How to check an organization: ways to check firms

2024 Author: Howard Calhoun | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 10:16

The realities of Russian business and changes in Russian legislation force us to be careful when choosing a counterparty as a partner, whether it is a relationship with a buyer, seller or contractor. During a crisis, there are usually more fraudulent schemes that can cause serious damage to a company.

Why is it necessary to check the activities of the organization

Firstly, it allows you to identify unscrupulous partners or clients, cooperation with which can cause financial damage to the company.

Secondly, the risks of participating in litigation both as a plaintiff and as a defendant are reduced.

Third, claims from the tax authorities in the absence of due diligence are prevented. This eliminates the possibility of additional taxes.

Checking the counterparty isnatural practice in the work of large companies. To do this, the organizational structure of the enterprise provides for a legal department, a security service. In the field of view of these divisions are not only issues of compliance with the law and security within the company, but also work with legal entities.

And if the turnover and income of large enterprises justify the cost of maintaining a staff of lawyers and "security guards", then the opportunities for small businesses are much more modest. Therefore, we will share our experience and advice on how the owner of a small company or its employees can check the counterparty on their own.

How to check an organization

We suggest using the following list of actions:

1. Study of constituent documents.
2. Check the presence of the organization on the website of the tax service.
3. Analysis of the counterparty by third-party resources.
4. Search for information through the website of the bailiffs.
5. Collecting a firm's online reputation.
6. Confirmation of existing licenses and SRO certificates (if any).
7. Checking the founders and persons having the right to act without a power of attorney.
8. Assessment of the financial situation.

Checking constituent documents

To start collecting information, we recommend that you request constituent documents: the charter, TIN certificate, PSRN, a decision to create an organization or a memorandum of association, a fresh extract from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities.

In the charter, you should pay attention to the title page, which indicates:

• company name;
• grounds for registration of a legal entity (decision or memorandum of association);
• registration date;
• signature and details of the founder.

The General Provisions section provides the company's full and abbreviated name, location address, goals and activities. The headings “Legal status of the organization”, “Executive body” are also subject to careful study.

Certificate of TIN and OGRN - documents issued by the Federal Tax Service when registering a taxpayer. Both documents must have the stamps of the tax authority, the same names, dates of registration and a single PSRN code.

The decision to create or the memorandum of association are checked for the same name of the organization, legal address, appointment of the director and his passport data.

An extract from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities is a summary of information about a company that is registered in the database of the tax inspectorate. The document should pay attention to the date of receipt. Compare information about the name of the counterparty, its legal address, information about the founders and other persons en titled to act without a power of attorney (director).

In addition, the extract contains the TIN codes for the founders and director, OKVED codes, information on the amount of the authorized capital and documents on the basis of which the data was recorded during registration and amendments to the constituent documents (for example, a change of director, founder, legal address).

What should alert: the discrepancy between the data in these documents indicates the likelihood of forgery. The presence of records of a change in director, founders or legal address classifies the organization as a risk group from the point of view of the tax authorities.

Collecting information about the company on the IFTS website

You can check the tax service organization on the official website of the tax authority. The main section is the service "Business risks: check yourself and your counterparty". At this point, you can get an extract from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities. The data from the electronic copy obtained by yourself is checked against the option provided by the counterparty.

Checking the counterparty with third-party resources

Where to check the organization additionally? The most popular services for collecting information about counterparties are provided by SBIS and Kontragent.

In the first option, you need to open the website of the operator for the submission of reports "SBIS". The trial period of use is 8 days and is provided after registration. To search, you must enter the TIN or company name in the appropriate fields. The result is displayed in the form of a dossier and includes information on the assigned TIN, OGRN codes, registration address, information about the director, financial position, company rating and participation as a defendant, plaintiff or third party in court cases.

The search is performed in the same way through the second resource. Information about the organization is displayed in a similar way.

What should alert: the person indicated by the director or founder is registered in a similar role in several companies. The organization is located at the mass registration address. The dossier contains information about the presence of lawsuits in the history of the enterprise. The decoding of the rating contains signs of tax evasion, bankruptcy, and the presence of losses.

Search for information through the website of the bailiffs

Data from the web portal will allow us to draw conclusions about the presence of claims from government agencies (non-payment of taxes) and third parties.

You can check the organization by TIN, name and region of location on the website of the bailiff service (SSP). If there is information in the database, a table will be generated containing the name of the state body, a link to the date and number of enforcement proceedings, the type and amount of debt.

If there is no data in the database, the first conclusion about the reliability of the audited company can be made.

Collecting data about a firm's online reputation

As a search query, we recommend choosing the TIN code, PSRN, company name. However, it should be borne in mind that in most cases the name of the company is not unique. Even in one region, several enterprises with the same name can be registered. TIN and OGRN are unique codes that are assigned to only one organization.

Searching for information in the Internet space will allow you to find reviews from other users aboutverified company. Also, using the TIN and PSRN, you can get links to court decisions regarding the selected counterparty, if such existed in its history of activity.

Confirmation of existing licenses and SRO certificates

In addition, the organization can provide a license or SRO certificate in a package of documents. Let's take a look at the most popular areas of activity for small businesses that require a license:

• all types of operations from development to maintenance of encryption tools and information systems;
• operations from development to sale, purchase or discovery of equipment to secretly obtain information;
• privacy activities;
• pharmaceutical industry;
• work of medical institutions, pharmacies, etc.;
• passenger and cargo transportation by water, air, road, rail transport;
• work of betting companies;
• private security and detective activities;
• ferrous and non-ferrous scrap operations;
• employment of citizens of the Russian Federation outside the territory of Russia;
• communication and television and radio broadcasting services;
• activities of educational institutions;
• mapping and geodetic services.

Depending on the type of license, you can use different web services. You can check the licenses of organizations of various types at the links of the sectoral state bodies of registration and issuance.

Verification of membership in the SRO is a littleotherwise. The following sequence of actions is performed:

1. First, the certificate itself is studied, where the registration number and the name of the self-regulatory organization are indicated.
2. On the website of Rostekhnadzor, open an advanced search and enter the name of the SRO that issued the document.
3. In the search results, open the information about the organization and find a link to the site.
4. On the company's Internet portal, find a section on membership in the SRO.
5. Enter the name or TIN of the organization that provided the certificate of admission.
6. If there is a company in the database, information about the date of entry, registration number and other information disclosed by the self-regulatory organization about its participants will be displayed.

Checking the founders and persons having the right to act without a power of attorney

The data obtained will allow us to draw conclusions about the nature of the existing problems and their possible impact on the performance of the audited legal entity.

Sources of information are also the websites of the bailiff service, VLIS, "Counterparties".

Assessment of financial position

For this, the analysis of financial statements for previous periods is carried out. Significant indicators of receivables or payables with insignificant assets (the cost of fixed assets, goods and materials in warehouses, the status of settlement accounts, etc.) and a small annual turnover are a signal for caution. It is better to entrust the study of the balance sheet to the staffspecialist. An experienced employee will easily find questionable indicators and inform the director.

We hope that our readers now have step-by-step instructions for a comprehensive verification of the counterparty: from constituent documents to verification of the organization's SRO.