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What is the best late payment excuses you have heard?
What’s the best late payment excuse you’ve come across?
It used to be "the cheque’s in the post but that is old hat now – however, it appears a permutation of that old excuse has now evolved.
I recently emailed a second statement out along with a reminder that the account was overdue and a request to bring the account up to date
The response was "when did you post the invoice as I haven’t received it yet?"
I forwarded the original email containing the invoice to be met with the response "can you please post as we cannot accept internet copies..our system is not set up for this invoicing process?"
I’m tempted to "forget" to put a stamp on the letter when I post it
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12 Replies
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I’ve had that same excuse – from a motor engineer who invoices me via.. yup – email!
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Least you get an excuse, had a customer go silent on us for 4 weeks. Administration papers in todays post 😕
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Get loads of them on a weekly basis. Ranging from the mundane "we’ve had a lot of expenses recently, can’t you wait til next month", to the utterly infuriating "we didn’t put the banner up for the event as the weather was too bad so we’re not paying for something we didn’t use", to the bizarre, "oh, if you’d said you NEEDED the money I would have paid when I got it".
These obviously have a knock on effect to us when we’ve got so much sitting out in late payments, sometimes amounting to several months turnover.
Cheekiest response I got to an emailed PDF invoice, "As a printing company can’t you afford a sheet of paper?"
Dave
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Best ive had was the money is in the kitchen drawer, the kitchen drawer is locked and my wife is away on holiday with the keys lol! Only person ive ever met with a lockable kitchen drawer!!
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quote Phill Fenton:The response was “when did you post the invoice as I haven’t received it yet?”I forwarded the original email containing the invoice to be met with the response “can you please post as we cannot accept internet copies..our system is not set up for this invoicing process?”
Ask to be paid by card or paypal. if still no, jump in the car and tell him to have a cheque waiting. 😀
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One of my worst was for around £25 and after I contacted him about it not being payed after a few months the company owner said "I don’t care how much it costs, I just needed it doing" ??? Yes and it was done now pay the £25 please!
Second time I contacted him he was in Japan apparently.
Third time I must have hit it right because I got a cheque in the post the next day – 9 months after invoicing him and all for £25!?Steve
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My worse and really feel like punching somebody in the back of the head when I hear it is ….
Sorry but our payment terms are such and such so you will be paid then 😮
WTFingFF
Who gives a cr@p what their payment terms are, here’s mine and pay up!!!!!! But in order to keep the customer we usually have to give in don’t we but they could at least ask instead of saying it like you should just shut uo and wait to be paid 👿 👿 👿
I need to slap somebody just thinking about it :banghead:
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Once, in reply to a second invoice I sent to a large national company, I was emailed a PDF.
It contained a two-page questionnaire.I was told that in order to join their "Payee’s list" I had to print it out on my printer, using my time and my paper, fill in all the spaces, using my ink, sign it, scan it and send it back.
I called them up and very curtly told them that all the information they need about me is on the invoice. I am NOT going to do your job for you!
I went up the chain of command. Each time they insisted I fill in the form. Each time I refused.
Finally, after spending ten times as long on this as filling in the form would have taken, I reached the decision-making level.
"Okay," he tells me, "you dont need to fill in the form. I am writing your check now, you will get it tomorrow."The bigger the organisation, the dumber it is.
Needless to say I havent had any more work from them.
Simon.
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Partnerships – i have had two recently one where the ‘partner’ had cleared out the bank account! And done a runner with the money – I got the money after chasing the remaining partner for 3 months.
Another one where the partners fell out and each claiming the other should pay – they both gonna get legal action if they carry on -
quote Colin Bland:Partnerships – i have had two recently one where the ‘partner’ had cleared out the bank account! And done a runner with the money – I got the money after chasing the remaining partner for 3 months.
Another one where the partners fell out and each claiming the other should pay – they both gonna get legal action if they carry onBeen stuck with that too. Cancelled the cheque on the deposit and one partner claimed he wasn’t paying for some site signage (several 8x4s on 5m posts concreted in). After 3 months of cheque in the post, lost your invoice, bank transfers that never happen.
Rocked up on site with a generator and a cutting disk…spoke to site foreman…he called the partner that was still speaking. He asked for another week…I declined and was ‘allowed’ to reclaim my goods by doing a lumberjack ‘timber’ number on our signs. Sometimes you just have to take action… -
Might do the same David.
A trade customer shafted us for 4k, their customers has a nice new sign, and we’re out of pocket. I’d love to go and reclaim it!
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quote David Hammond:Might do the same David.
A trade customer shafted us for 4k, their customers has a nice new sign, and we’re out of pocket. I’d love to go and reclaim it!
Bear in mind that it’s absolutely not recommended or entirely legal if they don’t allow you to remove it.
It IS criminal to remove it from a third party as you have no contract with them without involving courts to establish title in the goods etc.
Over the last dozen years I’ve been forced to remove maybe 4 jobs of varying value when there has basically been flat refusals to pay with a "what you gonna do about it" attitude…type of customers that won’t go whinging about it though.
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