At Saltare our number one focus is to eradicate late payments. In fact, we want to replace the negative late payment conversation with a positive early payment conversation. We have built a platform that gives reasons for both buyer and supplier to benefit from early payments. However, we know that at the moment not every business uses our platform. Therefore we want to provide a list of simple tips that will help you get paid sooner.
Here are some tips for businesses to ensure they get paid on time:
Set clear payment terms: Clearly define payment terms in your contracts or agreements with customers to avoid confusion or misunderstandings.
Send timely invoices: Send invoices promptly after completing work or delivering products, and ensure they contain all necessary information, including payment due date and payment methods.
Offer convenient payment methods: Provide customers with convenient payment options, such as online payment platforms or automatic payment options, to make it easy for them to pay.
Follow up on overdue payments: Have a system in place for following up on overdue payments, such as reminders and escalation procedures.
Communicate with customers: Regularly communicate with customers to ensure they are aware of payment deadlines and to address any issues or concerns.
Use early payment programmes: Consider using early payment programmes, such as Saltare’s platform. Ask your customers to implement Saltare to pay early and improve cash flow.
Conduct credit checks: Conduct credit checks on new customers to assess their creditworthiness and minimise the risk of payment delays or non-payment.
By following these tips, businesses can improve their chances of getting paid on time and reduce the risk of payment delays or non-payment.
As a large business, you know how important it is to maintain a reliable supply chain. Your success depends on the success of your suppliers and partners. But what happens when your suppliers are struggling with cash flow and unable to deliver their products or services on time? That’s where supporting your supply chain comes in.
Supporting your supply chain means working with your suppliers to ensure their financial stability and success. This can involve providing early payments and offering resources to improve their operations. By supporting your supply chain, you can ensure that your organisation will be more effective, maintain strong relationships with your partners, and even gain a competitive advantage.
One way to support your supply chain is by offering early payments. Early payments can help your suppliers manage their cash flow and reduce financial stress. However, implementing an early payment system can be complex, time-consuming, and costly. That’s where Saltare comes in.
Saltare is an early payment platform that enables large businesses to deliver early payments to their supply chain partners in the simplest way possible. With Saltare, you can provide early payments to your suppliers in just three clicks, without tie-ins, complex contracts, and all whilst providing them and you the insights needed to enhance your respective organisations. This allows you to provide critical financial support to your suppliers quickly and easily.
Saltare provides suppliers and you complete choice transparency, meaning your suppliers can choose which invoices to be paid early. This ensures that your suppliers have control over their own finances and can make the best decisions for their businesses.
With Saltare, you can support your supply chain in a way that benefits both your business and your suppliers. By offering early payments, you can improve your suppliers’ financial stability, reduce delays in your supply chain, and strengthen your partnerships. Additionally, Saltare’s simple and transparent platform makes it easy for you to implement an early payment system without the complexity and cost associated with traditional solutions.
In conclusion, supporting your supply chain is essential for the success of your business, and providing early payments is an effective way to do so. Saltare’s early payment platform makes it easy for large businesses to deliver early payments to their supply chain partners in just three clicks, with complete choice transparency and without tie-ins, complex contracts, or limited visibility. By using Saltare, you can support your supply chain and gain a competitive advantage in your industry.
Early payment programmes can support social responsibility and sustainability goals, such as supporting small and diverse suppliers. In this blog, we’ll explore how early payments can drive social value creation, and how Saltare’s early payment platform can help buyers and suppliers achieve these goals.
In the simplest form early payments can support social responsibility and sustainability goals by helping small and diverse suppliers. Early payments can provide small suppliers with the working capital they need to grow their businesses, which can support job creation and economic development in local communities. They can also reduce anxiety associated with late payments. Additionally, early payments can help diverse suppliers gain access to capital, reducing barriers to entry and promoting greater diversity in supply chains.
Buyers with a focus on social value creation can also reward suppliers for positive social value impact by offering to pay them early which can be in exchange for a smaller or even a zero discount.
