"lost" invoices

[Leftie]

I am fed up of chasing invoices that have got 'lost'. We even started putting a line in the cover letter reminding them the invoice was attached and needed paying within 28 days; to no avail.

We always enclose the invoice in a plastic folder with the cover letter every time we send a package of work back to the customer. I think that as they have the results of the work by email the day before, the content of the package coming back isn't of a great deal of interest to them, and the cover letter and invoice are put to one side to be forptten or thrown away.

We have cited the late payment legislation at them but frankly on an invoice of say £1k the interest for a month even at 2% over base rate takes more time to chase and type up than we get back.

Ideas?

I had thought about sending invoices over a certain amount ( say £1k) recorded delivery for the extra 70p.

[matrignano]

ANY invoice should be sent recorded delivery!

That's the only legally-recognised way of proving that you actually sent the invoice on the date you say you did.

What some companies do in order to ensure quicker payment of invoices is to offer a, say, 2% discount if the invoice is paid within 14 working days. Sometimes it is better to sacrifice those 2% rather than risking a negative cash-flow.

Edited by matrignano on Tuesday 7th August 08:04

Edited by matrignano on Tuesday 7th August 08:15

[Leftie]

matrignano said:

ANY invoice should be sent recorded delivery!

That's the only legally-recognised way of proving that you actually sent the invoice on the date you say you did.

Our packages go either Special Delivery or overnight courier with the invoice inside but they deny having had the invoice. I was thinking that getting a signature from the individual who commissioned the work by send it RD was better than the signature we get from the post room for a package.

It may be we just have to carefully highlight the fact we have a signature from their organisation and intend to start charging interest, or add a late payment surcharge they can take off if they pay within 28 days ? We can't really give an prompt paymnet discount as the price of the goods is set at an agreed national level and we can't increase prices to cover that.

[2 sMoKiN bArReLs]

E-mail a copy of the invoice direct to their finance department?

[jeevescat]

I sometimes get companies calling chasing invoices that I know nothing about. Normally always transpires that the invoice was sent with the goods, and are then filed filed as a packing list, not passed on as an invoice.

Send a separate copy of it to your point of contact or the accounts department.

[thewave]

We now e-mail .pdf invoices to all of our customers that have e-mail address, and request that they reply to confirm reciept of the contents of that e-mail

Our terms are 14 days, although don't chase until 1 month with a reminder
2 months nice letter suggesting oversight, could they please remit asap
3 months unless no contact - as we have not had any response to our letters dated xyz I have no option other than to place the matter with the County Court yada yada unless I receive payment within the next 7 days

We've only twice had to place something in court in the 7 years I've been here.

[Deva Link]

What size of organisation are you dealing with?

I think it's pointless sending them recorded delivery - if a finance dept says they haven't got the invoice then they aren't going to pay it no matter aho has signed for it.

Obviously it's important to send the invoice to the right place, and, certainly in my business, that's often a completely different location from the shipping address.

For our bigger customers, we email a statement to finance a couple of weeks before the invoice is due (normally 30 day terms) and ask them to confirm that the invoice is cleared for payment.

[stevieb]

Leftie,

Your invoices could be getting lost at the other end because the person who deals with the package has no interest in the invoice etc..

Send the invoice seperately to the account department, but also include a copy in the package..

Steve

[Marki]

We email the invoice and post the invoice and the cupid stunts still try and pull the old "we have not seen and invoice" trick

[Don]

jeevescat said:

Send a separate copy of it to your point of contact or the accounts department.

And "special delivery" so there's a signature. Costs bugger all - you *know* they have it.

[JustinP1]

Leftie said:

matrignano said:

ANY invoice should be sent recorded delivery!

That's the only legally-recognised way of proving that you actually sent the invoice on the date you say you did.

Our packages go either Special Delivery or overnight courier with the invoice inside but they deny having had the invoice. I was thinking that getting a signature from the individual who commissioned the work by send it RD was better than the signature we get from the post room for a package.

It may be we just have to carefully highlight the fact we have a signature from their organisation and intend to start charging interest, or add a late payment surcharge they can take off if they pay within 28 days ? We can't really give an prompt paymnet discount as the price of the goods is set at an agreed national level and we can't increase prices to cover that.

The way we do it is on our quoted price list, at the top we state that our standard price *includes* a 15% early payment discount for payments received within 28 days.

