How to Check Your Business Credit: 5 Reports and What Each Costs to See

There is no single business credit score, and there is no business equivalent of the free annual report individuals take for granted. An owner who wants to know what lenders see has to assemble it from several sellers, at several prices, and one of the most consequential records (the public filing index) is not a credit report at all.

The five sources below are the ones a lender is most likely to consult. Prices were read on the sellers' own pages on September 27, 2026, and where a seller does not publish a price, this article does not guess one.

1. Dun and Bradstreet Lets You See the File Free and Sells You the Scores

D&B says plainly that an owner can review and update the company's information for free. That review covers what D&B holds about the business: its name, address, officers, and the other facts that let a lender match the file to the applicant. The scores and the legal event data are another matter. D&B's credit products report bankruptcies, judgments, liens, lawsuits, and UCC filings, and they are sold, not given.

The PAYDEX score D&B publishes runs from 1 to 100 and rests on payment experiences suppliers submit. Its bands are 0 to 49 for high risk of late payment, 50 to 79 for moderate, and 80 to 100 for low. A company whose suppliers do not report will have a file D&B can describe and cannot score, which is less a verdict on the business than a record of how few people have spoken about it.

A free look at the descriptive file is worth taking before any application. Errors in the name or address are the ones that cause a lender's search to land on a different company.

2. Experian's Business Report Carries the Public Record Alongside the Payments

Experian sells business credit reports and publishes its dispute process, and its business reports, by its own description, include UCC filings, judgments, and collections. That combination matters for any company that has taken a merchant cash advance, since the funder's financing statement will often appear in the report whether or not a single payment was late.

Experian's report prices were not confirmed on a page it publishes, and the figures that circulate in search results are not repeated here. One price is known to be zero: when an owner's dispute produces a change, Experian says it will provide a second complimentary commercial report for confirmation, which is a strange way to receive a free report, and, as far as the published terms go, the only one on offer.

3. Equifax Sells Its Report Through Resellers

Equifax's own page does not complete the sale of its small business report to owners. Equifax's small business page sends the buyer to eCredable, which it calls an approved Equifax reseller, for the Business Credit Industry Report Plus 2.0 and relevant scores, listed as a one time download for $49.99. Monitoring is offered through Nav, another approved reseller, with subscriptions listed from $39.99 a month.

The report, per Equifax, shows the company's score, borrowing history, public records, and financial performance.

4. Your Personal Reports Are Free, and Lenders Will Read Them

The free report right most owners know belongs to individuals. The Fair Credit Reporting Act defines a consumer as an individual, and nothing in its free disclosure scheme reaches a corporation's file. For the owner personally, the FTC reports that the three nationwide bureaus have permanently extended free weekly credit reports at AnnualCreditReport.com. Those are reports, not scores.

They matter to a business application for a reason owners find unwelcome. The SBA now requires 7(a) Small Loan lenders to analyze the credit history of the applicant's guarantors, and a lender outside that program has its own reasons to read the file of the person who signed the guarantee. So check both, and check yours first.

A personal report will also show, in some cases, obligations the owner did not think of as personal at all (a business card that reports to consumer bureaus, a guaranteed equipment lease, an old account opened in the owner's name before the company had its own identity, each of which a lender will count against the owner whether or not the business is paying it on time).

5. The Filing Office Shows What Every Bureau Is Copying

Much of the adverse content on a business report originates in public records, and those records can be searched at the source. New York's Department of State charges $25 to search the UCC records for filings against one debtor. The search shows each unlapsed financing statement against the business, the secured party, and the filing date. A bureau that reports a UCC filing got it from a filing office like this one, directly or through a vendor.

A search at the source costs less than any bureau report and is, if we are careful about the word, more accurate, since it is the thing the bureaus are summarizing. What it cannot show is how any lender will weigh it.

The Score Lenders Used to Pull, and Why It Matters Less Now

Until March 1, 2026, the FICO Small Business Scoring Service score screened SBA 7(a) Small Loan applications. SBA Procedural Notice 5000-875701 ended that screen; lenders now use their own prudent credit analysis, and any model they use may not rely solely on consumer credit scores. Articles still quoting an SBSS minimum for 7(a) Small Loans (search results still surface them) describe a rule that no longer applies.

Owners who check their files and find MCA filings stacked against the company are usually looking at the debt, not the credit. Delancey Street is a business debt settlement company, not a law firm; it looks at MCA agreements and the filings they produced in a confidential first consultation without charge, and it works with independently licensed counsel on legal questions. You check the report, and then you deal with whatever put that line on it.