Saltare’s early payment platform makes this extremely simple. Buyers can segment supplier groups, applying flexible discount rules for paying differing supplier cohorts early. Suppliers can choose to take an early payment with complete choice. Regardless of whether they take the payment they can rest safe in the knowledge that their payment will be made and by when.
Saltare doesn’t discriminate by supplier size, industry, location or risk profile, resulting in everyone benefiting.
Early payments can support social responsibility and sustainability goals by helping small and diverse suppliers. By using Saltare’s early payment platform, buyers can support these businesses by providing them with the working capital they need to grow and thrive. This allows them to reinvest in communities, job creation, innovation and ultimately a better service provision to their customers.
Early payment programmes can help buyers and suppliers streamline their operations and reduce administrative burdens. In this blog, we’ll explore how early payments can drive efficiency for both parties, and how Saltare’s early payment platform can automate the early payment process, freeing up time and resources for both parties.
Early payments provide several benefits that drive efficiency for both buyers and suppliers. By offering early payments, buyers can reduce the time and resources required to manage supplier payments or payment queries. Additionally, suppliers can receive payment faster, improving their cash flow and reducing the need to manage overdue invoices.
With Saltare’s early payment platform, buyers and suppliers can streamline the early payment process. Saltare provides a centralised location for buyers and suppliers to manage their invoices and payments with the simplest communication and reducing the need for chasing (suppliers) or being chased (buyers). It is estimated that in the UK alone over 900,000 hours per day is spent by SMEs chasing invoices. This means that their customers are being chased by the same amount of time.
In Conclusion
Early payments provide a range of benefits that can drive efficiency for both buyers and suppliers. By using Saltare’s early payment platform, buyers and suppliers can streamline their processes, reduce inbound activity and focus on their core business operations. More time on value add, more innovation, more growth, more profitability. Why wouldn’t you?
As a Senior Executive you’re always looking for ways to improve your bottom line and create a more sustainable and socially responsible organisation. One strategy that can help you achieve both of these goals is early supplier payments. By paying your suppliers early, you can achieve cost savings, improve your reputation, and create social value. And with Saltare, a financial technology platform that facilitates early payments to suppliers, achieving these benefits has never been easier.
Cost Savings
One of the most significant benefits of early supplier payments is cost savings. Many suppliers offer discounts for early payments, which can add up to significant savings for your business over time. By using Saltare to facilitate early payments, you can take advantage of these discounts without having to manage payments manually.
Improved Reputation and Social Value
Early supplier payments can also help to improve your organisation’s reputation and create social value. When you pay your suppliers promptly, they are more likely to view your organization as a reliable and trustworthy partner, which can lead to improved collaboration and more favorable terms in the future. Additionally, early payments can help to support the sustainability of your suppliers’ businesses, contributing to a more sustainable and socially responsible business ecosystem.
Operational Efficiency
In addition to cost savings and improved reputation, early supplier payments can also improve your operational efficiency. By using Saltare to manage your supplier payments, you can simplify your payment processes and reduce the workload associated with managing payments manually. This can help to free up your time and resources, allowing you to focus on other critical areas of your business.
Real-Time Data Insights
Saltare’s platform also offers real-time data insights that can help you make informed decisions about your supplier relationships. By analysing data related to your supplier payments, you can identify areas for improvement, such as suppliers who consistently require early payments or who don’t offer discounts for early payments. This can help you to optimise your supplier relationships and achieve even greater cost savings over time.
Partner with Saltare Today
At Saltare, we’re committed to helping businesses achieve financial, operational, and data benefits while creating social value and enhancing their reputation. We believe that every business deserves the opportunity to see their supply chains benefit, which is why we’re keen to work with any organization that shares our vision. By partnering with Saltare, you can achieve cost savings, improve your reputation, and create social value, all while simplifying your payment processes and optimizing your supplier relationships. Contact us today to learn more about how Saltare can help your business achieve its goals.
Early payment programmes can provide financial benefits to both buyers and suppliers, such as improved cash flow and reduced costs. In this blog, we’ll explore how early payments can create financial benefits, and how Saltare’s early payment platform can help buyers and suppliers achieve these benefits through flexible payment terms.