Of course, in effect it is a late payment surcharge, but one the client knows about from the start and thus is contractually enforcable.

In practice before the discount is taken away we will always give at least one reminder directly to the finance department informing them that the invoice has definately been sent, if they dont have it we will fax another directly to them immediately and the invoice is only valid for 7 days before the discount expires.

[Leftie]

2 sMoKiN bArReLs said:

E-mail a copy of the invoice direct to their finance department?

They are quite large organisations with 3000 or 400O staff across 30 or 40 sites.

Often we don't have their finance dept email but we could PDF it and ask our contact to forward it. Have to be careful then that they don't pay it twice as they have in the past!

Not too sure asking for acknowlegemnet of receipt of the invoice would work, they are notorious for not answering or even reading emails.

[Vee]

Leftie said:

2 sMoKiN bArReLs said:

E-mail a copy of the invoice direct to their finance department?

They are quite large organisations with 3000 or 400O staff across 30 or 40 sites.

Often we don't have their finance dept email but we could PDF it and ask our contact to forward it. Have to be careful then that they don't pay it twice as they have in the past!

More fool them for paying the same invoice twice. What kind of controls does thier AP dept have !
Is it worth chasing the person who placed the order, and hence, committed their company to the cost ?

[shadowninja]

Don said:

jeevescat said:

Send a separate copy of it to your point of contact or the accounts department.

And "special delivery" so there's a signature. Costs bugger all - you *know* they have it.

They don't mean it got lost in the post. They mean it is lost generally. Whether it's been misplaced in an in-tray, filed in the wrong place or eaten by the office cat. No amount of signatures will mean it the phone call doesn't happen asking where the invoice is. Had this in a previous company and it was our customer's standard way of putting off payment.

[Leftie]

The 'chase time' is the real cost for us and this is what I want to avoid.

[emicen]

Leftie said:

2 sMoKiN bArReLs said:

E-mail a copy of the invoice direct to their finance department?

They are quite large organisations with 3000 or 400O staff across 30 or 40 sites.

Often we don't have their finance dept email but we could PDF it and ask our contact to forward it. Have to be careful then that they don't pay it twice as they have in the past!

Not too sure asking for acknowlegemnet of receipt of the invoice would work, they are notorious for not answering or even reading emails.

We have a company that books itro 1000 room nights a month with us for their IT business. They subcon a hell of a lot of work out. Only way to deal with it is purchase orders and cost centres. Could you implement a similar system.

When they call us to book their travel, they have to give us the cost centre for billing and purchase order for the travel. If one/both cant be provided we wont book it as the tail chasing would be ridiculous.

[Leftie]

Have had an electronic invoice done today: so a copy will go by email with the spreasheet of job results. Now lets see them say they haven't had it.

[stuartbuckell]

They get 'lost' because they don't want to pay. We get that occasionally.

Best results we have seen is to offer a 2% discount on payment in full within the specified date.

If its £1k invoice, it just cost you £20. But you have £980 in the bank and some cash flow.

Amazing how many lost invoices turn up.

[Mrs Trackside]

jeevescat said:

I sometimes get companies calling chasing invoices that I know nothing about. Normally always transpires that the invoice was sent with the goods, and are then filed filed as a packing list, not passed on as an invoice.

Send a separate copy of it to your point of contact or the accounts department.

stevieb said:

Leftie,

Your invoices could be getting lost at the other end because the person who deals with the package has no interest in the invoice etc..

Send the invoice seperately to the account department, but also include a copy in the package..

Steve

It happens here too. Invoices are sometimes sent in little plastic envelopes attached to the front of parcels. Unless I see the parcel and pull the invoice off, I often have to ring up for copies - which I will only know about if I have received a statement. And if the statement doesn't have a phone number on it, I won't bother looking it up to make that call. So unless they ring me, they don't get paid...

[JustinP1]

stuartbuckell said:

They get 'lost' because they don't want to pay. We get that occasionally.

Best results we have seen is to offer a 2% discount on payment in full within the specified date.

If its £1k invoice, it just cost you £20. But you have £980 in the bank and some cash flow.

Amazing how many lost invoices turn up.

Indeed!

Our early payment discount is 15% so it often makes a difference of a couple of hundred quid.

You would be stunned how many times a 'lost' invoice or a apparantly 'unusable' faxed invoice magically becomes instantly payable within a day as soon as we reinvoice without the early payment discount included!!!