Commercial vs domestic

[Dean Lofthouse]

Currently I am owed nothing from my domestic customers, they pay on completion and I have never had any real problems

 

Below is my commercial "owed" list and it seems I,m always having to chase commercial customers

[sloth]

Yep seems about right!

What software is that? Looks simple enough even for me...

 

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Arbtalk mobile app

[skyhuck]

I know what you mean Dean, I have sent out two invoices last week, one for £4,350+VAT and one for £6,600+VAT.

 

Neither is late yet, I hope they both pay within 30 days, but as you say most private clients pay on completion or with a day or two which is great!!

[treeman61]

That looks like invoice2go ......great app. Changed the way i do my accounts

[roseyweb]

I'm owed 15k net at the moment which for a one man and one muppet team is quite a lot. Also a lot if that money is for stuff I've had to pay the invoices for already like semi mature trees, 360's labour etc

 

The difference i can do 1k days on commercial but with domestic it's hardly half that and the jobs are less enjoyable

[Andrew Gale]

Although we predominately work for the domestic market we do undertake commercial stuff which I really don't like doing due to the time taken for payment. Our worst experience was for a very large construction/civil engineering company who took 90+ days to pay a £5k invoice; they constantly put problems up reference our paperwork, we hadn't completed this form, we hadn't submitted that form etc. In the end it took the threat of the small claims court to finally get our money; suffice to say we haven't been asked to quote since, and even if they did I'd tell them to poke it

[roseyweb]

There's a large civics company which rhymes with souther sweetie who have departments just to find ways of not paying you. Or so it seems

 

I've heard every excuse from plausible to laughable

[Andrew Gale]

They're the ones........

[openspaceman]

There's a large civics company which rhymes with souther sweetie who have departments just to find ways of not paying you. Or so it seems

 

I've heard every excuse from plausible to laughable

 

Doesn't rhyme but that's the way a firm I do work for do it.

it's a cashflow problem and big firms have big salary bills which take preference and yes mention county court and you'll get no more work, not that that bothers me or justifies the practice.

[Tom D]

We are mostly commercial, the LA's and FC pay pretty fast so no problems there apart from the occasional hiccup. The worst are the big FM companies, many of whom take 90 days as standard, the worst I have had rhymed with dlengale who took 7 months to pay me £26k.

 

Late payment in the commercial game is pretty standard, and if you want the work you just have to put up with it. The thing to avoid is the "Marks and Spencer" trap, this is where one company provided most of your work, as M&S do with many of their suppliers. I have seen someone pushed right to the brink of bankruptcy that way, once they owe you a lot of money they can turn the screws on your pricing and you have no choice as you know that they can take you under if they want to.

 

There is also the risk that one of these big companied goes under whilst owing you a lot, like Connaught a few years back. Again its wise not to get too far in with any one company, as you can be sure if they do go under you will be the last to know along with their staff.