How can a business accurately estimate its FICO score?
To help you determine your FICO score, we asked CFOs and account managers this question for the best resources and tips. From Experian’s Business Credit Score Check to Report to CreditSignal by DnB, there are several resources that may help accurately estimate your business’ FICO score.
Here are six resources to accurately estimate your business’ FICO score:
- Experian’s Business Credit Score Check & Report
- Your Amount Owed
- The Factors that Contribute to Credit Scores
- FICO Score Estimator Websites
- Your Credit Report
- Credit Insights by Dun & Bradstreet
Experian’s Business Credit Score Check & Report
Experian Intelliscore Plus is a plan you can use to check your business credit score or FICO SBSS score for small businesses. While there are several plans to choose from, they essentially evaluate your business credit score and credit report through your business checking account balance, time of ownership, and principal’s combined net worth. Experian offers a plan as low as $39.95, but they have annual plans you can select for more detailed reports and security.
Nunzio Ross, Majesty Coffee
Your Amount Owed
There are many ways for a business to estimate its FICO score. Calculating the amount you owe is an ideal method. Many lenders see the potential risk in borrowers who usually spend up to or above their limits and prefer observing the credit utilization ratios. Therefore, it’s suitable for businesses to remain below 30% of the available credit handed.
Gisera Matanda, WeLoans
The Factors that Contribute to Credit Scores
For the most part, FICO scores for businesses are similar to personal ones, however, there are a couple of key differences worth noting.
While personal credit scores range from 300 to 850, business credit scores (provided by Dun & Bradstreet, Experian, and Equifax) range from 0 to 100. In both instances the higher the better. The official score is called “FICO’s Small Business Scoring Service (SBSS)” and has a scale of 0-300. Nav’s Business Credit Scores and Reports gives you at least a partial look into this information (with the rest of the information behind a paid membership).
The biggest factors that go into the computation of the score include:
- Payment history
- Age of credit history
- Debt and debt usage
- Industry risk, and
- Company size
The most important factor by far when it comes to business credit scores is simply payment history, so above all else make sure all your bills and invoices are paid on time.
Peter Bryla, ResumeLab
FICO Score Estimator Websites
Use an estimator tool to get a good estimate of your business’ FICO score. The accuracy of the FICO score estimator tool relies on how much information you can give about your credit history. It will ask a series of questions to gather information about your credit behavior. From the data that has been gathered, it will base its calculation to provide a range of your FICO score. The more detailed you are about your credit history, the more accurate the estimator can get.
PracticalMoneySkills.com and myFICO.com are two reliable FICO estimator websites businesses can use.
Brogan Renshaw, Modelers Central
Your Credit Report
The best way to estimate your FICO score is to pull your credit report and review it. The information on your report will give you a close estimate of what your score may be. The closer you look at your report, the better estimate you will be able to get. You may notice that some of the information on your report is incorrect. If you have incorrect information on your report, you may be able to get it removed.
Fiona Lee, Notta
Credit Insights by Dun & Bradstreet
Credit Insights is a digital product made by Dun & Bradstreet (a credit monitoring company), that can monitor credit scores for businesses. Knowing these scores can help you to estimate your FICO score and get an idea of your overall credit health. This program is free for the first 14 days and gives you a look at four types of scoring. Paid plans present more scores beyond the initial four and extend your program subscription.
David Aylor, David Aylor Law Offices
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