The goal at this stage of the business credit building process is to have at least 5 reporting trade lines appearing on your Dun & Bradstreet, Experian Business and Equifax Small Business credit reports for your company.

Remember, simply opening accounts does not establish payment history or trade lines. You need to use your lines of credit by placing orders and paying your invoices ahead of the due date (preferably 10 days early). By doing this you establish a positive payment track record which gets reported by your vendors to the business credit reporting agencies.

Vendor Starter Accounts

The vendor process needs to go in stages and the first stage is where we covered the starter accounts listed in Step 4.1. This is where we made sure you begin with at least (5) vendor accounts so you can establish (5) reporting trade lines. You'll need to verify that your tradelines are reporting on your business credit reports before applying with any other business credit sources listed in Module 5. (Level 2)

As you continue to use your vendor credit lines you will establish a stronger profile since you are building payment history. Doing so may lead to potential credit limit increases with your existing vendors as well as even more favorable terms such as net 60 or net 90 day terms.

In addition, it will allow you to open new credit lines with almost any vendor or supplier who extends credit terms.

Note: You can always go back to review vendors throughout Module 4 but be sure you've reached (5) reporting tradelines before moving forward. If you fail to have met this requirement you risk being declined by the credit sources listed in Module 5 (Level 2) since they check your business credit reports and require multiple trade lines reporting as part of their credit approval.