--- title: "Credit Control Statistics: Paidnice Invoice Payment Data" description: "Credit control statistics from Paidnice invoice data: 46% of credit invoices are paid on time, and overdue ones are paid 3 times as often on reminder day." url: https://www.paidnice.com/blog/credit-control-statistics --- # Credit control statistics: what our payment data shows Written by Denym Bird Denym BirdCo-founder & CEO of Paidnice Denym started Paidnice in 2022 after customers paying late left his own business short on payroll. He has led it to $1 billion collected on time across more than 1 million invoices, and writes about credit control, late fees and getting paid on Xero and QuickBooks. Original data Co-founder & CEO of Paidnice Denym analyzed invoice and reminder records from over 1,000 Paidnice customers, then traced on-time rates, reminder response, send days and late payer patterns. Reviewed by Ashley Schroder Ashley SchroderCo-founder of Paidnice Ashley is a co-founder and lead developer of Paidnice, and builds the Xero and QuickBooks connections that put reminders, late fees and payments on the ledger. Before Paidnice he co-founded A2X, ecommerce accounting software for Xero and QuickBooks. Co-founder of Paidnice Data verified Published Oct 26, 2026 · 15 min Listen to this article, read by Denym Read by Denym Bird8 min 0:007:51 ## Summary The typical business gets 46% of credit invoices paid on time, in Paidnice's analysis of invoice data from over 1,000 customers. Overdue invoices are paid about 3 times as often on the day a reminder is sent, and 3 in 10 repeat payers cause more than half of all late invoices. - **Paid on time:** 55% of credit invoices are paid on time in Australia and New Zealand, 49% in the UK, 47% in the US and 43% in Canada. - **Reminders:** Once an overdue invoice is being chased, it takes 2 to 3 follow-ups on average to get paid, and 4 in 10 are paid after the first. - **Send day:** Send overdue reminders on Monday or Tuesday: about 6 more in every 100 are paid within 3 days than reminders sent Wednesday to Friday. - **Late payers:** Among payers with 5 or more invoices, 3 in 10 are late on 80% or more of them and cause 71% of invoices still unpaid at 75 days. - **Late fees:** Starting late fees is associated with about 3 more invoices in every 100 paid on time, compared with similar businesses that do not. Contents▾ You run the aged receivables report on a Monday morning and the overdue column is longer than it was last month. You want to know whether that is normal, whether your customers are worse than most, and which of the things you could do next would move the number. The figures on this page come from the invoice and reminder records of over 1,000 Paidnice customers, with the base and the caveat for every figure. Credit invoices are invoices with payment terms of 1 day or more that were not paid on or before the issue date. Paidnice customers are the businesses that use Paidnice. Their own customers, the people who owe the invoices, are called payers on this page. Original data ### Credit control statistics at a glance - **46%**The typical business gets 46% of credit invoices paid on time.[Paid on time](#on-time) - **3 in 4**3 in 4 invoices that reach 90 days overdue are still unpaid at 180 days.[Days late](#days-late) - **3x**Overdue invoices are paid 3 times as often on the day a reminder is sent (a pattern, not a controlled test).[Reminders](#reminders) - **2 to 3**A chased overdue invoice takes 2 to 3 follow-ups on average to get paid.[Reminders](#reminders) - **+6 in 100**Send overdue reminders on Monday or Tuesday and about 6 more in every 100 are paid within 3 days.[Send day](#send-day) - **3 in 10**3 in 10 repeat payers cause 55% of late invoices.[Late payers](#late-payers) - **+3 in 100**Starting late fees is associated with about 3 more invoices in every 100 paid on time than similar businesses.[Late fees](#fees-terms) - **9 days**The same payer pays a 14-day invoice 9 days sooner than a 30-day invoice.[Payment terms](#fees-terms) Source: our analysis of invoice data from over 1,000 Paidnice customers. Free: Payment reminder email templatesCopy the reminder emails for before, on and after the due date. ## How many invoices are paid on time? The typical business gets 46% of credit invoices paid on time, in Paidnice’s analysis of invoice data from over 1,000 customers. By country, 55% are paid on time in Australia and New Zealand, 49% in the UK, 47% in the US and 43% in Canada. Credit invoices are invoices with payment terms of 1 day or more that were not paid on or before the issue date. The [country comparison](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/payment-times-by-country) adds days to pay. Only 1 credit invoice in 8 is paid on the exact due date (1 in 5 in New Zealand). More are paid in the week after the due date (19%) than on it (13%), and 41% are paid early. The gap between businesses is far larger than the gap between countries. The typical business gets 46% of credit invoices paid on time. The top 10% of