B2B Credit Source
B2B Credit Source claims to be able to do many things. One of their main services, however, is “Unsecured Business Lines of Credit.”
One of the most interesting things here is that it says the following right on the B2B Credit Source Web site:
“B2B Credit Source is not a lender of money or a broker of loans. All services are provided on a consulting basis only.”
When I read this, I think what they’re really saying is, “If things don’t work out for you, we were just a consultant. We don’t actually make or broker loans, so if you don’t get one, it’s out of our hands. We just provide a consulting service. If you don’t get your loan, it’s your fault.”
Let’s look at this “unsecured business lines of credit” service and see if everything checks out.
Unsecured Business Lines of Credit
If you read their Web site, B2B Credit Source explains that they are not offering a loan or line of credit. Rather, they are offering you the opportunity to buy a corporation that presumably already exists but that has (hopefully) never been used. In addition, they offer to help you build that corporation’s business credit score, or PAYDEX [definition].
The premise behind this is that if you go to the bank looking for a small business loan, the bank will look upon your request more favorably if your business has existed for more than two years. They are careful to state, however, that these things don’t guarantee that you’ll get a loan or line of credit. Instead, they say, “This gives you a much greater chance of getting approved.”
That’s a stretch.
First of all, no lender cares that the corporation, as an entity, has existed for two years — or two decades, for that matter. What happens when a lender asks to see the corporate tax return for the last two years? Assuming that it’s been filed at all, it’s going to be zeroes across the board, with no revenue or earnings to be shown.
And what happens when you are asked to produce your own tax returns, and you haven’t claimed any earnings or dividends from this corporation (because there aren’t any)?
The bottom line here is that you’re not helping yourself at all just because your corporation is two years old. Not at all.
And what does B2B Credit Source charge for this service? $15,000! (Yes, fifteen thousand dollars!)
The truth is that you can form your own corporation on your own for less than a couple hundred dollars. If you are really determined to use an attorney, then you should not pay more than $1,000. But $15,000? That’s an insult to your intelligence.
And yes, I understand that this $15,000 includes helping out with the business credit and the PAYDEX, etc. But establishing credit in your business name is not all that complicated. It’s certainly not worth $15,000.
Moreover, just having a good PAYDEX is by no means a guarantee that your business will get a loan. It’s also highly unlikely (oh, let’s just call it impossible, shall we?) that you’ll get a business loan without a personal guarantee. You’re going to need good personal credit and some collateral to get a business loan, especially in the current economy. Having a two-year-old corporation with no assets, no revenue, and a PAYDEX, is not going to cut it by itself.
Having said all of this, is it my opinion that B2B Credit Source is a scam? I suppose that depends on your definition of the word.
It’s not a scam in the sense that they are relatively clear about what they are offering: a shell corporation and assistance with building a credit score for that business. If you understand that this is all you’re going to get, and if you feel that’s worth paying $15,000 for, then go ahead. As they say, “Caveat emptor.”
In my opinion, though, it’s misleading in the sense that B2B Credit Source makes it sounds as if doing these two things (buying the shell corporation and then building its credit profile) will ensure that your business will qualify for an unsecured line of credit. It’s misleading at best, dishonest at worst. You’ll have to be the judge.
B2B Credit Source: A Look at the Company
If for some reason you still think that B2B Credit Source is solid, here are a few things to think about:
The domain name “b2bcreditsource.com” was registered in either June or July of 2008. That’s only a few months ago. While not all new business are bad, you have to take this into account before blindly sending in $15,000.
In addition, it makes you wonder how there could be a copyright dated 2002 on the Web site (it’s at the bottom), when the domain name itself is not even a few months old. Is the copyright date supposed to make us think that the business has been around since 2002? Seems odd to me.
Also, B2B Credit Source lists three locations on its Web site: San Francisco, Las Vegas, and Atlanta.
When I Googled the San Francisco address, the first search result given was ”First Capital Business Solutions, Inc.” at this same address. Thing is, the Web site for this business (fcbsconnect.com) has been taken down. A cached version of one of the pages, however, indicates that this company’s business was helping clients gets business loans by building up their business credit.
Sound familiar? Wonder where they went…
As for the Atlanta address, I Googled that, too, and found the company that handles leasing for this office. The fifth floor of that particular building is available on a shared basis, meaning that tenants rent small office spaces. This by itself is not a red flag, as many legitimate small companies operate this way. (Although I don’t get the impression that B2B Credit Source wants you to think it’s a little business with a 300 square foot office space.)
