Get paid the day you send the bill

Most contractors we meet are not underpriced. They are underpaid, in the sense that money they have already earned is sitting in somebody else’s account for another three weeks.

The work is done. The customer is happy. The bill went out as a photo of a handwritten invoice, or a Word document attached to an email, or a text that said “let me know what works.” Then it waits. Then you chase it. Then you feel like a jerk for chasing it, so you wait longer.

Fixing that is not a software problem first. It is a sequence problem. The software just makes the sequence automatic.

Start the sequence at the estimate

Every job should begin as an estimate in the same system that will later send the invoice. Not a separate pad, not a text message, not a number said out loud in a driveway.

There are two reasons. The first is that a written estimate the customer accepts is the cleanest way to prevent an argument about scope later. The second is mechanical. When the estimate lives in the system, converting it to an invoice takes one click, and the line items, the price and the customer record all carry over without retyping.

Every tool that trades actually use does this. Whatever you already have probably does it and you may not have turned it on.

Take a deposit

If a job needs materials, or takes more than a day, or is with a customer you have not worked for before, take a deposit up front. A third is common. Half is normal on materials-heavy work.

A deposit does three things at once. It covers your cash outlay so you are not floating the customer’s materials. It filters out the people who were never going to pay. And it makes the final invoice smaller, which gets paid faster.

Ask for it as part of accepting the estimate, not as a separate conversation. A customer clicking accept on a document that already says a deposit is due is a much easier moment than a phone call about money after the fact.

Send the invoice from the truck

The single biggest change most trades can make is sending the invoice before leaving the job site.

An invoice sent from the driveway gets paid faster than one sent four days later, for a simple reason: the work is fresh, the customer is standing there happy about it, and nobody has to remember anything. Four days later the job is a memory and the bill is an interruption.

This means the invoice has to be sendable from a phone. If your process requires getting back to a desktop computer at the shop, the process is the problem.

Card and ACH, both

Give the customer a payment link in the invoice, and give them two ways to use it.

• Card. Fast, familiar, works for anyone, and costs you roughly three percent depending on the processor and the card. Best for smaller residential jobs where speed matters more than the fee.
• ACH, or bank transfer. The customer pays from a checking account. Costs a fraction of a percent, or a flat fee of a dollar or two, and takes a couple of business days to settle. Best for larger invoices where three percent is real money.

Put both on the invoice and let the customer choose. On a small job most people tap the card. On a large one, plenty of customers pick the bank transfer without being asked, because they are used to it.

Turn on reminders and stop chasing

Automatic reminders are the part owners resist and then never turn off once they have tried it.

Set a simple ladder. A polite note three days after the invoice goes out if it is unpaid. Another at seven days. Another at fourteen with a mention of the terms. The messages go out on their own, in a neutral tone, from the system rather than from you.

The reason this works is not that the messages are clever. It is that they are consistent and unemotional. You are no longer the person who has to decide whether today is the day to call about the money, and the customer is not being confronted, just reminded.

If you charge a late fee, put it in the estimate the customer accepted, state it on the invoice, and let the ladder mention it. A late fee that appears for the first time on a past-due notice is an argument.

What the fees actually buy you

Card processing costs about three percent. Owners hate that number, and it is worth being clear about what you get for it.

• Money in the account in one to two business days instead of an unknown number of weeks.
• No trip to the bank, and no check that sits in the truck console for nine days.
• No bounced check and no collection call.
• A record of every payment matched to an invoice, which makes the year-end books a much shorter conversation.

On a thousand dollar invoice, three percent is thirty dollars. If it moves payment from four weeks to two days and removes two phone calls, most owners decide it is worth it. On a twenty thousand dollar invoice the math changes, which is exactly why ACH belongs on the same invoice.

You can also decide to build the card cost into your pricing. That is a pricing conversation, not a payments conversation, and it is a legitimate answer.

When to keep taking checks

Keep taking checks. Some customers will only pay that way, some commercial accounts run on a check-cutting cycle you are not going to change, and on a large invoice a check costs you nothing.

The rule we use is simple. Offer every method, do not make anyone feel awkward about the one they choose, and make sure a check still gets recorded against the invoice in the system so your reminder ladder stops. The worst outcome is a customer who paid by check and then gets three automated notices because nobody marked it.

What a working setup looks like

Put together, the whole thing is about six steps.

1. Estimate written in the system, sent for acceptance.
2. Deposit requested at acceptance where it applies.
3. Work done.
4. Invoice sent from the phone before leaving, converted from the estimate.
5. Card and bank transfer links on the invoice, checks still accepted.
6. Automatic reminders at three, seven and fourteen days, switched off the moment payment is recorded.

None of this is exotic and none of it requires new software if what you have already does it. Most of the work is deciding on the sequence and then actually turning the features on.

Money you have earned but not collected is the cheapest financing your customers will ever get, and you are the one paying for it.

If you want to know which parts of that sequence are missing in your business, that is what the free discovery meeting is for. 30 minutes, no obligation.