By neglecting customer due diligence, businesses are exposed to unnecessary risks, such as unpaid invoices and bad debt, which could have potentially disastrous consequences.
CreditorWatch offers Australia’s most comprehensive and latest data on credit risk. Our 24/7 monitoring and real-time alerts help you keep a close eye on any adverse information that might affect your business, right now or further down the track. Use the best available data to make the most informed decisions for your business.
Due diligence is not a one-off process
Most businesses understand that, when onboarding a new customer, it is essential to review their credit history and risk to ensure they will be able to meet payment terms. However, many fail to review the ongoing financial health and payment behaviour of existing clientele and partners. Due diligence is not just a one-off process conducted at the beginning of each contract.
Credit monitoring is a vital aspect of credit management. It is important to perform ongoing monitoring and be alerted to any changes in behaviour after getting a new trading partner onboard. It enables you to be constantly aware of how your customers and suppliers are performing, so that you can better manage your ledger and reduce your financial and credit risk.
Change is inevitable
Businesses are continually changing; financial health and credit scores fluctuate. Credit reports obtained at the start of a contract may not be an accurate indicator of future financial health. Various factors can affect a customer’s ability to pay on time and there is always an inherent risk that a debtor will not pay their invoice. It is therefore crucial to be aware of key updates, latest risks and any unusual activity, as the failure of a customer or supplier can severely impact your business.
While it is obvious to investigate the repayment ability of customers, do not overlook suppliers and other partners. If they fail to fulfil their contracts, causing you to be unable to supply goods or services to your customers, your business could suffer serious financial and reputational repercussions.
To protect your business, it is important to stay on top of the financial health and credit risk of all your trading partners.
Do you really understand the financial health of your trading partners?
Many business owners are unaware that their top customers represent their biggest exposure to credit default. Having established strong relationships and trust, these customers are often given larger credit limits and extended payment terms. However, this leaves businesses in a vulnerable position when their favourite customers start experiencing financial issues.
Even long-standing customers could be subject to court proceedings with other companies. A customer who is a bad debtor to someone else also puts you at risk. Do you truly know what is happening behind closed doors?
Most businesses are in a very different condition now than they were pre-pandemic; you may not know your customer base as well as you think you do.
24/7 automated monitoring and alerts
Ongoing credit monitoring enables you to be vigilant of your trading partners, helping you to proactively mitigate risk and prevent bad debt.
CreditorWatch monitors any commercial entity – such as potential and existing customers and suppliers – helping you stay on top of your entire ledger. Our automated monitoring service works 24/7, delivering information and alerts as soon as they occur.
Receive real-time notifications via email when the circumstances of any of your trading partners change. If there is adverse information which could affect their credit rating or financial risk, for instance, if a debtor goes into administration or stops paying other suppliers, we will alert you instantly.
Whether you have one or thousands of customers, CreditorWatch gives you up-to-date information on all of them. These instant alerts allow your credit team to make informed decisions and take immediate action to mitigate credit risk exposure.
Perform ongoing monitoring to avoid working with entities that are unable to pay their bills, deliver their goods, fulfil their contracts, or may soon go out of business.
A way to gain more control over who you do business with and implement measures to mitigate risk, like adjusting credit limits is to ask for cash on demand or expediting debt collection.
Receive real-time alerts for:
- Entity status changes
See deregistrations, administrations, liquidations, and strike-off actions as soon as they occur.
- ASIC and ABR changes
Get notifications about ASIC and ABR documents lodged and changes in directors, shareholders, ABNs, ACNs, addresses and business names.
- Adverse events and high-risk indicators
Get alerts about trading partners with adverse information such as court actions, outstanding balances, payment defaults, mercantile enquiries, insolvency notices and administration appointments. These are warning signs that they are financially struggling.
- Payment Predictor changes
See an entity’s payment habits, including the average number of days that they take to pay their bills. Compare it to the rest of the industry to identify and avoid slow paying businesses.
- Payment Rating changes
Assess an entity’s payment reliability and risk based on their past behaviour and understand its propensity to pay on time, or at all.
- Risk Rating changes
The most predictive company credit rating system in the market, helping you assess a business’s creditworthiness and predict their likelihood of default.
Director due diligence helps you discover bankruptcy data, cross directorships, and adverse director information in your ledger.
Leverage CreditorWatch’s exclusive data and insights
CreditorWatch empowers businesses with the latest credit information and exclusive risk insights. We are the most used credit bureau in Australia, with access to 50+ public and private data sources. With 55,000+ customers accessing and contributing unique financial data across all states and industries, we offer a complete ongoing picture of an entity’s financial health.
Our public data sources include Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), Australian Business Register (ABR), Australian Courts and more. We have a live feed of the latest personal insolvency and bankruptcy data coming directly from the Australian Financial Security Authority (ASFA). We are also the only commercial credit bureau that collects data directly from the ASIC-operated Published Notices register.
Our unique data includes payment defaults, mercantile enquiries, credit enquiries, transactional data, corporate ATB data, georisk and geodemographic data and ATO tax default data.
We are also the only commercial credit bureau that combines SME and corporate trade payment data. We have exclusive access to over 10 million monthly tradelines, derived from corporate ATB uploads and our Xero and MYOB integration, providing the full picture of how a market actually gets paid.
Stay informed with accurate and timely updates on your customers and suppliers. The more information you have, the better you can predict future performance, proactively mitigate risk and maintain a stable upward trajectory. Gain a competitive advantage by responding quickly and make better credit decisions to protect your business.
Protect your business with CreditorWatch
CreditorWatch supports businesses of all sizes, from SMEs to larger corporates, with a broad suite of credit monitoring and risk management tools to alert them to early warning signs when their customers are financially struggling.
Perform ongoing monitoring to gain valuable insights into an entity’s financial health and a better understanding of who to do business with. Take a proactive approach to debtor management, make smarter credit decisions and protect your cash flow.
To learn more about using CreditorWatch’s monitoring service to protect your business, get in touch with us today or start your 14-day free trial here.
