Credit Application Automation

There may not be a process riper for automation than the commercial credit application.

Here is how most companies are still doing this today, in 2025.

Sales rep has a stack of paper credit applications or maybe a PDF of the document that he provides to the prospective customer.

Propsect prints out the application and fills it out with a pen, often with questionable penmanship. He then scans it to himself and later emails to the sales rep.

The sales rep emails to his credit manager. The credit manager prints it out and keys all the information into their ERP system for new customer entry, and then often re-keys into an online credit bureau or credit insurance portal, all while struggling to read messy handwriting.

Credit manager then calls or emails all the trade and bank references listed, follows up on those he does not hear back form, and then finally analyzes all the collected information to decide what size credit limit to extend.

Good news, he approves the requested credit limit.

Bad news, because the process took a week and the order was time sensitive, the prospect already placed his order with the company’s competitor.

Here is how we can redesign for the 21st century.

Sales rep sends buyer a secure link to the company’s credit application, or the link is hosted on the company’s website.

Buyer searches a database of all legal and operational business entities to find his company. He enters his information and desired credit limit on his phone or keyboard, no more messy handwriting. He agrees to all terms with a digital signature.

The company’s credit is checked automatically via links to credit bureau and insurer portals. Trade and bank references are contacted automatically so more information can be collected. Depending on the size of the request, approval may be instant, and at the company’s discretion, this approval can even be instantly communicated to the buyer.

All the customer information can be pushed via API to credit insurance portals and ERPs with no manual re-keying necessary.

With the same day approval, salesperson books the order. Prospect is impressed with the efficiency of the process and hopes to buy more from the company.

Without having to chase down references and key in information, credit manager has hours back in his day to be productive.

There are several excellent partners in this space, each with their own strengths and target markets in terms of industry, company size, and application volume.