Early payments offer several financial benefits for buyers and suppliers. For buyers, early payments can provide discounts, optimises cash and improve profitability. Suppliers can benefit from improved cash flow, reducing the need for costly financing options.
Saltare’s early payment platform offers complete flexibility regarding when a supplier wished to get paid and in the simplest way. It also saves them from spending on non-value add activity like credit control, by notifying when a payment is going to be made. The platform enables buyers to offer early payments to suppliers whist ensuring they see a reasonable return on their cash. This means that suppliers can potentially benefit from the attractive finance rates of their much larger clients reducing the need for costly financing options.
The buyers will also see the cost benefit of efficiencies driven by them not needing to fund a the non-value add activity associated with managing inbound payment queries.
In short, by using Saltare’s early payment platform, buyers and suppliers can take advantage of flexible payment terms to improve their cash flow and reduce costs.
Cash flow is critical to any business. Sadly, payment uncertainty and late payments leave many suppliers struggling to maintain healthy cash flow, putting their futures at risk. And causing disruptions to your supply chain and the economy as a whole.
We are on a mission to change that.
Early Pay by Saltare improves the flow of cash to the entire supply chain in a way that works for everyone. Enabling you to protect your supply chain, become the buyer of choice and deliver real social value.
Watch our short video to find out how.
Transform the way you pay and contact Saltare today.
Arrange a demo to see just how Early Pay will deliver benefit to your business and your supply chain.
Early Pay is a unique payment solution that offers a quick and easy way to facilitate early payments to suppliers, improving the flow of cash to the entire supply chain, whilst delivering sustainable economic and social benefits.
The challenge
Local authorities continue to face significant financial pressures of real term cuts, increasing costs and rises in demand for public services. With the added pressure to deliver on the National Procurement Strategy, such as fulfilling social value, building greater connections with local suppliers and embracing procurement innovation.
Effective supply chain management and strong supplier relationships have never been more important.
The solution
By using Early Pay local authorities can stimulate their local economy, supporting it to level-up through early payment offers to local businesses, helping them to prosper.
How does it work?
Its really smart and really simple.
Once a council has approved an invoice, Early Pay will notify the supplier. The council can offer to pay early, and choose whether to apply a discount. The supplier can accept the offer if they so wish. There’s no obligation either way, but the supplier will have peace of mind of knowing exactly when they’ll be paid.
Due to the flexibility of Early Pay, councils have the option to prioritise local businesses and choose to provide early payment with no discount. Any discounts applied to other supplier groups can generate additional savings that can then be reinvested into local services.
Transform the way you pay and contact Saltare today.
Get in touch to arrange a demo to see how Early Pay will deliver benefit to your organisation whilst enabling you to generate significant social value, strengthen communities and help local businesses prosper.
Local Government and Early Pay – Facilitating the Future of Public Sector Payments
From road maintenance to social care, councils’ responsibilities are wide-ranging and complex. To deliver the essential services every community deserves and requires, local authorities work with a diverse array of suppliers. That means they spend a considerable amount on procuring third-party products and services.
In 2021 alone, councils spent £70 billion with third parties. This represents a 7% increase on 2020’s spending. Both figures highlight just how important third parties are to local government service provision and the key role procurement and commissioning play in councils’ ability to deliver those services.
As an organisation committed to reshaping the way people think about payments, in particular SME payments, Saltare finds the relationship between councils and their suppliers full of potential. That’s why we are exhibiting at this year’s County Council Network (CCN) Annual Conference and dedicating this blog to examining the interplay between council service provision, payment processing, and our product, Early Pay.
In this article, we explore how councils can use a digital early payment processing solution to benefit local businesses and the communities in which they operate. Taking three influential local economy whitepapers as our starting point, we show you how Early Pay can contribute to efficient service provision and a healthier relationship between key factors in the community.
But, first things first, let’s provide a little context.
CCN and the role of Early Pay
The CCN comprises 36 local authorities and is England’s largest association of councils. Its 2,600 councillors represent around 26 million people, cover 86% of the country’s landmass and are responsible for 39% of its GVA (CCN). In other words, they are instrumental in determining how local services are provided for a significant percentage of the country.