Here’s a link to a description of the office space in Atlanta.
No, the real red flag is that the people who manage this space have never heard of B2B Credit Source. I sent the contact for the property manager an email, and very quickly I received the following reply:
“I have checked with our Midtown center and with our billing department and neither have heard of this company.
Unfortunately I have had companies do this in the past, use our address without paying for a service, but there is not a lot we can do about it.”
Yikes.
If you’re thinking about doing business with B2B Credit Source, please remember to check all the facts, do your homework, and be sure that you understand what you’re getting.
—
If you’ve ever done business or thought about doing business with B2B Credit Source, please share your experience with me. And if you are an executive with B2B Credit Source (not an affiliate) and you’d like to offer a response, I will publish it as long as it is based on verifiable facts.
October 19th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
It is the policy of B2B Credit Source to comment and erroneous comments made about the company. This person has not had any experience working with our company but presumes to know how we operate and makes false assumptions that there is something “not right” with our offering. It is made very clear that we dont guarantee funding. This is told to each and every client at the time they contract with us. It is also stated on our contract before they pay us. However, it is our intent to present their corporation to our funding sources after we have developed the credit profile. Our staff are ex-Dunn and Bradstreet profile managers and are experts in building D&B profiles. Although non-personal guarantee loans are limited in funding sources, they do exist with a two year corp and solid business credit profile. We also offer a personally guaranteed product that gives us a much broader lending database.
Making claims that we are a scam or running some kind of fraud is slanderous and subject to legal prosecution. Our company has a very high funding success rate and is very clear about what we offer. We never take anyones money without making sure what they are purchasing. If they request their money back, they always get a refund. You will not find anyone stating otherwise.
Any future slanderous blogs or comments will be referred to our legal counseling for appropriate handling.
B2B Credit Source
—
Blog editor’s note: I find it odd that, once again, no one wants to attach their name, phone number, or even a distinct email address to this company. This is a generic response that B2B Credit Source gives to anything it finds about the company on the Web. You’d also think they’d know that the name of the company is “Dun & Bradstreet” (with one “n” as opposed to two). They misspell this company’s name everywhere. Lastly, slander is spoken as opposed to written, so a “slanderous blog” is, by definition, not possible.
October 23rd, 2008 at 9:53 am
The editor of this blog clearly has not worked with B2B and is making specuative and opinionated remarks. I am a mortgage broker from FL and became a customer of B2B earlier this year. I signed up for their program to get a no PG line of credit utilizing a shelf corp. I was requesting between 150-200k. I was told at the time that it would take 30-60 days. Well, it ended up taking closer to 4 months. But the end result was I got funding of $185k in various bank lines. Even though i was probably sold on shorter time frames by the sales rep, everything else they promised pretty much came thru. I suspect that the longer timeframes could of been due to bank underwriting changes due the market. There is also a lot more “involvement” the client needs to participate in than I expected in the beginning. However, this company not only came thru for me, they were great to deal with. Since then I signed up as part of their Affiliate Program and have sent many happy clients to them. The clients have experienced pretty much what I did but I think they are now doing away with the no PG program and requiring the clients to put up good credit. I can honestly say they have helped each and every one of my clients and have paid me my affiliate referral fee within a week of funding.
I was told about this blog by one of my referring clients that was concerned about the legitamacy of this company. The editor of this blog is voicing his uneducated opinion with no real substance to his claims. Yes they “dont guarantee funding”. Yes they say “they are not a lender or broker of loans”. So what are they guilty of? Telling the truth? Give me a break! The editor either didnt like what he heard or is working for their competition.
Take it from a client of B2B as well as an affiliate, this company is the real deal and is not like some of these other companies that just take your money and run. (probably not unlike what the author is associated with)
Johnny T
—
Blog editor’s note: This has got to be the lowest of the low. The IP address that was used to submit this comment resolves to mail.fcaconnect.com, which handles email for a company called First Capital Alliance [link]. If you go to this company’s Web site, you can see on this page [link] that the president and CEO is a man named Mark Magnus. Mr. Magnus is also either the president or CEO of B2B Credit Source. He was also listed as the contact person for an online job posting (executive assistant/bookkeeper) for B2B Credit Source. In addition, the email address that “Johnny T” used was invalid. My reply was returned as undeliverable.
Update: It appears that the people behind First Capital Alliance have taken down the site. In the future, I’ll be sure to capture the images so they may be stored in perpetuity.
October 28th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
Thanks for writing this.
