Business Credit Reports: check any UK company before you trade
⚡ Quick Answer: Business Credit Reports let you check the financial health of any UK limited company before you trade with it. Search by company name or number in your customer portal, buy a one-off report, and optionally add monitoring so we email you when something changes. Prices start at £9.99 (+ VAT) per company.
What Is a Business Credit Report?
A business credit report is an independent assessment of how likely a company is to pay you on time and stay solvent. It brings together public records (Companies House filings, court judgments, Gazette notices) with payment data and a scoring model, and gives you a rating, a score and a recommended credit limit for that company.
Businesses use them to:
- Check a new customer before offering payment terms or starting work on credit.
- Check a supplier you depend on, so a failure does not disrupt your business.
- Keep an eye on existing customers for early warning signs such as new court judgments or overdue accounts.
⚠️ Important: Bad debt is one of the biggest risks to a small business. Companies that suffer a bad debt are around three times more likely to become insolvent than those that do not. A single unpaid invoice can be the difference between a good year and a serious cash-flow problem.
What's in the Report
Section | What you get |
|---|---|
Credit rating | A rating band from low to high risk, with a plain-English description |
Credit score | A score from 0 to 100, plus the previous score so you can see the direction of travel |
Recommended credit limit | The maximum credit the scoring model suggests extending to the company |
Company status | Active, dormant, in liquidation, proposal to strike off, and so on |
County Court Judgments (CCJs) | Number of judgments and total value |
Insolvency history | Whether the company or its group has any insolvency events on record |
Financials | Latest turnover and filed accounts |
Directors and ownership | Current officers, resignations and persons with significant control |
Registered details | Registered office, incorporation date, company number |
PDF report | The full report as a PDF you can download, save or share internally |
Reports cover UK limited companies and LLPs registered at Companies House. Sole traders and partnerships do not have a Companies House record and cannot be searched.
How the Rating and Score Work
The score is produced by a commercial credit-scoring model that weighs filed accounts, payment behaviour, court judgments, adverse notices, director history and company age. Broadly:
- Higher score, lower risk. A company with a strong score and a healthy credit limit is a reasonable candidate for normal payment terms.
- Lower score, higher risk. Consider payment up front, a deposit, shorter terms or a lower credit limit.
- Status ratings. Very new companies, companies with a strike-off notice, or companies in an insolvency process are shown with a status rating rather than a numeric score, because there is not enough trading history to score them.
⚠️ Important: A credit report is a guide, not a guarantee. It reflects the information available on the report date. Use it alongside your own judgement, references and trading history.
Monitoring and Change Alerts
If you buy a report with monitoring, we watch the company for you and email you when something changes. Alerts include:
- New CCJ recorded
- Credit rating or credit score changed
- Credit limit decreased
- Accounts overdue or filed late
- New accounts filed
- Winding-up petition or winding-up order
- Striking-off notice
- Pre-insolvency warning
- Notice to appoint an administrator, or administrators appointed
- Director appointed or resigned
- Registered name changed
Changes are batched into one email per company, so you get a single clear alert rather than a stream of notifications. Each alert links back to your portal, where you can see the full history of changes and refresh the report.
Pricing
Plan | What's included | Price (+ VAT) |
|---|---|---|
Report | Full report and PDF for one company, with access for 12 months | £9.99 |
Report + 12 months monitoring | Everything in Report, plus change alerts for 12 months | £34.99 |
Report + 24 months monitoring | Everything in Report, plus change alerts for 24 months | £59.99 |
Prices are per company you check, charged as a one-off payment to the card or payment method on your Hoxton Mix account. There is no subscription and nothing renews automatically. You can buy reports on as many companies as you like.
How to Buy a Report
- Log in to your customer portal.
- Open Credit Reports and search by company name or company number.
- Choose the company from the results, pick a plan, and confirm the payment.
- Your report is generated straight away. Open it on screen or download the PDF.
You need a payment method saved on your account before you can buy a report. If you do not have one, the portal will prompt you to add it first.
Common Questions
Which companies can I check?
Any limited company or LLP registered at Companies House in the UK, including companies you already trade with, prospects, suppliers, and competitors. You cannot run a report on a sole trader or an individual.
Is this a personal credit check?
No. Business Credit Reports cover companies only. They do not look at anyone's personal credit file, and they are not a consumer credit check under the Consumer Credit Act.
Will the company know I have checked them?
No. Running a business credit report leaves no footprint on the company being checked and has no effect on its rating.
How up to date is the report?
The report is generated at the moment you buy it, using the latest data held by our credit data provider, which updates continuously from Companies House, the courts and the Gazette. The report date is shown on every report.
Can I refresh a report I have already bought?
Yes. For as long as your access to that company is active (12 months, or 24 months on the two-year plan) you can regenerate the report from your portal at no extra cost. Refreshes are limited to once every 24 hours unless a change has been detected in between, in which case you can refresh straight away.
What happens when my monitoring period ends?
Alerts stop and the company drops off your monitored list. Your previously generated reports stay in your portal. To keep monitoring, buy a new plan for that company.
Can my team see the reports?
Yes. Business Credit Reports use the same team permissions as the rest of your portal. Team members need the Read credit report permission to view reports and the Manage credit report permission to buy them. Account owners can set these under team settings.
Where does the data come from?
We work with an established UK commercial credit reference provider. Their data combines Companies House filings, County Court Judgment records, Gazette and HM Courts notices, payment performance data and their own scoring model. We do not create the scores ourselves.
Can I use the report to refuse to trade with someone?
Yes. How much credit to extend, and on what terms, is your commercial decision. Many businesses set simple rules, for example asking for payment up front below a certain score, or capping exposure at the recommended credit limit.
Do I need a Hoxton Mix virtual office to use this?
Business Credit Reports are available to Hoxton Mix customers through the customer portal.
Can I get a refund on a report?
Reports are generated and delivered immediately, so they cannot be refunded once purchased. If a report fails to generate for a technical reason you will not be charged, or we will refund you in full.
Updated on: 14/09/2026