Building Business Credit in 2025: A Ledger-First Playbook for Beancount Users
If you keep immaculate books in Beancount, you already think in systems. You appreciate precision, automation, and a single source of truth. This guide turns that disciplined mindset into an 11-step, practical workflow for establishing and growing business credit. We'll map each critical step to simple, automatable Beancount habits, transforming your ledger from a historical record into a forward-looking tool for financial strength.
The 2025 Quick Primer: What Actually Matters
The world of business credit can feel opaque, but the principles for 2025 are straightforward. Here’s what you need to know before you start.
First, separate your identities. The absolute foundation of business credit is a distinct legal entity (like an LLC or corporation) with its own, separate bank accounts. Co-mingling personal and business funds is the fastest way to be denied business credit.
Next, get an Employer Identification Number (EIN). This is your business's social security number for tax purposes. It is always free and you should apply for it directly with the IRS—never pay a third-party site for this service.
Then, understand how you’ll be scored. Unlike consumer credit's unified FICO score, business credit is measured by several bureaus, each with its own methodology:
- Dun & Bradstreet PAYDEX® (1–100): This score is almost entirely driven by your payment history with vendors and suppliers. A score of 80 is considered on-time, while anything higher indicates you pay your bills early.
- Experian Intelliscore Plus (1–100): This is a predictive score that forecasts the likelihood of serious delinquency. It analyzes payment trends, public records, and other company data.
- FICO® SBSS (Small Business Scoring Service): This score is critical for accessing SBA 7(a) "Small Loans." As of 2025, the Small Business Administration (SBA) lists a minimum prescreen score of 165.
Finally, know that monitoring is fragmented. Scores differ by bureau, and accessing your full reports often costs money. Before paying for a report, try to verify which score a specific lender or vendor uses.
Heads-up: A quick note on identifiers. If you plan to sell to the U.S. federal government, the Unique Entity ID (UEI) replaced the D-U-N-S number in the SAM.gov system on April 4, 2022. However, for building your business credit file with Dun & Bradstreet, the D-U-N-S number is still essential.
The 11 Steps (and the Beancount Moves That Make Them Stick)
1. Formalize the Entity and Separate Money Flows
This is the non-negotiable first step. Form a legal entity, open a dedicated business checking account, and keep personal funds out. This creates a clean financial history that credit bureaus can track.
Beancount Move: Your ledger should explicitly reflect this separation from day one. Open distinct accounts for the business and document initial capitalization cleanly.
2025-01-01 open Assets:Bank:Checking:Business USD
institution: "Bank of Example"
2025-01-01 open Equity:Owner:Contributions USD
2025-01-05 * "Owner Capitalization"
Assets:Bank:Checking:Business 10000 USD
Equity:Owner:Contributions
2. Get Your EIN (Free) and File It in Your Repo
Apply directly at IRS.gov. Once you receive your EIN confirmation letter (SS-4), store a digital copy in a docs/ directory alongside your ledger. This keeps critical identity documents version-controlled and accessible.
Beancount Move: Use metadata at the top of your ledger file to record the EIN and link to the source document.
; organization-id: "EIN 12-3456789"
; documents: "docs/tax/SS-4.pdf"
Tip: Beware of search-ad "EIN helpers" that charge fees or harvest your data. Always verify you are on a .gov domain before entering sensitive information.
3. Claim Your D-U-N-S® Number
A D-U-N-S number links your company to its Dun & Bradstreet credit file, which vendors and lenders use to assess your reliability. Go to the D&B website to claim or update your company's record for free.
Beancount Move: Just like your EIN, add your D-U-N-S number to your ledger's metadata. You can also link to an internal checklist for vendor onboarding to ensure you're always providing consistent information.
; duns: "123456789"
; vendor-onboarding-checklist: "docs/credit/dnb-checklist.md"
4. Open a Business Credit Card and Use It Prudently
A revolving business credit card is a powerful tool, as issuers often report your payment history to business bureaus. Use it for regular expenses, keep your utilization modest (ideally under 30%), and never, ever miss a payment.