November 12th, 2008 at 12:49 pm
I KEEP GETTING SPAM FROM biz@msn.com WITH THE PHONE # 888-599-2127. I HAVE REPEATEDLY ASKED TO BE TAKEN OFF OF THEIR ‘LIST’ AND THEY HAVE REFUSED TO DO SO. I AM MOVING FORWARD WITH A LAW SUIT. IF ANYONE WOULD LIKE TO JOIN ME, PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT. I HAVE SUED SPAMMERS LIKE THIS BEFORE.
November 14th, 2008 at 1:18 pm
I LEFT YOU A RESPONSE ABOUT MY EXPERIENCE WITH B2B. IF YOU ARE THINKING OF DOING BUSINESS WITH THEM THIINK AGAIN. THEY TOOK MY $15,000. PLUS AND HAVE NOT DELIVERED. I HAVE NOT GOTTEN ANY CREDIT LINES AND I DO NOT BELIEVE I WILL. THEY GOT MY MONEY THROUGH A WIRE TRANSFER ON JUNE 10TH 2008 AND TODAY BEING NOV 15TH NOTHING YET. THEY NOW HAVE ME WORKING WITH DERWENT COMPANIES WHO I BELIEVE WORK IN THE BATHROBES AND DO NOT KNOW WHAT THE HELL THEY ARE DOING. I HAVE BEEN GIVEN SO MUCH RUN AROUND IT IS UNBELIEVABLE. THEY ARE NOW USING THE LINE THAT THEY ARE NOT A BANK AND CAN NOT CONTROL THE BANK DECISIONS. I GAVE THEM MY MONEY SO THAT A BANK CAN TELL ME NO. I COULD HAVE ACCOMPLISHED THAT MYSELF. I DID NOT NEED TO SPEND 15K TO DO THAT
November 17th, 2008 at 2:16 pm
Funny that they claim that they can lend a $200k line of credit in 45 days, yet they claim not to be a lender? Plus, they pay money to obtain cell phone numbers in order to phish and peddle their falsely advertised product. If a company needs to blindly market to anyone with a cellphone, banking on no demographic, just blanket phishing, then how could you entrust your money to them? I’m so tired of this crap, besides writing to consumer advocacy groups, we need more help to curb this kind of marketing.
November 17th, 2008 at 8:44 pm
I have gotten spam on my cell phone to call 888-599-2127 from both biz@msn.com and getcash@yahoo.com. My cell phone was put on the DONOTCALL registry in 2007. I would be happy to participate in a lawsuit.
November 24th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
Anyone know of “NewVenture Advisors” they claim to have shelf corporations with exisiting line of creidts attached of 1.3 million seeling for 24k plus 5% of line once funds are available to nyer which takes 3-6 weeks. For some reason something sounds very odd. Anyone with input or ability to investigate please post. (I respomded to their graigslist ad i then got an email from Steven Abrams, Partner in the company attached a corp purchase agreement on the letterhead their address is 909 N Sepulveda Blvd. Suite 450. El Segundo, CA 90245 Phone number 310-686-3706. Anyone with info please share.
December 11th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
There is another wolf in the pile. 60dayfilmfinancing,com uses B2B to bait people who are struggling to get their entertainment projects financed. They referred us to B2B and yes, it appears to be unfolding that the blog above could be true. I’ll update you when the lawsuit is filed and if anyone else is having the same problem please post to this blog as I’ll be checking back.
December 22nd, 2008 at 1:16 am
Oh NO! I did it in September and so far NOTHING other than a shelf Corp with a Dun and Bradstreet #. I have been contacted by D&B to help build my corp score though but still nothing from B2B. I was supposed to be funded by last Friday December 19, 2008. I also worked with Derwent Technologies with NO success. This was my disabled fathers ONLY 15K in Savings. HOW COULD PEOPLE BE SO BAD? Does anyone have a LAWYER to help……?
December 22nd, 2008 at 11:53 pm
yes B2B is a scam, they had on the ave 20 customers a month that is 300K. i to should have closed my loan by now, but not yet ant Tim Carre one of the owners told me they FIRED the entire staff on FRI DEC 19, good luck but im am calling a lawyer, the secretary of state of California, franchise tax board and if you run Tims name in the SOS Nevada you can see all the corps and LLC’s he and his crooked partner Mark Magnus own… CLASS ACTION
December 24th, 2008 at 7:11 pm
Just got a letter from Mark Magnus saying they are shutting their doors due to “the lending environment”. They are still working hard to set up the corporations as promissed, but no one signs up for corps for a corps sake. We all sign up for the unsecured LOC. These people are terrible!!!