businesses get 68%. The bottom 10% get 21% and leave 28% of invoices unpaid at 75 days. For what changed at single businesses after they started with Paidnice, see our [customer results](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/paidnice-customer-results#customer-results). The spread between businesses (21% to 68%) is wider than the spread between countries (43% to 55%). ## How long do payers take to pay after the due date? An invoice 7 days overdue has a 1 in 5 chance of still being unpaid 180 days later. At 30 days overdue the chance is 2 in 5, and at 90 days it is 3 in 4. More on [when an overdue invoice becomes bad debt](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/when-overdue-invoice-becomes-bad-debt). The UK, Australia and the US are within about 2 invoices in every 100 of each other. Past 90 days the odds fall further. An invoice still unpaid 90 days after its due date has a 4 in 10 chance of being paid within a year. About 6 in 10 are not paid within a year. New Zealand is the exception, where more than half are paid. The share still unpaid 75 days after the due date also differs by market. On the credit-invoice base, 75 days after the due date, 5.6% of invoices are unpaid in New Zealand, 7.3% in Australia, 9.4% in the UK, 13.3% in the US and 13.9% in Canada. The UK government’s late payment research puts a cost on that tail: UK businesses are owed [an estimated £26 billion in late payments at any time](https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/688a089a6478525675738ff9/late_payments_research_impact_on_uk_economy.pdf). Figures from other published surveys, by country and industry, are in our [accounts receivable statistics](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/accounts-receivable-statistics) roundup. ## Do payment reminders work? Overdue invoices are paid about 3 times as often on the day a reminder is sent as comparable overdue invoices with no reminder (about 12 in 100 against about 4 in 100). Within a week, 38% are paid against 22%. Businesses chose which invoices to remind, and the comparison invoices may have been held back on purpose, so this is a strong short-term pattern, not a controlled test. This is why [credit control software](https://www.paidnice.com/credit-control-software) that sends every reminder on schedule matters. The day-by-day response curve, from the send day to a week later, is in [how fast customers pay after a reminder](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/how-many-payment-reminders#reminder-day). Each reminder is followed by more payments than no reminder. Against no reminder, the first overdue reminder gets about 19 more invoices in every 100 paid within 7 days, the second about 12 more, the third to eighth 5 to 7 more and later ones about 3 more. Later reminders go to harder cases, which explains part of the fall. Once an overdue invoice is being chased, it takes 2 to 3 follow-ups after the due date on average to get paid (median 2). 4 in 10 are paid after the first, 6 in 10 by the second and 8 in 10 by the fourth, and 1 in 10 is not paid within 180 days. Most reminder sequences stop at the due date: 85% of invoices that go overdue get no reminder after it. The full curve, reminder by reminder, is in [how many payment reminders it takes to get paid](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/how-many-payment-reminders). ## When do customers pay, and which day should you send a reminder? Inside the same business, about 6 more overdue reminders in every 100 are paid within 3 days when they are sent on Monday or Tuesday rather than Wednesday to Friday. The Monday and Tuesday gain holds in 4 in 5 businesses. A three-day window from a Thursday send crosses the weekend, which explains part of the gap. In the UK the contrast is sharp: Monday sends are paid within 3 days 44% of the time, against 22% for Thursday sends. Weekly payment runs are the likely reason. In the UK, 1 payment in 4 lands on a Friday. In New Zealand, 15% of payments land on the 20th of the month. The Friday and 20th-of-the-month figures show when payments land. The due date’s weekday matters too. When the due date falls on a weekend, about 3 fewer invoices in every 100 are paid on time, inside the same business, in 2 in 3 businesses. In New Zealand it is about 8 fewer in every 100, in 4 in 5 businesses. The weekday-by-weekday results and the UK and NZ patterns are in [the best day to send a payment reminder](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/best-day-to-send-payment-reminder). ## Which customers pay late? Among payers with 5 or more invoices, 3 in 10 are late on 80% or more of them. Those payers cause 55% of late invoices and 71% of invoices still unpaid at 75 days. In a typical business, 2 customers in 3 never go seriously overdue. The [worst 1 in 20 customers](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/late-paying-customers-warning-signs#worst-customers) bill 24% of revenue and cause 70% of the seriously overdue money. Seriously overdue means still unpaid 75 days