The CCN Annual Conference (20th to 22nd of November 2022) is an opportunity for those councillors to convene and share information, ideas and research. This year, the conference will focus on the following topics:
Delivering economic growth
Local government finance
Levelling up
Climate change
Adult social care and children services
Housing
We strongly believe Early Pay can help councils tackle many of these challenges and achieve their main aims.
Emphasising the local
In August 2022, Locality and Lloyds Bank Foundation released the Principles in Practice report. Based on extensive research, the report examines how local authorities can build long-term partnerships between councils and the people and organisations they represent, while also unlocking the power of community.
Much of the Locality report expands on research conducted by the New Economics Foundation. This key paper was entitled Plugging the Leaks and focused on maximising value from local government spending. Finally, the Localis report, True Value, has also provided invaluable information. These three reports are the foundation on which we built this article.
At Saltare, we believe local authorities and businesses must work together to deliver value to their communities and generate economic growth. To do so, they need a comprehensive set of tools that facilitate relationship-building and reward investment in local services.
Digital innovation is vital
Commitment to innovation is central to the Keep it Local philosophy. Locality’s report makes it clear that finding new ways of working and developing strong connections between councils and regional suppliers is essential to stimulating the local economy. This is relevant on several levels.
First, faced with severe budget restrictions and public sector funding cuts, councils are struggling to deliver the services their communities require. In many instances, they are being asked to do more with less. This is not a problem that will simply disappear.
While working within these limitations will always be tricky, there are ways to relieve the pressure. Most notably, digital technology. Digital automation technologies, like Early Pay, drive efficiencies and reduce costs, while allowing employees to focus on more nuanced and valuable work.
In the case of Early Pay, automated early payment offer processing ensures council employees do not have to devote time to setting up, managing and processing early payment rebate calculations. It turns a labour-intensive process into one that is more time efficient. It saves councils money and streamlines their operations.
New ideas mean a fresh approach
Innovative solutions as a whole (not just digital technology) are important. Councils must explore new ways of delivering services and challenge procurement orthodoxy to ensure their choices represent maximum value for money. The Principles in Practicedeals with issues in great depth.
Keep it Local researchers argue “big outsourcing contracts” that are justified through appeals to economies of scale “lead to tick box, one-size-fits-all services, that don’t deal with people’s problems at source.” On the contrary, they often artificially inflate service demand by creating failure demand – “demand caused by a failure to do something or do something right for the customer.” (Locality)
In other words, large-scale, outsourced services cannot resolve issues because they cannot provide relevant and targeted solutions that meet the complex needs of local people. Instead, they refer the individual to another service. This leads to people bouncing around the system until they fall between the cracks.
The NEF report goes on to argue that “residents don’t all think alike, and no two communities have the same views on an issue… local people can, and need to, find strategies that are appropriate to their area.” This encourages a local by default approach that recognises every locality is different and needs to be treated as such.
Local businesses provide better services and stimulate the economy
At the heart of the local by default argument is the idea that local businesses and community organisations are more equipped to harness local relationships to offer tailored support to residents. They understand the nuances and complexity of local problems and are better able to prevent them. Local businesses can provide services that resolve, rather than refer, and they minimise failure demand. Essentially, choosing to work with local SMEs improves public service provision.
But there are economic benefits, too.
When councils partner with local businesses, public money is injected back into the local economy. Studies show that every pound a council spends on a community organisation (a local business, community group, or charity) creates £2.50 for the local economy (Locality). By employing local people and utilising local supply chains, council spending on local suppliers stimulates and grows the local economy.
At a time when many SMEs are struggling, councils have the opportunity to step up and provide support by investing in their products and services. However, this is not a handout. It is beneficial for all involved. Councils deliver more effective and targeted services, while local suppliers benefit from additional business and investment.
Early payment means additional help for local businesses
However, councils can go further than using local businesses to provide services. They can also empower and benefit them by guaranteeing their cash flow via early payment offers.
