Black Flag Alert

What the Black Flag Alert MCP server does

The Black Flag Alert MCP server exposes company credit-risk intelligence as tools that an MCP-compatible AI client can call. Its coverage is limited to companies registered in England and Wales, with data for approximately 5.1 million companies. Company numbers beginning with SC, NI, R, FC, or OE are outside the stated coverage.

The service assigns each covered company an R-Score from 0 to 100. The score combines filed accounts, filing behaviour, charges, County Court Judgments, and winding-up activity. The available data supports company identification, risk review, contact lookup, and portfolio-style enrichment.

How it works

A typical workflow starts with search_companies, which finds up to 20 matching companies by name and returns the company number needed for subsequent lookups. get_company then returns a broader profile containing the R-Score, financial information, charges, CCJs, directors, and a narrative. For a quicker and lower-cost assessment, get_risk_narrative returns only the plain-English risk summary.

The Black Flag Alert MCP server also supports get_contacts for SMTP-verified email addresses, phone numbers, and domains. batch_enrich accepts up to 50 companies in one call and returns score, status, overdue information, and exposure. The usage tool reports the API key's rolling 24-hour usage against its limits. Tool metering differs by operation: searching and usage are free, while company, narrative, and batch calls consume calls, and contact retrieval uses contact lookups.

Setup and configuration

The remote endpoint is https://blackflagalert.com/api/mcp and uses streamable HTTP with MCP 2025-06-18. Configure an MCP client with the endpoint and an Authorization: Bearer <API key> header. API keys are available through the developer site, including a free trial with no card requirement.

For local stdio use, install the bfa-mcp tool when available through PyPI, or run the repository from source with uv sync. Set BFA_API_KEY in the client environment. BFA_BASE_URL is optional and defaults to https://blackflagalert.com.

Tools and capabilities

• Search company names and obtain eight-character company numbers.
• Retrieve full company profiles with risk and corporate details.
• Request a cheaper plain-English risk narrative.
• Look up SMTP-verified email addresses, phone numbers, and domains.
• Enrich as many as 50 companies in a single request.
• Check rolling 24-hour API usage and limits.

Limitations and notes

The Black Flag Alert MCP server is focused on England and Wales; it does not cover the company-number prefixes listed in the coverage exclusions. Results depend on the data supplied by the service and its stated R-Score methodology. API usage is metered for several tools, so applications should select the risk narrative when a full profile is unnecessary and use usage to monitor limits.

The service can be connected remotely without a local installation, while the stdio configuration requires an API key in the client environment. The project is licensed under MIT.