after the due date, or paid 30 or more days late. The [six warning signs of a late payer](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/late-paying-customers-warning-signs) are set out with what followed each. The first invoice is a strong early signal. Payers who pay their first invoice on time pay 73% of later invoices on time. If the first invoice is 1 to 14 days late, they pay 39% on time. A payer’s history predicts the next invoice and does not show cause. The payer signals above, as a table. Each figure is for the payer’s next invoice; where there are two, the second is the rate without that signal. Original data | Payer signal | What follows | | --- | --- | | Last invoice on time | Next on time: 82% | | Last one 1 to 7 days late | Next on time: 28% | | 1 overdue invoice open | Unpaid at 75 days: 14% vs 5% | | 4 or more overdue open | Unpaid at 75 days: 26% vs 5% | | First 3 invoices late | 1 in 7 turn on-time payers | | Relationship ends | Unpaid at 75 days: 29% vs 13% | Source: our analysis of invoice data from over 1,000 Paidnice customers. When a payer relationship ends, the final invoice is twice as likely to be unpaid at 75 days (3 times in Australia). Chase it first. ## Do late fees and payment terms change payment? Starting late fees is associated with about 3 more invoices in every 100 paid on time, compared with similar businesses that do not. See [whether late fees work](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/do-late-fees-work) and [net 14 against net 30](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/payment-terms-statistics). Businesses chose to start fees, so this shows an association, not a controlled test. 68% of them improve, against 52% of the comparison group. The gap is the same for small, mid-size and large businesses. The gain is strongest in Australia (about 6 more invoices in every 100 paid on time) and smallest in the UK (about 2 more). A late fee gives the payer a reason to pay your invoice before the others, and you can waive it for a good payer who slips once. 92% of paid late fees are paid on the same day as another invoice from the same payer. Fixed fees are paid more often than percentage fees: 81% against 57% (businesses choose their own fee type). In the UK, the statutory fallback is [interest at 8% plus the Bank of England base rate](https://www.gov.uk/late-commercial-payments-interest-debt-recovery/charging-interest-commercial-debt) with a [fixed sum of £40, £70 or £100](https://www.gov.uk/late-commercial-payments-interest-debt-recovery/claim-debt-recovery-costs) per late payment. Payment terms are the other lever. The same payer pays a 14-day invoice 9 days sooner than a 30-day invoice, with no rise in unpaid invoices. About 2 to 5 fewer invoices in every 100 are paid on time because the deadline is tighter, but the money arrives 9 days earlier. Reminders on their own move payment too. After a business turns on reminders, 71% collect more invoices within 30 days, and on-time payment rises from 53.4% to 58.5%. A matched test against similar businesses gives a smaller gain, about 2 more invoices in every 100 paid on time. The DSO results for each setup, from reminders only to reminders with a late fee, are in [how to reduce DSO](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/how-to-reduce-dso), with [payment terms wording you can copy](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/examples-of-payment-terms-on-invoices). ## Which credit control myths does the data bust? Two credit control myths fail the same-business test: invoices due in December are paid on time as often as invoices due in other months, and payers on free email addresses pay on time as often as payers on company addresses. Our post on [credit control myths tested against invoice data](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/credit-control-myths) covers the rest. Inside the same business, on-time rates do not change over the holidays. Across businesses, median days late rises over the shutdown from 8 to 11 days, so late invoices take longer to clear even though no more of them go late. Payers on Gmail, Outlook and similar addresses pay on time as often as company-domain payers inside the same business. The raw rates look higher for free addresses because of business mix, so the within-business result is the one to use. Invoice size has a small effect. Among the biggest fifth of a business’s invoices, about 3 fewer in every 100 are paid on time, with no rise in unpaid invoices. When an invoice is more than twice a payer’s usual amount, about 2 fewer in every 100 are paid on time, inside the same business. ## What is the difference between late payment rate, DSO and days late? Late payment rate, DSO and days late are 3 different measures: the share of invoices paid after the due date, the average days to collect a credit sale, and how far past the due date a paid invoice landed. | Measure | What it counts | Typical figure | Best use | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Late payment rate | Late ