DUNS: what D&B checks and why applications stall

A D-U-N-S application takes one short form. It starts a review: Dun & Bradstreet verifies the company data, and Apple and Google later compare it with their own accounts. Here is what gets checked and where the process most often stalls.

What D&B asks for

D&B's global site lists information you may need to provide: legal name, address, phone, name of the owner or CEO, legal structure, year started, primary line of business and number of full-time and part-time employees. The form of D&B's Ukrainian partner, A.B.M. Ryzyk-Inform LLC, is shorter and tied to local registries: registration and tax codes, the English version of the name, the operating address and contacts. It takes no scanned documents; everything is typed in.

Three details people learn too late

• The number is tied to an address. D&B issues a separate number for each location. An office and a warehouse in different cities mean two numbers.
• D&B may call. A representative may contact the applicant to validate the information. If the contact person is away, the request waits.
• The English name must match everywhere. D&B publishes no official transliteration rule, so whichever spelling you choose has to be repeated in Apple, Google and contracts.

Where applications stall

The most common problem is a mismatch with the D&B profile. Apple then shows "The information you entered did not match your D&B profile" and asks you to check the profile, and to update it after a legal name change. Google Play requires the name and address in the payments profile to match D&B and may restrict the account, up to removing apps, if they differ. Apple also rejects numbers registered to trade names or branches and checks for a public website on the organization's own domain.

Official waiting times

The slowest option is a standard request on D&B's site, which D&B aims to complete within 30 business days in most cases. For a small fee, whose amount D&B does not disclose, that shrinks to eight business days. Apple developers get the number faster, within five business days, followed by up to two more business days before Apple has the data. Google allows a month for its process. D&B's Ukrainian partner gives no time guidance.

SAM.gov follows different rules

For US federal grants and government contracts the D&B number lost its purpose in spring 2022. SAM.gov now assigns its own Unique Entity ID during registration, at no charge.

To go through the process without these stops, see how we get a DUNS number for you: lookup, data check, submission and support until the number is issued.