One of the biggest problems SMEs face is late payments. Currently, UK SMEs spend around 900,000 hours every day chasing payments (Tide) and approximately £200 billion is locked up in unpaid invoices. Late payments affect three in five SME owners (Barclays) and one in three UK businesses report that late payments threaten their survival (Time Finance). A recent Xero and PayPal study shows that British businesses are owed an average of £23,360 in overdue invoices.
Councils can play a role in alleviating this problem by ensuring payment is, at the very least, made within the agreed terms. They can also utilise payment tools, like Early Pay, to provide small and medium sized businesses with more certainty and protect their cash flow. By ensuring SME business owners know when they will receive payment, councils give businesses the security they need to invest in their organisation, guaranteeing their future and facilitating growth.
The impact of early payment on individuals’ health
The impact of early payment and the ability to better manage cash flow does not stop at economic growth. Small business owners in the UK are facing a mental health crisis that we can largely attribute to the uncertainty surrounding late payments. 88% of people who run micro-businesses (less than ten employees) worry about late payments (Brodmin). 17% of all business owners say late payments undermine their confidence in their professional abilities (Pay UK).
Late payments cause SME owners sleepless nights and result in stress, anxiety, depression and extreme anger. One in nine business owners has considered accessing professional support to help cope with their anxiety over late payments (Pay UK). Combine this with the emotional toll of the current cost-of-living and energy crises, and you have a commercial environment that is not conducive to small business success or happy and healthy lives.
Mental health issues also directly affect physical health. High stress levels can result in severe health problems like heart disease, while exacerbating conditions like asthma and gastrointestinal disease (Mental Health). In turn, this places an even greater strain on public health services.
By using payment processing tools like Early Pay, councils can play a part in tackling the root cause of these health issues. Small business owners do not necessarily want reduced payment terms. They want certainty. They want to know when they will receive their payment so they can plan accordingly.
With Early Pay, once the council approves a supplier’s invoice, it can also offer to pay early and receive a small discount for doing so. There is no obligation to request or accept the discount offer. Either way, the supplier knows exactly when they will receive payment.
Using Early Pay to prioritise local businesses
Local authorities can chose to use the Early Pay discount feature to prioritise local businesses and generate additional savings that it can reinvest in local services. It does so by enabling councils to segment their suppliers and distinguish between local companies and other businesses.
With local suppliers, councils can choose to provide early payment and request no discount. This provides local businesses with the highest level of support and helps build strong relationships between councils and local SMEs. For companies outside the local area, councils can choose to offer early payment in return for a small discount on the invoice. They can then use this discount to reinvest in local services, such as Social Care and Adult and Children Services.
Early Pay helps councils cement their relationships with suppliers by providing certainty and treating them with respect. Local businesses benefit and councils generate significant social value by strengthening communities and helping local people prosper.
Conclusion
We believe strategic partnerships between local government and SMEs are key to economic growth and improved service provision.
By using Early Pay to facilitate payments to local suppliers, councils achieve three things. They:
Stimulate the local economy and support levelling-up through investment in community businesses.
Encourage a local by default approach that results in improved service provision and delivering social value for the community.
Financial benefits achieved through potential early payment discounts. Plus operational efficiencies as a result of reduced inbound invoice queries
But these are only the headline benefits.
Working with local service providers strengthens communities and engages the local workforce. Adopting early payment processes tackles the root cause of many business owners’ mental health concerns. And opting for local suppliers and implementing early payment practices secures local authorities’ supply chains.
For councils, early payment processes and tools are just one part of the solution. But they are a positive and powerful step toward more rewarding public-private relationships and a system that recognises small and medium sized local businesses can, should and must play a part in delivering essential services in the future.
If you want to learn more about how Early Pay can benefit your council and local small businesses, please do not hesitate to get in touch and speak to our experienced and knowledgeable team. We look forward to hearing from you.
Today, late payments are one of the defining features of the UK SME landscape. It is a wide-reaching problem that directly affects three in five SME owners and indirectly impacts a significant portion of the UK workforce (Barclays). While the financial repercussions of late payments are considerable, the impact on small business owners’ mental health is just as troublesome. In this article, we examine the effect late payments have on mental health and what steps can be taken to resolve the issue.
