3. How can I get paid faster by my customers?

Invoice more quickly by automating the invoicing process on site

When invoicing by time spent, the customer expects to receive an invoice at a certain frequency. On a time-and-materials project, invoicing is often done on a monthly basis.

To ensure that invoicing can be carried out as early as possible in the month, a few processes need to be put in place to speed things up:

• Validation of times performed by the customer or manager, with an online approval workflow. This facilitates exchanges and ensures reliable invoicing.
• Automatic retrieval of Activity Reports for invoice preparation. The data submitted must enable invoices to be prepared automatically.
• Mass dispatch of invoices from the invoicing platform. Here again, a suitable tool can save many hours of invoicing work.

Automate communication to bill deadlines earlier

In the case of flat-rate billing, it's usually a communication problem that leads to a payment cycle that's too long.

Field teams and project managers are not always aware of the importance of confirming to billing teams that a milestone has been reached, so that a due date can be invoiced.

These project teams need to be able to easily indicate when a deadline is billable. Ideally, from their project management tool, they should be able to confirm that the due date has been reached, thus notifying the billing teams. Thanks to this example of automated communication, invoicing can be carried out immediately, and payment received more quickly than if the invoice had been issued late.

Better control regarding overdue payments

To improve cash flow, you need to be able to monitor unpaid invoices. It's important to be able to consult a report on unpaid invoices: the aged trial balance is a report that enables you to analyze unpaid invoices and classify them according to the number of days that have elapsed since they became unpaid. The aim is to prioritize reminders. Indeed, the more time passes, the less easy it is to recover a debt.

This reporting must be easily readable by the invoicing teams, and must enable them to prioritize reminder actions.

Manage customer reminders effectively

While customer reminders can't always be automated, it is possible to considerably simplify the process. Here are the steps you can take to improve your reminders:

• Set up an automatic notification system when an invoice goes unpaid. This information needs to be automatically transmitted to those responsible for collection, as well as to the project managers, who may find it easier to win the customer's case. Invoicing software can generally be used to create this notification system.
• Automate reminders to suit customers and projects. Automatic reminders are not always the best option. Relationships and knowledge of the context are essential for effective collection. However, for a large number of projects, an automatic reminder with timed e-mails can reinforce the efficiency of the system.

The 9 problems of project invoicing and how Stafiz can help you solve them?

1. How do you estimate costs, prices and billing type for a billable project?

2. How to manage the risk of project overruns?

3. How can I get paid faster by my customers?

4. How to manage complex billing arrangements

5. How do you handle tax billing and multi-currency billing?

6. How to manage invoicing between different entities within the same company (inter-company flows)

7. How can we simplify communication with our customers?

8. How can I change certain parameters during the course of a project that will have an impact on invoicing?

9. How do I set up a project quotation and invoicing tool?

The 9 problems of project billing