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Do you charge late fee for delayed payments? If yes, how much. and how to mention it in invoice?
Thread poster: Supriya Dixit
Supriya Dixit
Supriya Dixit
India
Local time: 07:02
English to Hindi
+ ...
Oct 9, 2022

Hi All,
I am a freelancer working with English-Hindi and I have experienced some professional ghosting in the past. I researched on ways to avoid it, and one of them was to charge a late fee. So I just want to know, do you charge a late fee for delayed payments to avoid ghosting? If yes, how much? Is it to be mentioned in terms of percentage or some other way? And what is the best phrase to mention it in your invoice?
 
Maria Teresa Borges de Almeida
Maria Teresa Borges de Almeida  Identity Verified
Portugal
Local time: 02:32
Member (2007)
English to Portuguese
+ ...
. Oct 10, 2022

I haven’t had a single delayed payment for a long time. Most of my customers are repeat clients and pay like clockwork. There’s just a very sporadic client who is less punctual but pays the moment I send a reminder. With a new client we have to be explicit from the start: I always say that my payment terms are 30 days after invoice date by bank transfer or through Wise or TransferMate. I’d say that late fees in general are a waste of time, they are low, hard to enforce, can become an accou... See more
I haven’t had a single delayed payment for a long time. Most of my customers are repeat clients and pay like clockwork. There’s just a very sporadic client who is less punctual but pays the moment I send a reminder. With a new client we have to be explicit from the start: I always say that my payment terms are 30 days after invoice date by bank transfer or through Wise or TransferMate. I’d say that late fees in general are a waste of time, they are low, hard to enforce, can become an accounting nightmare and to top it up clients who don’t pay don’t care a dime about them… ▲ Collapse


Supriya Dixit
Christel Zipfel
 
jyuan_us
jyuan_us  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 21:32
Member (2005)
English to Chinese
+ ...
Mind you Oct 10, 2022

Mentioning that you will charge a late fee for delayed payments could be felt as annoying, and it could scare away potentially good clients. Remember there are much more honest clients than bad players.
 
Christopher Schröder
Christopher Schröder
United Kingdom
Member (2011)
Swedish to English
+ ...
Yes and no Oct 10, 2022

jyuan_us wrote:

Mentioning that you will charge a late fee for delayed payments could be felt as annoying, and it could scare away potentially good clients. Remember there are much more honest clients than bad players.


Absolutely not. It’s standard business practice.

I mention one but have never applied it.

Christel Zipfel
 
Evgeny Sidorenko
Evgeny Sidorenko
Russian Federation
Local time: 04:32
English to Russian
+ ...
I have a different way of handling this Oct 10, 2022

An existing client delaying the payment a little with reasonable excuses (they are rare but exist) and/or with prior notice is ok. Anyone with a 1-2 days' delay for unacceptable reasons is put on the 'yellow list' (work with caution and/or avoid when 'safer' jobs are available). Anyone with longer/unannounced/unjustified delays are included into the 'red list' (never work again).
 


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Do you charge late fee for delayed payments? If yes, how much. and how to mention it in invoice?







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