Archive - Originally posted on "The Horse's Mouth" - 2005-03-03 07:52:19 - Graham Ellis
I dislike chasing late payments. It's such a waste of time and effort that could be better used elsewhere.
There are still a number of companies out there who seem to feel that they don't need to pay us until they're reminded that their money is overdue (and we bend over backwards to accommodate your systems too). Or they feel they can say that "the cheque will be in the post today" then sit on it for a further 5 days (and need further chasing). But what are such companies really doing? They're saying that they don't really value their relationship with their suppliers - that as far as their concerned, it's quite OK for them to lie about payments and to make a nuisance of themselves by upsetting other companys' cashflows.
I'm often very tempted to ask people that I'm chasing for payment whether they have been paid their salary for the month of (names historic time when course was run), or if they would be happy if their money was due at a certain date but all they could get was a promise and not the actual payment.
I'm a geek - love doing my technical work and if people play fair with me I'll go 120% of the way to providing them with assistance above and beyond the call of duty, and do it with pleasure. But if your company "strings us on" on payments, I find it very hard to be motivated to provide this extra service - that's just human nature. Another sad thing about human nature - once a fence is broken like this, there's no instant repair.