December 25th, 2008 at 12:29 am
Has anyone dealt with NewVentures Advisors in California ? They sell Loaded Corps with upfront fee and backend . Just have weird vibe about Steven Abrams , has anyone done anything with them ?
December 29th, 2008 at 6:13 pm
I too have been involved with B2B…not a good experience!! I would be interested in corresponding with others on this blog to try and figure out a game plan.
December 30th, 2008 at 5:12 pm
this is not good people they can not do this to us. I gave them 16K on May of this year, it has been more then 6 months that they have my file first it was that First Capital Business Solution and after that B2B. I talked to 10 different persons who work for this company’s they all told me different things. i am tired of waiting and i am going to get a lawyer asap thus i can at least get my money back if there is anyone here wants to join me let me know.
December 30th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
B2B HAS FIELD BANKRUBTSY THESE PEOPLE TOOK OUR MONEY AND LEFT US HANGING I STARTED THIS CORP THING 7 MONTHS AGO THEY TOLD US ILL TAKE 45 DAYS MAXS THE LADY I SPOKE TO WAS RANDY AND THE OTHER WAS LYNN THEY HAVE ALL MY INFORMATION, AND THEY HAVE NOT DONE [expletive deleted] FOR ME THIS MAKES ME SICK TO MY STOMACK THEY GOT 30KKKKKKKK FROM ME AND NOTHING YET. WE ALL SHOULD HELP EACHOTHER OUT. GOOD LUCK TO ALL OF US, LET GOD HELP US, THIS WAS NOT OUR GIFT FOR CHRISTMAS.
December 30th, 2008 at 7:15 pm
WHO HAS INFO FROM THEM ALL I KNOW IS THAT THEY FIELD BANKRUBSY ON DEC 24 OF THIS YEAR.
December 30th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
Do we know for sure if they filed BK? What source did you get the info from? If so, we are most likely screwed!! Does anyone live near their offices in SF to check and see if the biz is shut down?
December 30th, 2008 at 8:23 pm
We all need to band together and file complaints with the Attorney General, Secretary Of State, govt. agencies, etc. They committed fraud by filling out credit apps online without my permission!!
December 31st, 2008 at 1:01 am
ONE OF THEIR GUYS SAID THAT THEY FIELD BK I KNOW HER WELL ENOUGH TO TRUST HER THESE @#$%^ERS DID NOT EVEN PAY HER. DID ANYBODY DELT WITH LYNN PETERSON OR @#$%ING RANY WHO INTERDUCED ME TO THEM? IF YOU R WORKING WITH DERWENT COMPANIES YOU MIGHT BE GOOD BECAUSE THEY R STILL IN BUSINESS, DERWENT WORKS WITH @#$%ING B2B THEY HAVE ALL MY INFO COLORED COPY SS AND ID CARD THESE PEOPLE CAN DO MORE DAMAGE TO US, PLEASE LETS ALL GET 2GETHER AND DO SOMTHING ABOUT IT, ALL THE INFO THAT I HAVE IS THEY FIELD BK ON DEC 24 AND THEY MIGHT REOPEN ON JANUARY 5TH BUT WHO KNOWS IF ITS TRUE, DID ALL OF US GO THROW DERWENT OR WHAT? BECASE THEY MIGHT DO SOMTHIN FOR US.I GAVE 30K IN CASH TO THEM ON JUNE OF 08 AND NOTHING YET.
December 31st, 2008 at 1:14 am
DID LYNN PETERSON CALL ANYONE FOR WIRETRANSFER INFO AND ACCOUNT # TO WIRE THE MONEY OR NOT BECAUSE THAT WAS THE LAST THING I DID WITH THEM. SHE GOT MY ACCOUNT INFO AND TOLD ME ILL MAKE YOU HAPPY FOR THE NEW YEAR YOU R IN THE FIRST 30 PEOPLE GROUP. YOU GET YOUR MONEY BY END OF THESE MONTH WICH WAS 19TH SHE PROMISSED. DID ANYONE ALSE GO THROUGH IT?
December 31st, 2008 at 2:34 am
Yes Lynn emailed me asking for wire instructions ASAP in the early part of Dec. Then on Dec. 16 she called and said it looks like we are closing on Dec. 19. Well, the 19th came and went without anything, not even an email. Derwent is supposedly closed for the holidays until Jan. 5…seems like a long vacation to me?! Derwent actually owns B2B.
