The administration notice you saw too late
A customer with a large unpaid balance goes into administration. Looking back, the warning signs were public: overdue accounts, a string of director resignations, a charge registered against the business, a winding-up petition in the Gazette. Nobody in your business was watching.
Or a key supplier changes ownership, and you only discover it when their terms change. Or a subcontractor you are about to sign with was only incorporated a few weeks ago.
Why nobody watches the filings
The information is public, but checking it by hand does not scale. Credit control has hundreds of customer accounts. Purchasing has dozens of suppliers. Looking each one up on Companies House every month is nobody's job, so it happens occasionally, usually after something has already gone wrong.
| Event | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Accounts or confirmation statement overdue | Often an early sign of difficulty |
| Director appointments and resignations | Changes in control or stability |
| New charges registered | New secured borrowing |
| Change of registered office or name | Restructuring, or records needing update |
| Insolvency notices in the Gazette | Winding-up petitions, administrations, liquidations |
| Proposal to strike off | The company may cease to exist |
Companies House has a follow feature for individual companies, and credit agencies sell monitoring. Both help. What they rarely do is connect to your own customer and supplier lists, weigh changes by your exposure, and send the alert to the person who can act.
What finding out late costs
Bad debts from customers who were visibly in trouble. Deliveries made on credit to a business already heading for administration. Supply disruption when a supplier fails. Contracts signed with companies that should have been checked more carefully. And customer records that go stale when companies change names or addresses.
Credit decisions also end up based on how a customer pays today rather than what their filings say about tomorrow.
Onboarding is the other gap. A new supplier or subcontractor is often approved on a quote and a phone call, and nobody looks at how long the company has existed, whether its accounts are filed on time, or whether the directors have a trail of dissolved companies behind them.
How we build a filings monitor
- We pull your customer and supplier lists from Xero, QuickBooks, Sage, your CRM or ERP, and match each to its Companies House number, with uncertain matches reviewed by a person.
- We connect to the official Companies House API and its streaming feed, so changes to watched companies are picked up as they are published.
- We check the London Gazette's data for insolvency notices against the same list.
- Each event is scored by type and by your exposure, such as the outstanding balance from your accounts system or whether the supplier is critical.
- Alerts go to the right person: credit control for customers, purchasing for suppliers, with a link to the filing and a short explanation of what it means.
- Company names and addresses in your systems can be updated from the official record, with changes logged.
- New customers and suppliers are checked at onboarding, showing incorporation date, filing history and any warning signs.
The monitor uses official, published data through the routes Companies House and the Gazette provide. It gives early warning, not a credit rating, and decisions stay with your team.
Warnings while there is still time
Credit control hears about an overdue filing or a petition while the balance can still be managed, such as by moving a customer to pro forma terms. Purchasing sees ownership and director changes at key suppliers as they happen. Your records stay in step with the official register, and new accounts are checked as a routine step rather than when someone remembers.
Could this help you?
- You have been caught out by a customer's insolvency
- Nobody checks Companies House for existing customers or suppliers
- Credit decisions rely on payment history alone
- Customer names and addresses in your systems are out of date
- New suppliers are not routinely checked before contracts