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Dun and Bradstreet Deserves No Credit
By Michael Taylor
A few months ago I blogged about trying Dun & Bradstreet’s credit building service for my small business, Cedarcrest Capital, as an experiment.
Now, three months later, my score for them: Low.
In at least three different ways they’ve failed to live up to their promise and made it impossible to recommend the service to other small business owners. First, they failed to deliver on their original promise; next, they tried a fear tactic to generate additional business; and finally, they did not follow up to satisfy a customer who expressed dissatisfaction (that would be me).
A steep price-tag – close to $600 – supposedly pays for D&B to contact your company’s creditors with a view to verifying a history of timely debt payment. I provided the maximum allowed six creditors to D&B, with up-to-date contact information.
After a month, a D&B representative reported to me their inability to reach even three of my creditors, despite the fact that I know I could reach each of them with one phone call.
Having failed to deliver on the basic promise of the service, the D&B representative proceeded to try to sell me further, more expensive, services relating to monitoring my business credit.
When I pushed back over the phone and said D&B needed do a passable job with the original task before moving on to further sales, the representative attempted to sell through fear. He suggested that my lack of D&B Score will hurt my borrowing ability, and further that I’ll need to pay them additional sums to monitor my business credit going forward.
Now, I’m not a good candidate for the “fear sell” since my business has perfect credit; maybe this will work with less credit-worthy businesses. But I have to think almost no business owner would purchase more products from a company that couldn’t do their first job correctly.
When I politely suggested as much, the D&B representative decided that arguing with me was a better tactic than promising to follow up internally and make it right.
It seems he chose wrongly.
Comments (4)September 4, 2008 1:08 PM
Comments (4)
D&B used to come around to my small business selling their credit checking services. You get an order, you check with D&B to see if the customer pays their bills. As part of the service, they let you pick two companies to get free reports on. I gave them two, and both came back with good credit. One of them I had placed for collection WITH D&B. So they had a known bad creditor in their own system and didn't even talk to the guys on the other side of the house. The second company had been suspended from trading by the SEC. Pretty incompetent credit checking.
Posted by Doug Crice | September 5, 2008 9:14 AM
Posted on September 5, 2008 09:14
Thanks for your comment Doug. I didn't even mention their credit reports, of which I've bought quite a few...I too find the information spotty at best.
I received a call from a D&B representative following my post, who seems interested in making things right.
There is a real need for solid business-to-business credit checking, so I sincerely hope they can improve their processes.
Posted by Michael Taylor | September 8, 2008 6:22 PM
Posted on September 8, 2008 18:22
I have a very low opinion of D&B. Today I got a call from someone pitching and investment. They told me they purchased my contact information from D&B. Stay away from them. I have given D&B no information yet I have a Amex Business Platinum and several corporate credit cards.
Posted by Joe Turner | September 10, 2008 12:08 AM
Posted on September 10, 2008 00:08
Is D&B trying to destroy my credit score or monitor it?
D&B ranks right up there with "Free Magazine Trial Subscriptions" and Columbia House Deals. I stupidly signed up for their two-week, FREE trial of DNBi SelfMonitor Service. I thought it would be interesting to at least SEE what they've got on file about my company. (As it turns out..not much..I've done little/nothing on credit to speak of.)
Bad decision on my part. Two weeks and 1 minute later they have debited my checking account for $449. My fault! I, of course, should have remembered to cancel the purchase before I purchased it, right?
Aren't those scams illegal? Wouldn't a reputable business send an email to remind you that your two week trial was about to end?
Now I have to scramble (after paying the $35 overdraft fee) to avoid other bills defaulting tomorrow on the 1st of the month. Only to watch D&B then downgrade my credit for the first time ever. Oh, sweet irony.
Thanks D&B. I feel very secure.
Tom Ladue
A struggling entrepreneur
Posted by Thomas Ladue | April 30, 2009 4:51 PM
Posted on April 30, 2009 16:51