December 31st, 2008 at 2:39 am
My only question is why would Lynn be asking for wire instructions and calling if the fundings were not going to happen?
December 31st, 2008 at 3:07 am
she told u that because she never said anything about colsin 2 me she just told me you be getting a gift for christmas did she asked you for colored ID and SS# ? who built your Personal credit?
December 31st, 2008 at 3:25 am
Yes, I did send in ID and SS. No one built my personal credit, Derwent was supposedly building the corporate credit.
December 31st, 2008 at 3:54 am
nobody helped u wit ur personal credit cause it has 2 b over 758 ur score to even apply 4 it man thats wut they told me
December 31st, 2008 at 1:06 pm
It was already in the high 700’s.
January 3rd, 2009 at 3:14 pm
Of course they got my 15K and yes LYNN PETERSON was the one who told me that I would have FUNDING by the 19th and needed a color copy of my drivers license and social security card. LYNN PETERSON also said she needed WIRE INSTRUCTIONS from me so I passed that along as well……….MARK MAGNUSON IS THE OWNER of all the entities…..HE’s THE ONE WE should be SUING………….ANY IDEAS
January 3rd, 2009 at 5:27 pm
I would say complain like you’ve never complained before to every govt. agency you can find. The squeeky wheel always gets the grease. Other than a personal visit to Mark Magnus and associates, this will have to be the starting point.
January 5th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
My story is all the same as everyone elses. I am sick to my stomach and should have been smarter than this. I put the $15000 plus the $995 to do this. Here are the names I dealt with as they are the same as everyone elses. Lynn Peterson, Tim Carre and Dave Meistral. Even though they may have filed for Bankruptcy count me in for Class Action. Thier phone number is disconnected 800 906 7706. What a surprise!!!! Please notify me by e-mail for the legal action
January 5th, 2009 at 7:56 pm
Hey!
I did sign up with B@B Credit as well, however, I always felt that there is something wrong with this, so i made a decision with my partner: we will put the up front fee of 15K on credit card and if they try something funny we can always dispute the charge.
That is exactly what we did and as far as i know I got my money back.
January 5th, 2009 at 8:22 pm
Okay, Who wants to lead this? We need to have someone who can keep track of our emails, contact #’s, etc. We need to move on this quickly because even though they have filed bankruptcy, ALL bizness associates CAN APPEAR IN PERSON at their Bankruptcy HEARING and state their case/claim. BUT we have to find out when all this is. I suggest someone in the California area if not San Francisco. take the lead on this. I would but I am on the other side of the Country.
January 5th, 2009 at 10:13 pm
I’m glad I found this blog. I too have been dealing with Lynn Petersen over the past couple of months and recently received emails from Mark Magnus about B2B closing it’s doors. I paid 15K up front in Sept and have the same negative experience as everyone else in this thread. Please include me in any next steps this group is taking.
January 6th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
ARABO LYNN TOLD ME THE SAME THING SHE TOLD YOU CAN YOU GIVE ME CALL I WANT TO TALK TO YOU ABOUT THIS I HAVE A LAWYER WHO CAN HELP US TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS MY NUMBER IS 818 720 8133
IF ANYONE HERE HAS SOME IDEAS THAT CAN HELP US LETS GET TOGETHER AND DEAL WITH THIS CALL ME WILL MEET AND TALK ABOUT THIS
January 6th, 2009 at 6:01 pm
I to have had the same negative experience. Include in the next steps . Is drewent company owened by b2b? Has anybody talked to a rep from derwent after the reopening of jan 5
January 6th, 2009 at 7:21 pm
Derwent owns B2B. I have emailed everyone at Derwent and no one has returned any email at all.
January 6th, 2009 at 9:04 pm
I have spoken to a guy named Chase at Derwent that supposedly is the owner so they are opened for business (still). I am shocked to learn all this things. I’ve been helping some friends of mine that gave them the $15k plus the $990 and I’ve been the one speaking to them for they don’t speak very good english. I was also dealing with Lynn Petersen who reffered the case to Derwent and is now in their hands, they put up the money back in August and still nothing. Now…..if Derwent is the owner of B2B and they have filed for Bankruptcy then will they follow? uhm! Please count them in for any legal action against this people
January 6th, 2009 at 10:03 pm
Arabo,
You mentioned a lady by the name of Randy. Do you know her last name? I’ve been dealing with a Randy and I’m wondering if it is the same person.