An established late payment culture
In 2021, the UK boasted 5.548 million small businesses (defined as having 0-49 employees), constituting 99.2% of all UK businesses (GOV UK). 62% of those businesses have experienced an increase in late payments and/or had payments completely frozen since COVID (FSB).
One in three UK businesses reports that late payments threaten their survival.
That is the highest figure in Europe. Late payments aren’t confined to a few isolated cases, nor is it a minor concern. Worryingly, late payments have become a part of the UK business culture. And it has a real and measurable impact on the lives of hardworking business owners.
For some small businesses, late payment means they cannot invest in growing the business. For many, it means they struggle to sustain their business. For others, it means the journey is over.
The cost of late payments to small businesses
The financial cost of late payments for micro, small and medium-sized businesses is clear. Smes are the engine room of the UK economy and the heart of communities up and down the country. The repercussions are felt at every level if they cannot be sure of their cash flow.
A lack of cash flow clarity means investing in your own business feels far riskier. This limits innovation and hampers growth, resulting in a sluggish commercial environment and stagnating businesses. This is only exacerbated by the current energy price crisis, the fallout from Brexit and the slow post-pandemic recovery. Right now, small businesses need certainty more than ever.
The average small business is owed £23,360 in overdue invoices (The Accountant). That is a significant hole in any company’s finances. With this in mind, it comes as little surprise that a remarkable 37% of UK small business owners have considered closing their company because of cash flow issues caused by late payments. (The Accountant).
While this causes considerable problems for the small businesses owed this money, it also causes disruptions in larger organisations’ supply chains.
A devastating mental health impact
Though the financial cost of late payments is widely recognised, we often overlook the impact on individuals. For many workers, separating their professional and personal lives and ensuring they do not take work home with them is a challenge. For small business owners, it is almost impossible.
This has a terrible and terrifying effect on those individuals’ mental health. 88% of people who run micro-businesses (less than ten employees) worry about late payments (Brodmin). A quarter of SME business owners say that late payments harm their life outside the workplace. 17% of all business owners say late payments undermine their confidence in their professional abilities (Pay UK).
PPD research shows that the four leading mental health issues resulting from late payments are stress, insomnia, depression and extreme anger. One in nine business owners has considered accessing professional support to help cope with their anxiety over late payments (Pay UK). Business owners are suffering personally due to their customers’ inability or unwillingness to pay invoices within terms.
There is also a clear link between physical and mental health. High stress levels can lead to severe health problems like heart disease (Mental Health). It also exacerbates existing conditions like asthma and gastrointestinal disease. Poor mental health results in poor physical health and significantly strains the NHS.
Powerless and lacking recourse
Many small business owners feel powerless when faced with late payments. They have few recourses, and chasing payment is usually time-consuming, expensive and ineffective. This only adds to the problem. The feeling that nothing can be done compounds the stress and anxiety business owners already feel.
In a sense, this is what we mean by the UK building a culture of late payments. The practice is accepted, generally goes unpunished, and those on the receiving end can do nothing about it. Though the practice is pervasive, larger businesses (the organisations responsible for late payment) are typically unaware of its effect on small business owners’ day-to-day lives.
Part of the process of changing this culture of late payments involves raising awareness. The better big businesses understand their role in the problem and the repercussions (both financially and on mental health), the more likely they are to make changes. However, awareness alone is not enough.
We believe improving the situation requires a three-pronged approach.
1 Making larger businesses aware of the effects of late payments and their responsibilities to smaller companies.
2 Developing tools that make payment within agreed terms easier.
3 Introducing new legislation to tackle and eradicate this culture of late payments.
Raising awareness and encouraging ethical buying
Let’s start by looking at the first of these points – making larger organisations aware of the problem and their responsibilities. ESG regulations are one of the key ways we can achieve this.
ESG stands for Environmental, Social and Governance. The UK government introduced the ESG regulations as a response to the COVID pandemic and as part of its programme for a “Green Industrial Revolution.” They emphasise a new way of doing business – one that recognises the environmental, social and governance challenges we face and the role commerce has to play in creating a brighter future.
