Questions and answers.

We check your client records against official government records and show you every place where your version and theirs disagree. You see the difference, the official value and the source we checked, all on the same line. Nothing in your own system is touched — we read, we report, and you decide what to act on.

That is exactly what the free Audit is for. Send us 100 of your real records and within five working days you get a one-page scorecard showing what we found in them. If it turns out your data is in reasonable shape, that is worth knowing too.

Yes. The checks are the same whether you hold 500 records or 50,000 — only the volume changes.

The Audit is a free sample: 100 records, one scorecard, five working days. The Cleanse runs the same checks across all your databases, once, and gives you a full report of what was found. The Engine is a full Cleanse followed by the same checks every month, so discrepancies are caught as they happen instead of building up again over time.

Yes. Most businesses start with the Audit because it is free and it tells them what they are dealing with, but nobody has to. If you already know your records need work, we can scope a Cleanse from the start.

The Audit takes five working days from the moment your 100 records reach us. A Cleanse runs from three weeks, depending on how many records you hold and how many systems they live in. Both start as soon as the short paperwork is signed and your export is with us.

A one-page scorecard covering 100 of your real records, within five working days. It shows what we were able to check, what matched the official record and what did not, with each difference listed so you can see it for yourself rather than take our word for it.

Yes. Free, and no obligation to continue. There is no trial that quietly converts, no card details, and no charge at any point for the Audit itself.

Yes — two short documents, and both are there to protect you. The first is a data processing agreement, which sets out exactly what we may and may not do with the records you send and commits us to deleting them. The second is a one-page order form recording that the Audit is free and what it covers. Neither commits you to buying anything.

Export them to a CSV from whichever system holds them and send the file over — no integration, no access to your system, nothing to install. You choose which records you provide us.

Yes — 30 days after the Audit run, automatically.

Yes. The scorecard leads with a score out of 100 for your sample, with the findings behind it listed underneath so the number is never just an assertion. It also tells you how many of the 100 records we could check against an official register — some businesses, sole traders especially, are not held on any public register, and we would rather show you that than quietly count them as clean. It is a snapshot of the sample, not a running measure of your whole database.

Yes, and that is the end of it. If the sample comes back clean we say so plainly, and there is nothing further to sell you. We would rather tell you that than take money for work you do not need.

You send an export, we run every record through the same checks, and you get back a report of everything we found. Each finding shows the value you hold, what the official record says, and which source we consulted. We also show a tidied version of the messier fields — spacing, capitalisation, punctuation — always alongside your original, which stays exactly as you sent it.

From three weeks. A single system holding a few thousand records sits at the lower end; several systems, or a database that has been running for a decade, takes longer. You get a firm timeline before you commit to the work, not after.

No. Nothing we do touches your system. You send us an export, we send you a report, and every change is made by you, in your own software, at whatever pace suits you.

You apply them. Every finding gives you the field, your value, the verified value and the source we checked it against, so each decision takes seconds and stays yours.

Yes. Nothing is applied by us at all, so disagreeing costs you nothing — you skip it and move on. You know your clients; if a record looks wrong to us and you know exactly why it is the way it is, that is the end of the matter.

Yes. Within each of your systems we identify records that look like the same client entered more than once, and show them to you side by side with what each one holds. Where we cannot be confident two records are the same, we say so rather than deciding for you — it is far better to leave two records apart than to wrongly treat two clients as one. What you then do with a pair is your call, in your own system.

Yes, deliberately. Anything that cannot be resolved with confidence is held back and put in front of you rather than settled automatically.

Yes. You get a report listing every record where we found something, one entry each. Each finding sets out the field, the value you hold, what the official record says, which source we consulted, and how much weight to give it — from a straightforward correction up to something that needs a business decision. Records where we found nothing do not appear, so what you are working through is the exceptions rather than your whole database.

Yes. We work from whatever export your system produces — a CSV is all we need. There is no integration to build, nothing to install, and nobody from Acennan needs access to your software.

It keeps checking, and it shows you the direction of travel. A Cleanse is a snapshot: accurate the day it lands, and quietly less so every month afterwards as businesses change name, move premises, change status or deregister. The Engine runs the same checks every month, reports only what has changed since last time, and tracks your score month on month so you can see whether your data is improving or drifting. It also builds a dated record of what was checked and when, which is worth having the day somebody asks why a client's details are what they are.

