or tradelines. Which vendors are reporting, and how you paid. If a vendor you pay every month is not listed, it may not report to that bureau, or may not have reported yet.
- Anything negative: collections, liens, judgments, or late payments. If you see something you do not recognize, act on it immediately.
- Inquiries. Experian's detailed report shows who has checked your file. A cluster of recent inquiries can make lenders cautious.
If there is no file
Sometimes you search a bureau and find nothing. That is not a bad score. It means no file exists yet, and the fix depends on the bureau.
- At Dun & Bradstreet, the file starts with your D-U-N-S number and fills in as suppliers report payments.
- At Experian and Equifax, a business file generally appears once a creditor or vendor that reports to that bureau starts reporting your account.
So if you only use vendors that report to D&B, you can have a D&B file and nothing anywhere else. That is why it is worth knowing which bureaus each vendor reports to, and confirming it with the vendor. See net 30 vendors that report.
Business credit reports are also not covered by the same consumer protections as personal reports. Companies you do business with can generally buy them, which is one more reason to know what is in yours first.
Fixing errors
If something is wrong, dispute it with the bureau that holds the error. Each bureau has its own process on its website. Fixing it at one bureau does not fix it at the others. Keep documentation: your state filing, your EIN confirmation letter, paid invoices, and any correspondence. Check again about 30 days later to confirm the correction went through.
How often to check
Check monthly while you are building, and always before you apply for anything. The best time to find a problem is before a lender does.
Now that you can see your reports, learn what the scores mean in PAYDEX vs Intelliscore vs FICO SBSS.