How Safely Are You Trading?

Coface UK has designed an on-line Quick Credit Management Health Check .

It's a 'tick the box' questionnaire that asks the right questions. It doesn't ask all the right questions - and it's certainly looking for information about the companies that complete it - but then one would expect that of an on-line questionnaire.

The important thing about this 'credit management health check' is that the first paragraph (which isn't part of the questionnaire at all, really) asks "How safely are you trading on credit terms?" Which is, of course, the most important question of all.

Good credit management policies and procedures have always provided a 'security blanket' for companies wise enough - or perhaps stubborn enough or brave enough! - to insist upon using them.

I regularly receive instructions from credit controllers who do their best to work in an environment where selling goods or services is an overriding imperative, and management seems incapable of recognising that nothing is sold until it is paid for, and that everything that is sold needs to be paid for within a specified period of time. And, moreover, that it isn't wise - in the long run - to pander too much to big clients.

Fill in the form - or just look at the questions, and think it out for yourself. How safely are you trading, really?