how to manage offline clients who don't pay?

If they don't pay we cancel their hosting. If you don't control their hosting then you should get full payment up front.

Once they have done this for a few months we will extend credit. Pretty basic Business 101.

Quentin

Being able to either bill their credit cards monthly or setting up Paypal auto payments is really the way to go if you can. It saves a lot of time. I've found that people ussally don't pay because they simply forget. Take payment upfront whenever you can ... it saves everyone a lot of trouble down the road.

Regularly contact people that are behind on payments, first by email and if that doesn't work, call them ... its harder to ignore phone calls. Of coarse, stop any services you are providing.

Hi,

With my clients, I setup direct debits and send out an invoice each month. I'm lucky enough that I haven't had any non-payers; YET.

I think what i'd do is call them up and let them know how far behind they are...give them the option to bring their account up to date if not tell them that all work is stopping until the account is brought back up to date.

Don't take this the wrong way, but most business owners don't understand SEO so tell them that any work you've done you will undo and their website will slip down the rankings meaning they've spent money for nothing.

Hope that helps,

~Russ

If there anyway you can take back your services ie. hosting, domain, etc?

The first question I would ask myself is are they getting results from your service? If they are not seeing the value, then they have probably decided to stop using your service. That happens quite often. If you have control over your services you could temporarily turn off their site or whatever you are using to generate business for them and once they see that you are making them money they will immediately send that check or at least try to come to an agreement.

Great responses here so far.

Next time don't do anything without a check.

Once they pay - they get scheduled for work on the calendar.

The longer they wait, the longer it is until they see results.

If they don't pay you stop working and take back all the current work you've done.

Now in your case call them and ask them what's up?

Maybe they forgot?
Maybe they don't have the cash?

Whatever the problem - find out about it and go from there.

Worst case - if you can - barter for some goods and consider it is lesson learned.

Tim

I have a couple of decades' experience of working off-line in consulting services.

If you are invoicing them on a monthly basis, then that's good but late payers should also get a Statement of the outstanding amount if their monthly payment is late (seven days from due date to statement date). The Statement should also remind them of your terms (I'll come to this in a moment).

If they ignore the statement, too, then follow up promptly with a call and make a polite enquiry. Ask if there's a problem for the delay in payment. As already mentioned in another post, above, the company may have cashflow problems and a little understanding on your part will be appreciated and may even get your account pushed up the list of creditors to be paid more promptly.

However, even before you get to this stage, your Terms of Service or Terms and Conditions of business should be as water-tight as possible and, what is more important, get them to sign the contract stating that they accept your terms and conditions of service or have something in writing that states that they accept your terms.

Your TOS should be crystal clear. For example: On acceptance of your services, 50% upfront payment on signing of the contract. 50% of the fees on the completion of the service and a monthly retainer payable on the xth day of each month commencing ...

You should have a heading in your terms like "Late or Non-payments"

If payment is received after more than seven days from the due date, we reserve the right to apply interest charges at x% per day/month above the bank's base rate on the sum outstanding.

If late payments persist, we reserve the right to suspend all work on the account and take such steps as may be necessary to recover monies owed to us. Or words to that effect.

If you want to know what other consultancies in your field do, just act as a prospective customer and ask a few of the more established ones to send you their terms and conditions of business (or TOS) if this info is not available on their site. Then adapt the terms to suit your particular style of conducting business. A reasonable but formal terms of service or agreement will impress your clients and get them sit up and take notice.

Whatever you do, though, don't feel intimidated about demanding your fee for work done. It's your right. You're running a business not a charity. Unless you show that you mean business, your clients will not take you seriously or respect you for that matter.

In nearly three decades of bricks and mortar consultancy business, I had need to issue only two winding up orders (very extreme but highly effective) on a couple of medium to large companies who dragged their feet and wanted to pay in 90 days (when I enquired about the delay) when my terms to which they had agreed clearly stated seven days from date of invoice. I got paid in full within 24 hours of them receiving my one para letter warning them of the proposed winding up order. What was more remarkable was that those same clients were eager to continue to do business with my company for many years thereafter. They were never late paying my invoices after that!

Good luck!

hi everyone

thank you for the depth of experience coming out in replies

for this particular client

they are hosting on their own server

as they had an already existing website

so shutting down site is not an option

i can stop their services and watch their rankings take a tumble

though it does not necessarily mean i get paid for work i have done

some of you have suggested payment upfront
but these guys like other clients i have are on multiyear contracts payable monthly

if i say pay the monthly fee upfront for several years
they will not agree to become clients

any further thoughts?

thanks again for your help so far

I collect money before the month's work is done. If they have been a client for a while and payment is late, I just call to see what's going on.

If they aren't paying you and expect to get work for nothing, that's a great way to run your business into the ground!

Clients not paying you is sending the message in business that they aren't respecting you. How would a restaurant owner react if you just ate a meal and didn't want to pay?

Don't let clients walk over you, if they stop paying, services need to stop. It's an uncomfortable thing to confront, but you've got to do it if you want to run a successful business.

Matt

You got tons of great advice here so far.

Have you called them yet? If not, call them and ask them how everything is going? Ask them if they have any questions. Tell them you are just giving them a quick heads up that you didnt receive the check due yet. Make it sound more like a question like did it get lost in the mail or did someone forget.

If they are local, tell them you want to stop by and get some additional info from them to help serve them, then ask them for a check while you are there. You might also want to just set them up on paypals recurring billing. That is the only way I take payments right now.