Find out early about risks and improve the effectiveness.
“In times of economic uncertainty, it is more important than ever to keep a regular check on the creditworthiness and payment behaviour of customers,” Wenzel says. Wenzel.
Process automation provides the foundation for continuously monitoring the customer’s status and, consequently, for efficient and secure credit management.
“Many businesses only look at the credit scores of their customers only once per year, but we continuously check their credit scores. This means that we are able to spot potential payments that are in default more accurately and, even more important significantly earlier.”
The way it works: When critical information-related issues are discovered through continuous review by the scorecard, relevant employees are immediately notified via an announcement in the dashboard. This could happen if customers fall into the riskier category because they’ve paid for invoices late or financial numbers that need to be stronger are published. In such cases, the responsible credit manager is in charge and takes appropriate actions. If required, the sales department needs to be contactable, and the credit limit is reduced, the payment terms are changed, or the delivery could be stopped altogether.
Since our internal data and external details that we get from Dun & Bradstreet go into our scorecard making our risk assessment significantly more trustworthy, this contributes to the superiority that we use in our risk assessments.
Andreas Wenzel, Global Credit & Customer Finance Manager at Bayer AG
Concentrate on high-risk customers.
Since the personal scorecard was launched, credit supervisors at Bayer have focused on focusing on high-turnover customers with poor creditworthiness. However, Customers with an acceptable default risk are dealt with automatically. This aims to reduce the number of canceled orders and, in particular, boost growth at Bayer. “All in all, we have been able to considerably improve our efficiency in credit management by automating the processes,” Wenzel adds. Wenzel.
In-depth portfolio analysis
At Bayer and other companies, additional risk information obtained from Dun & Bradstreet is included when evaluating the creditworthiness of customers with high risk. The data is carefully scrutinized and carefully analyzed by credit managers. “The structures of large corporations and large corporations are extremely complex and require more attention. Balance sheets should be scrutinized closely as well as news about the stock market and affiliations reviewed,” explains Wenzel. According to him, it is all it takes to make watertight credit-related decisions that will cost millions of euros.
A thorough examination of the entire portfolio had to be on the agenda before starting the process to automate. What credit checks of customers can be automated? What thresholds are required, and what should be considered when determining the scorecard’s calibration? “In clarifying these and other questions, we relied entirely on the technical expertise of Dun & Bradstreet – and we did very well,” summarizes Wenzel.
In these times of uncertainty for the economy and uncertainty, it is more vital than ever to examine the creditworthiness and behavior of payment by customers constantly.
Andreas Wenzel, Global Credit & Customer Finance Manager at Bayer AG
In the meantime, this project group has developed an automated credit management system internationally. This allows the Bayer Group to make reliable credit decisions even during volatile times and lower the risk of debtors by focusing on specific threats.