Freelance Strategist - supporting businesses like Klarna, EY, adidas, Google, P&G and more. YJ Freelancer of the Year. Founder: Manual of Me, Outside Perspective, Leapers, Freelancing.support, de-construct
A reminder to anyone feeling awkward about chasing a late payment... 1/ You've delivered the work, and already provided them with a 30 day interest-free period to pay you. 2/ The "payment due" date on your invoice is the latest date they can pay you by, not the date they should start thinking about getting it sorted. 3/ Their lack of internal process and cash flow issues are not your problem. Even if their client hasn't paid them yet, you've done the work. They shouldn't have hired you if they didn't have the budget to pay you. 4/ It's not personal. You're a business, asking another business, to pay you for the work done. 5/ You're entitled to late payment surcharges and interest in law. You don't have to have included it in your terms or contract. 6/ If you're dealing with a larger company (50+ employees), speak to the Office of the Small Business Commissioner for advice, they can often take action or give you guidance on what action to take next. 7/ It's not going to damage your relationship with your client - they already damaged it, by not paying you on time. 8/ Even if it's not causing you cashflow issues, act promptly. Every invoice which doesn't get chased and challenged makes it that _little bit more okay_ for businesses to pay late. You can guarantee your client is chasing their late payers. I'm revising our ever popular guide to late payments, and would love to hear any stories from fellow freelancers, so we can include a diverse range of experiences. Hit me up if you'd like to share your story.
I’d add to the list - have a debt collection company in your contacts as last resort and when needed. I had some good experiences with our local one who helped us recover unpaid invoices. Once we started working with them we referred the invoices to them much sooner. First time I waited almost 60 days, but then once invoices were not paid within 45 days, and there was no communication from the party, I offloaded the chasing to them. There is a fee though but for cashflow reasons it was still better than nothing and not knowing.
The tradesperson doing work round your house probably wants the money transferred before they’ve even driven away. No need to feel awkward at all. If people want a long term loan, they can peruse the banks on the high street.
This stuff needs airing and calling out. I had a really ugly experience once with an agency who turned out to be notoriously absent of any morals / ethics. Chased nicely. Then firmly but fairly. Then I had to resort to threatening to expose them to their client (who I’d helped them pitch to and win). I got paid after that. Would be happy to share my story.
This has happened to me many times before.. Now I only sell productised services where clients pay a fixed price upfront. I’m building a platform that allows others to do this too, If anyone needs help- my DMs are open 🖖
I had my worst ever experience with this last year, chasing down a big amount of money for months. Your guide was brilliantly useful and I would recommend it to anyone, it's an incredibly stressful thing when you aren't paid, and taking the emotion out of it, e.g. you're not 'in the wrong' to be chasing, is key. Thanks again for everything you do in this space Matthew Knight
A great tip I heard recently: set up a credit control email alias if you want to separate out the relationship, or just feel more comfortable having a different name do the chasing.
Item 0 on that list... 0. Never feel awkward about it. They are witholding YOUR money. It's yours already.
Why even give 30 days? Isn't 14 perfectly reasonable?
I recently had to go through a solicitor to get my client to pay and unpaid invoice and so glad I did. I wouldn't have been able to sleep at night if I'd let them just not pay without doing anything about it.
Freelance Strategist - supporting businesses like Klarna, EY, adidas, Google, P&G and more. YJ Freelancer of the Year. Founder: Manual of Me, Outside Perspective, Leapers, Freelancing.support, de-construct
3moIf people need some resources on dealing with late payments, we are revising our guides at the moment, but there's a quick reference here: get.freelancing.support/on/late-payments