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Comment by hinkley | Hacker News Reader

The thing about dissolving a company is that they generally should have done it before getting a bunch of services without paying for them.

Like a gambler they think the big win is coming any second and they drag it out too long, leaving a bunch of unpaid bills behind then.

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Really no reason to speculate. Could be a life crisis, ill health ect.

Or worse, planned on not paying in the first place and made off with investor cash while maintaining the appearance of moving on their venture.

I want to be a producer!

As a contractor some of this is on you also. Before extending credit to a client you should do some due diligence on their ability to pay.

But how? Make them show me their books? Aside from a downpayment idk what else there is

You could do a credit check.

And in this particular case since they're a UK company, yeah, you can just look at their reported accounts.

2023

CURRENT ASSETS: £571

Creditors: Amounts Falling Due Within One Year: £28,051

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That's not a client I'd take.

As a customer or a vendor, being able to see any company's health like this must be wonderful if you're evaluating whether you want to enter a relationship with them. More of the world should do this.

Wait, what, Anyone can check the balance of a UK company's chequing account?

Limited liability companies have to submit their accounts annually. Most small business accounts aren't audited, so it's self-reported at that level, but still useful to check scale, cash crunch, etc.

I legitimately did not know we could do that in the US. A cursory search says we can I think?

I worked at a couple places where the vendors got wise and moved to cash in advance or net30 from net90 for us. We probably deserved it.

Well isn't it possible that this is a recurring service? Like that he's also buying web hosting from the web dev

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