Before you sign with a new partner, ship on account or extend payment terms, a quarter of an hour spent on what the public registers say about them is time well spent. In Ukraine a lot of it is public, and free.
1. Find the company in the Unified State Register
Start from the ЄДРПОУ — the eight-digit number a company receives when it is entered in the register. It is its primary identifier, it does not change, and it is not reissued to anyone else after the company is struck off. If you only have a name, search on that and make sure you have the right company: similar names are common.
Look at three things: whether the company is active or in liquidation, when it was registered, and its legal form. A company founded yesterday is not a bad sign in itself, but it does mean you have no history to judge it on.
2. See who stands behind it
The register publishes directors and shareholders. Two questions matter: whether the person negotiating with you actually has authority to act for the company, and whether the directors have changed recently. A change on its own says nothing — a change immediately before a large transaction is worth asking about.
3. Check the insolvency register
This step is harder in many countries and in Ukraine it is free and instant. The insolvency register shows whether proceedings have been opened against the company. An opened case changes everything: payments can later be challenged, and your claim joins a queue.
4. Check the VAT number and VAT status
If a partner invoices you with VAT, they must be registered for it. Check the VAT number — twelve digits — in the European Commission's VIES system. And crucially, check whether they are listed as an unreliable VAT payer. If they are, you become liable for the VAT they fail to remit. That is a Ukrainian particularity and deserves its own article.
5. Read the annual accounts
Annual accounts are filed to the register's financial statements filed with the tax and statistics services and are public. Look at revenue, at the result for the period, and above all at equity: if it is negative, liabilities exceed assets.
The absence of accounts is itself a signal. Filing is a legal duty and a substantial share of Ukrainian companies do not comply — so a gap does not automatically mean trouble, but for a trading company that has filed nothing for years it is a question worth asking.
What it adds up to
No single one of these is a decision. Together they give a picture clear enough to decide whether to ask for payment up front, shorten the terms, or simply go ahead. And all five are public — you need nobody's permission to look.