Beancount Move: Model your credit card as a liability. Use metadata to note which bureaus it reports to. Track purchases and, crucially, payments from your business checking account.
2025-01-01 open Liabilities:Credit:BizCard:BankCo USD
reports_to: "Experian, Equifax (varies)"
2025-02-04 * "Laptop (business card)"
Assets:Equipment:Computers 1600 USD
Liabilities:Credit:BizCard:BankCo
2025-02-15 * "BizCard payment (keep util <30%)"
Liabilities:Credit:BizCard:BankCo 1200 USD
Assets:Bank:Checking:Business -1200 USD
5. Establish Vendor Net-30 Trade Lines That Report
This is the fastest path to building a strong PAYDEX score. Find vendors that offer payment terms (e.g., Net-30) and confirm that they report your payment history to bureaus like D&B. Office supply, packaging, and shipping companies are common starting points.
Beancount Move:
Track each vendor invoice in your Accounts Payable (Liabilities:AP). When you pay the invoice, record the transaction and consider adding a tag to track your payment habits.
2025-02-03 * "Acme Packaging — Net30"
invoice: "INV-2025-023"
Expenses:COGS:Packaging 525.00 USD
Liabilities:AP:AcmePackaging
2025-02-27 * "Pay Acme INV-2025-023 (paid early)"
Liabilities:AP:AcmePackaging 525.00 USD
Assets:Bank:Checking:Business -525.00 USD
; tag: net30-early
6. Pay on Time or Early to Target PAYDEX ≥ 80
D&B explicitly maps a PAYDEX score of 80 to "prompt/on-time" payments. Scores above 80 signify early payments. If your cash flow allows, paying invoices 10–20 days before the due date can significantly boost your score.
Beancount Move:
This is a process, not a transaction. Set up a recurring reminder (e.g., a cron job or a Makefile task) that queries your open Liabilities:AP accounts and flags invoices that are due in the next 30 days, prompting you to schedule payments early.
7. Keep Business Identity Consistent Everywhere
Use the exact same legal name, address, phone number, and industry codes (like NAICS) across your bank accounts, IRS filings, insurance policies, and credit bureau profiles. Inconsistencies can lead to fragmented credit files or mismatches.
Beancount Move: Establish a single source of truth for this data in your ledger's top-level metadata.
; company-legal-name: "Acme Robotics, Inc."
; naics: "541511"
; address: "123 Market St, Springfield, ST 12345"
8. Monitor Your Business Credit and Dispute Errors
Business credit reports are less standardized and regulated than consumer reports, making errors more common. Periodically pull your reports from the major bureaus and dispute any inaccuracies immediately.
Beancount Move:
Maintain a directory for docs/credit/ where you store PDFs of your credit reports and any dispute correspondence. You can link to these documents directly from transactions that were misreported, creating an auditable trail.
9. Graduate to Bank Lines and SBA Options (When Ready)
Once you have a solid history of on-time payments, you can approach banks for lines of credit or apply for SBA-backed loans. For SBA 7(a) Small Loans, lenders use the FICO SBSS score, and the current minimum prescreen is 165. Keep your personal credit clean as well, as it's often a factor.
Beancount Move: Use your ledger to track key financial metrics that lenders care about, like your Debt Service Coverage Ratio (DSCR) or cash buffer days. You can define these as custom metadata and run queries against your ledger to see if you meet a lender's covenants before you even apply.
10. Automate the Habits That Move Scores
Good credit is the result of consistent habits. Set up autopay for at least the minimum payment on business credit cards. Schedule a weekly time block to run your A/P. Regularly review A/R aging to protect your cash flow. Systematize the behaviors that lead to good scores.
Beancount Move: Document your financial policies as metadata. This serves as a reminder and a checklist for your operations.
