Late payment for B2B service providers

Where the money gets stuck

• Recurring services invoiced without proof they were performed. The client pays what they can check; the rest waits.
• A quality complaint that appears when the invoice arrives. Never during the month, always when it is time to pay.
• An invoice sent to the wrong department, sitting in a drawer while you think it is being paid.

The clauses that matter

• A job sheet or attendance sheet signed every month by the client’s site manager.
• A written complaint window in the contract: after it, the service is deemed accepted.
• The approver’s name and the invoice route, recorded at signing: who receives it, who approves it, who pays it.
• Payment terms in days from receipt of the invoice, repeated on every invoice.

The reminder sent five days before the due date checks that the invoice has been registered: it is the first step of the reminder schedule.

Worked example

Fictional example. A security company invoices 6,000,000 FCFA a month to four clients. Its invoices are paid at 75 days on average, against 30-day terms. The share due to late payment is 6,000,000 ÷ 30 × 45 = 9,000,000 FCFA tied up. Financed by a 14% overdraft, it costs about 1,260,000 FCFA a year.