A SCOTTISH manufacturer is demanding a retraction of a potentially damaging "supplier alert" claiming a deterioration in its credit risk, after an admission from the company that sent it, apparently Dun & Bradstreet, that the warning seemed unfounded.
The email alert, marked "sent by Dun & Bradstreet", was sent to a US corporation which is the largest customer of East Kilbride-based TPL Labels, a healthy £3 million turnover business with a top credit rating from other sources.
When TPL finally made contact with the customer support department of the firm that sent the message, it was told the alert had been "generated by a US solution". The message referred to TPL as located in "Glasgow, England".
Last night, Patricia Colpitts, spokeswoman for Dun & Bradstreet in New York, said the alert from "Dun & Bradstreet" had possibly come from D & B Credibility Corporation, which D & B had "sold some years ago". The D & B Credibility Corporation also uses "Dun & Bradstreet" branding, and the same DUNS company identification system.
Bob Taylor, chairman and managing director of TPL, a 40-year-old family firm which has 500 industrial customers, said: "I don't know where they have got their information, because it doesn't apply to TPL Labels."
Mr Taylor said: "Initially when I tried to get through on the phone to Dun & Bradstreet, I tried umpteen times with their menus and it was a brick wall. When I did get someone, they said they wouldn't talk to me unless I bought the report on my own company."
TPL only discovered the alert had gone out because its major customer, a US corporation, tipped it off and questioned its supplier. "I believe it is against the terms and conditions of Dun & Bradstreet for them to pass this on to us," Mr Taylor said.
When formal contact was finally made by TPL, a "D & B" customer manager Pete Griffin told the firm: "I have checked our report for your business ref... and we give a 2A1 rating with a failure score of 91 which is completely different from what you describe."
A week after the complaint was made, Mr Griffin responded again: "I can confirm that this was generated by a US solution and I contacted the team that manage this last week to provide me with more information... as I can see no unfavourable data being received."
Mr Taylor said: "What about a retraction? I am getting absolutely nowhere. They are investigating but they haven't promised to do anything. The problem I have is who else has received this, and what damage is it doing to my business?"
He said the customer had been unsettled by the alert, until "we explained it was a cock-up and sent them other credit reports which were all glowing".
Ms Colpitts said: "At this point, we believe this alert was published by D&B Credibility Corporation (DBCC), and not D&B. This is an entity that D&B sold several years ago. However, we have contacted them to resolve this issue."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article