Business credit, explained properly
Most of what is written about business credit is either a sales pitch or a list of steps with the mechanism left out. This is the mechanism: what a credit file is made of, who decides what goes into it, and what you can actually do about it.
Nobody builds your credit file for you.
A business credit file is not built automatically. That single fact explains most of what confuses people about this subject.
Consumer credit accumulates whether you pay attention or not: lenders report to the consumer bureaus as a matter of course, because they are required to and because the infrastructure assumes it. Commercial credit has no such default. A supplier who extends you thirty-day terms is under no obligation to tell anybody how you paid, and filing that report costs them time and money for no direct return.
So most of them do not. And that is how a business pays every invoice early for a year, across four or five suppliers, and finishes the year with a credit file that is exactly as empty as it started.
Everything on the pages below follows from this. Build the entity and the identity so a file can exist. Open accounts with the suppliers who actually report, which is a question you have to ask each of them directly. Pay before the due date, because these models reward early rather than treating it as neutral. Then watch both files, because they will disagree and one of them will eventually hold something that is not yours.
- A tradeline is one reported account. A credit file is the sum of its tradelines.
- Paying a supplier does not report the account. Only the supplier reporting it does that.
- Every bureau scores on its own scale, so a number without its bureau attached means nothing.
- Checking your own business credit file has no effect on it. There is no hard inquiry on yourself.
Eight pages, in the order they build on each other.
Each one answers a single question completely. Read them in sequence or jump to the one you came for.
Which bureaus this is actually about.
There is no single business credit score. These are the two files Ruproa reads and reports to, on their own scales.
A 1 to 100 business credit score with a recommended credit limit beside it, often the figure a supplier deciding on terms actually reads. Included from the Starter plan up.
How the Creditsafe score worksThe OneScore for Commercial, on its real 300 to 650 range, with the trade references and public records behind it. Included from the Professional plan up.
How to read the Equifax fileRuproa reports your payment activity to Creditsafe and Equifax Business every month, so the file you are watching is the file you are building.
Ruproa is not affiliated with Dun & Bradstreet and does not issue DUNS numbers or Paydex scores. If you need those, you get them from D&B directly and for free.
Common questions.
What is business credit?
Business credit is a record of how reliably a company pays what it owes, held by commercial credit bureaus and keyed to the business rather than its owner. It is built from tradelines (individual accounts reported by suppliers and lenders) and it is separate from the owner's personal credit file.
How is business credit different from personal credit?
It is a separate file, keyed to the business and its EIN rather than an SSN, scored by different models on different scales, and, unlike consumer credit, it is not built automatically. A business credit file grows only when a creditor chooses to report an account, and most small suppliers do not.
How do I start building business credit?
Make the business a separate legal entity, get an EIN from the IRS, open a business bank account, and keep the name, address and phone identical everywhere. Then open accounts with suppliers that confirm they report to a bureau, and pay them before the due date.
Which bureaus does Ruproa work with?
Creditsafe and Equifax Business. Ruproa reads both files into one dashboard and reports your payment activity to both every month. Ruproa is not affiliated with Dun & Bradstreet and does not supply Paydex scores or DUNS numbers.
Do I need a Social Security Number?
No. Ruproa onboards on your EIN. Your personal credit file is never pulled, soft or hard, and it stays separate from your business file.
Is there a free way to start?
Yes. A Ruproa account is free forever and includes the dashboard, your company profile and a starter set of guides. Pulling your live bureau file is the paid step, from $19 a month. There is no free trial on any plan, so nothing switches itself on and starts charging you later.
Elsewhere on the site
Start the file, then watch it fill.
The account is free forever and takes a few minutes. EIN only: no SSN, and no personal credit pull.