In the context of late payments, the Social element of ESG is most important. ESG aims to encourage companies to become “ethical buyers.” Being an ethical buyer should mean you pay your suppliers on time. Liz Barclay, the Small Business Commissioner, made this clear in a recent conversation with Saltare. “We need to get payment performance as an ESG standard,” she noted. “It is about looking at your payment practices and thinking about how well you treat everybody in your supply chain.”
If payment performance were to become a recognised part of the ESG regulations, it would be a significant step forwards for small business owners. Though ESG reporting is not currently mandatory, experts suspect that the regulations will become more rigorous and comprehensive over the coming years. The government hopes that businesses will adopt ESG reporting without the need for legislative coercion and that it will become a widely accepted framework for commercial operations.
Introducing tools that facilitate payment to terms
Many larger organisations do not maliciously or intentionally withhold payment. In the vast majority of instances, a lack of awareness or complex bureaucracy causes delays. Between large organisations and micro and small businesses, there is a disconnect.
By their very nature, large companies are impersonal. They are an amalgamation of finely tuned systems and processes that enable the business to operate on a large scale. On the other hand, micro and small businesses are very personal. Micro businesses are often indistinguishable from the individual running them. Regularly, they are one-person operations. This disconnect means big companies find it incredibly difficult to understand the impact of their actions on small business owners.
Digital tools can bridge this gap by ensuring companies make payments within the agreed terms. Early Pay is an excellent example. An innovative payment solution, Early Pay is a quick, and easy way to offer and facilitate early payments. Once an invoice is approved, Early Pay will notify the supplier. You can offer to pay early (and choose whether to apply a discount or not). Your supplier can chose to accept the offer if they wish to.
Buyers benefit from a more efficient payment process, and a more secure and sustainable supply chain. Suppliers benefit from the peace of mind of knowing exactly when they will receive their money. There is no need to chase invoices, and the suppliers’ cash flow is guaranteed. Of course, there are a whole host of other benefits, too. Early Pay also reduces inbound invoice enquiries and operational costs, generates valuable supply chain data, and enriches the wider commercial environment.
Legislation and a government leading by example
Currently, the strongest piece of legislation a small business can rely on is the Late Payment of Commercial Debts Act. It empowers small businesses to claim a fixed sum, as well as interest, on outstanding payments. However, pursuing a large company through these means is time-consuming, expensive and stressful. It can have a significant impact on mental health. For many small business owners, it is a risk they are unwilling to take.
Though we are unaware of any current legislative response to the problem, the issue is at the forefront of the Small Business Commissioners mind. When speaking to Saltare, Liz Barclay explained that late payments are a significant issue. “Small businesses are the lifeblood of their local communities. They put so much back into the social fabric and communities they are in. But small businesses go to the wall if they cannot manage their cash flow. They need to know when the money will hit the bank account.”
However, for Liz Barclay, the problem is not confined to small businesses. Big companies also rely on a healthy small business sector to maintain their supply chains. “Until we start getting that message through to bigger businesses, they won’t see that they are shooting themselves in the foot. The next time they need that talent that contributes so much to their business’s success, it will not be there. And it will cost them a lot more to go out and look for new suppliers who can do that job.”
What next?
At Saltare, we believe micro, small and medium-sized business owners deserve to live happy and fulfilled lives. Resolving the issue of late payments will go a long way to improving their situation. To do so, three things need to occur. Buyers need to understand the effect of late payments on small business owners, the government needs to encourage settlement within terms, and companies must implement digital tools to facilitate those payments.
We believe Early Pay is an essential step towards a healthier UK business environment. It is a digital solution that benefits both buyers and suppliers and works towards a stronger, fairer and more robust supply chain. At the same time, it tackles the root cause of small business owners’ biggest challenge – late payments. If we can tackle the late payments problem, we will positively and significantly impact this developing mental health issue.
If you want to learn more about how Early Pay can help your business become an ethical buyer while also bolstering your supply chain, contributing to the wider business environment, and providing small business owners with peace of mind, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.
Finding the support you need
If you are a small business owner struggling with late payments and require mental health support, there are several places you can seek it.
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