Monthly, after the initial run that sets your baseline. Each month covers what has changed since the previous report.

A report showing your current score, how it has moved since last month, and every record where something has changed — or confirmation that nothing has. If you use more than one system it breaks the score down by system, so you can see which one is drifting.

Yes. The report arrives monthly and waits for you. Nothing expires, nothing needs a response by a particular date, and nothing happens in your system whether you act on it or not.

Five checks against Companies House: the registered name, the registered office address, the postcode, the company status and the company type.

Alongside those we tidy the formatting of eleven fields — telephone, email, company number and contact name among them. And where no official register holds a field, such as a main contact or a trading name, we compare what each of your systems says and show you where they disagree.

Addresses need a note of their own. Only the registered office appears on an official register, and for many of your clients that will be your own office — which is correct, and not something we flag. Trading and correspondence addresses appear on no register, so we check they are real and correctly formed and compare them across your systems.

Two things we tell you rather than guess. A trading style name has no official source, so we do not check it against one. And where a client is a sole trader or partnership with no company registration, the registers hold nothing about them — we check the address is real, compare your own systems, and say plainly what could not be verified.

On dedicated servers in Manchester, in the United Kingdom. Each customer's records sit in their own separate store rather than pooled in one shared database, and each store is encrypted with its own key. Everyone at our end who can reach client data signs in with two-factor authentication, and every access is logged.

Records from a one-off engagement are deleted 30 days after it closes. On an ongoing subscription they stay for as long as the subscription runs, and the same 30 days applies once it ends. Separately, we keep a record that the work was done — what ran, for whom and when — for six years.

Yes — while it is travelling to us and while it is sitting on our servers. Each customer has their own separate key, so one customer's records cannot be read using another customer's key.

Yes. Your records are used to do your work and nothing else — not to build anything, not to train anything, and not to improve a service for somebody else. Nothing is sold and nothing is pooled with another customer's data.

Yes. Your records sit on our own servers and are not passed to anyone else for any other purpose. Nothing is sold and nothing is shared. The one exception, named in our data processing agreement, is the company that houses the servers — as with any hosted service, they are bound by written terms not to access what is on them.

Yes. If anything happened to your data you would hear it from us directly. We have a dedicated breach escalation procedure that details our contractual and legal obligations, which is available on request.

Yes, and we provide one as part of onboarding. It is written specifically for this service rather than adapted from a generic template, and it sets out exactly what we may and may not do with your records.

Yes. You stay in charge of your clients' data throughout: you decide what to send, what to act on, and what happens in your own system, and we do only what you have asked for.

It helps with the judgement calls, and only those. Anything that can be checked against an official record is checked without it — that is a straight comparison, and there is no room for interpretation in it. Where it earns its place is the harder question: two records that look like the same client but are not identical, where a person would otherwise have to sit and weigh it up. Even then, anything it cannot resolve confidently is put in front of a human rather than decided.

Yes — your decision, not ours. It is set when you onboard, and changeable at any time with your written authorisation.

Yes. It is a setting on your account, and it is off unless you choose otherwise.

There isn't one. The Engine runs month to month with no minimum term — give us a month's notice whenever you want to stop. Month one is the Cleanse; from month two you are paying for the monthly checks, for as long as they are worth having.

Yes. Within 90 days of your Cleanse report you can start the Engine straight away — the Cleanse you have already paid for counts as month one, so you pick up from the monthly checks. After 90 days your records will have moved on enough that we would start again with a fresh Cleanse.

Yes. If something we have reported turns out to be wrong, tell us and we will re-check it and correct the report at no cost to you. If a whole run has gone wrong, we run it again.

We have contractual response rates which are available on request.

Yes, and at no extra cost — working across several systems is how the service is built, not an upgrade. Each system is treated as its own set of records and stays that way throughout.

Yes. Nothing is migrated, nothing is abandoned, and no system has to be declared the main one. We read an export from each and report back on each.

Yes. Where two of your systems hold different values for the same client, we show you both, side by side, with what each one says. We do not decide which of your systems is right — you know your clients and your processes, and no system is treated as the master.