The meticulousness of your records can help you assess the health of your business. Without them, you can’t easily identify trends, compute ratios, or make any decisions for the virtual data room software for due diligence future. You also need these records when you file tax returns and to back up the information you report in your financial statements. These include income (profit and loss) statements and balance sheets.

Most states have corporate department or secretaries of state offices that require companies to submit an official statement of ownership. These documents are accessible online in most cases. You can search for these documents by name of the company and the websites will have the list of officers or directors, addresses, and other details regarding the company. Some private companies or private firms publish business directories. These directories may include the city of a company’s headquarters or the place where it is registered. They also often include contact details, the name of the principal officer or officers, as well as an outline of the type of business the company is involved in.

Many cities require that any person or business that is operating any business within the city register, and many cities have put these documents online. Certain counties keep fake company names indexes, where the top officers of a partnership as well as their addresses are listed. Certain states have a master index of all fictitious business names and a few counties as well as the secretary of the state department or the corporation department have made these indexes available online.