; policy:
; - autopay: "Liabilities:Credit:BizCard:BankCo:min"
; - payables-run: "weekly, Mondays"
; - target-utilization: "<30%"
11. Keep Learning Your Scores’ Dials
Finally, understand what drives each score so you can focus your efforts:
- PAYDEX (D&B): Driven almost entirely by payment timeliness and the number of trade lines reporting.
- Intelliscore (Experian): Influenced by payment trends, public records (liens, judgments), and firmographics (age of business, industry risk).
- SBSS (FICO/SBA): A blended model using business credit, personal credit, and business financials. Used heavily for SBA 7(a) loans.
A Compact Beancount Starter for Credit-Building
Here is a minimal credit.beancount file to get you started on tracking these activities in a structured way.
option "operating_currency" "USD"
; --- Accounts ---
2025-01-01 open Assets:Bank:Checking:Business USD
2025-01-01 open Assets:Equipment USD
2025-01-01 open Liabilities:AP:Vendors USD
2025-01-01 open Liabilities:Credit:BizCard:BankCo USD
2025-01-01 open Expenses:COGS:Packaging USD
2025-01-01 open Expenses:Office:Supplies USD
2025-01-01 open Income:Sales USD
2025-01-01 open Equity:Owner:Contributions USD
; --- Identity (metadata you can query) ---
; EIN: 12-3456789
; DUNS: 123456789
; NAICS: 541511
; address: "123 Market St, Springfield, ST 12345"
; --- Example workflow ---
2025-02-03 * "Acme Packaging — Net30" "Boxes for March"
invoice: "INV-2025-023"
vendor_duns: "987654321"
Expenses:COGS:Packaging 525.00 USD
Liabilities:AP:Vendors
2025-02-27 * "Pay Acme INV-2025-023 (early)"
Liabilities:AP:Vendors 525.00 USD
Assets:Bank:Checking:Business -525.00 USD
2025-03-04 * "Laptop (business card)"
Assets:Equipment 1600.00 USD
Liabilities:Credit:BizCard:BankCo
2025-03-15 * "BizCard payment (util <30%)"
Liabilities:Credit:BizCard:BankCo 1200.00 USD
Assets:Bank:Checking:Business -1200.00 USD
Common Questions
How many trade lines do I need to generate a D&B score? Dun & Bradstreet requires a sufficient number of verified trade experiences to generate a PAYDEX score. While there's no magic number, the key is having multiple vendors consistently reporting your on-time or early payments.
Where do I check my business credit scores? Each bureau (D&B, Experian, Equifax) offers paid access to reports on their websites. Some third-party services aggregate data, but they may not show the specific score a lender uses. Before paying, ask your potential lender or vendor which credit bureau and score they rely on.
I see sites charging money for an EIN. Are those legit? No. An EIN is always free from the official IRS.gov website. Avoid non-.gov domains and sponsored search ads that pose as official IRS pages; they are designed to charge you for a free service or collect your data.
Recap: The System in One Checklist
- Form an entity → Open a dedicated business bank account.
- Get an EIN (free) → Store the SS-4 document in your code repository.
- Claim your D-U-N-S number → Align your business identity across all systems.
- Add a business credit card → Automate payments and keep utilization low.
- Open 2–3 Net-30 vendor accounts that report → Pay them early to target a PAYDEX score of 80 or higher.
- Monitor your reports → Dispute any and all inaccuracies with the bureaus.
- When ready, approach lenders → Keep the SBA's SBSS prescreen minimum of 165 in mind as a benchmark for readiness.
Sources for Further Reading
- U.S. Small Business Administration: On establishing business credit and the SBA 7(a) Small Loan SBSS minimum.
- IRS: On obtaining an EIN for free.
- Dun & Bradstreet: On PAYDEX scores and D-U-N-S numbers.
- Experian: On Intelliscore Plus and business credit basics.
- Investopedia: On monitoring business credit.
- GSA: On UEI replacing D-U-N-S in SAM.gov.
