Better Business Bureau

Any business check should include a phone call to the local Better Business Bureau (BBB). If a customer has ever filed a complaint about the business, you will have access to the complaint record. This record(s) can sometimes provide a great deal of information that you would not have found elsewhere.

Secretary of State

The Secretary of State is a useful resource for those that want to obtain information about a business or corporation. Depending on the state in which the business resides, you may be able to find anything from registration records to disciplinary actions taken against licensed professionals within the business.

To determine what is available from the secretary of state for your target’s state, look in the ‘State Government’ section of the program under Search.

Bankruptcy Records

To help determine the likelihood of a business going bankrupt, you may want to check for previous bankruptcies under the owner’s name. These records are available to the public and may provide other information that is useful as well. To determine if there are any records for your subject, request a name search from the appropriate state bankruptcy court.

Where to obtain an online listing of the court contact addresses can be found in the ‘State Government’ of the program.

Corporation, Fictitious Name & UCC Filing Records. Most of these records are open to the public and many can even be found within searchable databases on the Internet. Uniform commercial code (UCC) transactions are particularly informative in a business background check and the records usually provide details of the transactions that were filed.