The southeastern U.S. has experienced a business boom. Labor issues still plague employers and talks of reducing or eliminating state income taxes make their way through legislative bodies. Georgia has seen its fair share of business creation and relocation of corporations into the peach state.
With all the business activity it also brings out the unscrupulous – to say the least. Bad actors, fraudsters, conmen, swindlers and hustlers. Whatever negative name you want to apply, throw it out there. What happens when you need to choose a vendor or servicer for a project. What steps should be taken to make sure you’re not entering into business with one of those mentioned?
Most of us open a browser and let the internet gods lead us to our decision making. Depending on the need and our persona, we may spend anywhere from five minutes to days and months researching every detail, cross checking and comparing several sources. We may ask our network about servicers they’ve used and obtain a personal recommendation. Nothing is necessarily flawed with this approach and after all, internet research is a tool to be used.
It’s one thing to choose a bad plumber but an entirely different matter if a supposed business consultant takes off with several thousands of dollars. What about the IT servicer who claims they have a gazillion clients and can save you a ton of money? With rudimentary due diligence, many will search their secretary of state’s website and scroll until they discover the business entities. This is a good, not great, first step.
Depending on how robust a state’s website is, only limited information can be obtained. Georgia’s site is limited but others even more so. A critical problem exists in that fraudulent or just questionable companies, may take the time to register with the secretary of state. How, do you say? It’s not that difficult. While it’s a criminal offense to falsely register a company, news of prosecutions never seems to make headlines.
An Atlanta private investigator says that he and the law firms he serves are often frustrated when trying to locate a supposed officer in a company. “The limitations of the state’s site and information collected is a concern. The problem is compounded when a common name is listed as an officer or registered agent, connected to a post office box address in a strip mall.”
Therefore, a Georgia secretary of state business search is truly only one step in determining the legitimacy of a corporation. For continued due diligence, the investigator says to consider a professional. “Online tools are fine; however, a deeper dive is often necessary, especially with a critical vendor. We’ve found a number bogus or problematic servicers, even though they went to the trouble of registering with the secretary of state.”
In one notable case his company arrived at a commercial location to discover the listed address was that of a different entity all together. The investigator goes on to say that a prevention service can reveal issues that if previously known, would avoid severe financial loss. “It was profoundly sad because we could have stopped the fraud. Similarly, others went on to be victimized.” It’s not just fraud in Georgia but other states as well. The value of website information offers only so much.
