EN The Credit Rating You Never Asked For (That's Already Making Decisions for You)
CompanyWall: Serbia's Credit Detective
Europe has Creditreform and Bisnode. The US has Dun & Bradstreet. Serbia has CompanyWall.
CompanyWall.rs automatically pulls financial statements from the APR (Agencija za privredne registre — Serbia's business and financial registry), runs the numbers through its own model, and spits out a rating. The scale goes from CCC — "serious problems" — all the way up to AAA — "you could lend them money with your eyes closed."
The key thing to understand: you don't do anything to get rated. Once you file your annual financial report (završni račun) with the APR, the data is out there. CompanyWall picks it up, runs the analysis, and publishes the result. Your rating already exists. The only question is whether you know about it — or whether you find out at the worst possible moment.
We found out in May. Our rating: AA+. Nobody filled out a form. Nobody paid for an audit. Nobody asked. At some point, the system decided we were active enough to be counted — and handed down a score that most entrepreneurs in Serbia don't even know exists.
The Scale: What the Letters Actually Mean
CompanyWall sorts companies into five credit tiers, from lowest to highest:
| Tier | What It Means |
|---|---|
| CCC | High risk. Serious liquidity or solvency problems |
| BBB | Satisfactory. The company operates but has recurring cash flow difficulties |
| A+ | Reliable. No signs of risky business practices in the foreseeable future |
| AA+ | Very high creditworthiness. Confirmed high standards and strong ability to meet obligations |
| AAA | Top tier. Awarded to a handful of companies — industry leaders with spotless track records |
Five tiers, nothing in between. No AA, no A-, no BB — just these five. Companies that land in the top three (AAA, AA+, A+) receive a "Sertifikat bonitene izvršnosti" — an official certificate of financial soundness you can actually use in negotiations with partners and banks.
What does the algorithm look at? CompanyWall analyzes 22 financial indicators grouped into two components:
Static assessment (based on the annual report):
- Liquidity — does the company have enough working capital to cover short-term obligations?
- Solvency (solventnost) — how leveraged is the company relative to its own equity?
- Efficiency — how well does the company manage assets and generate revenue?
- Profitability — is the company earning more than it spends?
Dynamic assessment (updated throughout the year):
- Bank account freezes
- Tax arrears
- Liquidation or stečaj (bankruptcy) proceedings
- Other negative indicators
This matters: you can have a flawless annual report from last year, but if your account gets frozen or tax debt appears mid-year, the dynamic component will drag your rating down — without waiting for the next završni račun.
AAA goes to a tiny fraction of companies in the country. That tier belongs to long-standing industry leaders with years of clean history.
Who's Checking Your Rating (Spoiler: Everyone Except You)
Here's what we realized once we started paying attention.
Banks. You walk in to open a business account for a new legal entity. The bank sees: d.o.o. registered recently, short history. Classic setup for extra KYC scrutiny. But if your established company shows AA+ on CompanyWall — the conversation goes differently.
Payment providers. We're a payment integrator. Our job is connecting merchants to card acceptance. That means contracts with PSPs. Every PSP, before granting access to advanced features — cascading payments, subscriptions, card-on-file — evaluates the counterparty. A strong rating removes a lot of questions before they're even asked.
Merchants. If you're a payments company, your clients are trusting you with their money. When a merchant is choosing between two integrators, they can't always assess API quality or support response times. But pulling up CompanyWall and comparing ratings? That's thirty seconds.
Grant programs and investors. Serbia has active support programs for tech companies and startups. When you apply for a grant or put together an investment deck, financial health gets verified. CompanyWall is the first thing they'll open.
The short version: your rating works like a company résumé. Nobody reads it during the first handshake — but everyone checks it before making a decision.
How We Got AA+ (Without Trying)
Honest answer: we didn't optimize for the rating. We paid taxes on time, filed reports, and didn't take on debt we couldn't service.
Sounds simple. In practice, it was two years of switching payment providers, fighting with fiscal cash registers, losing sleep over 3DS failures on the bank's side, and explaining to the regulator why a refund for a cancelled concert isn't tax evasion.
Two years of things constantly on fire. The fiscal register would go down at the worst possible moment. A payment provider would transfer the wrong amount. A merchant would try to go around us and deal directly with the PSP. The regulator would send a letter mentioning a 50,000-dinar fine.
Through all of it, financial discipline held — not because of automation or a CFO, but because of stubbornness. Because we understood that if the završni račun isn't filed on time, the APR remembers. If social contributions are late, the tax authority remembers. And CompanyWall remembers too.
It turned out the algorithm only cares about one thing: the numbers add up, the reports are filed, there's no debt. Two letters and a plus sign.
What Can Drop Your Rating (And How to Avoid It)
Missing the završni račun deadline
The annual financial report is due to the APR by the end of March. Miss the deadline and you get a fine — plus a gap in your CompanyWall data.
Arrears on social contributions
In Serbia, doprinosi (social contributions) are not something you can "pay later." Arrears show up in public registries.
A sharp revenue drop with no context
The algorithm doesn't know you deliberately wound down a product line. It sees: 10 million dinars last year, 2 million this year. The rating reacts.
Accumulating short-term liabilities
Borrowing is fine. Not repaying on time is not.
Multiple legal entities with inconsistent financial hygiene
Many entrepreneurs in Serbia operate more than one d.o.o. Each entity gets its own rating.
Practical Checklist: What to Do Right Now
1. Check your rating. Go to companywall.rs and search by company name or matični broj (registration number).
2. Confirm your završni račun is filed. Log in to the APR portal and verify directly.
3. Check for tax arrears. The ePorezi portal shows your current status across all taxes and contributions.
4. Use the rating in negotiations. If your score is AAA, AA+, or A+, you can obtain a "Sertifikat bonitene izvršnosti".
5. Watch the dynamic component. CompanyWall updates data after each new annual report is published — but dynamic indicators can shift mid-year.
In short
- CompanyWall automatically generates a credit rating for every Serbian company that files with the APR — you don't apply for it, it just exists.
- The five-tier scale runs from CCC (high risk) to AAA (industry leader); top-three companies can get an official certificate of financial soundness.
- Banks, PSPs, merchants, and grant programs all check CompanyWall before making decisions about your company.
- The main risks to your rating are late filings, tax arrears, sudden revenue drops, and short-term debt you can't service on time.
- The fastest action you can take today: search your company on companywall.rs and find out where you stand.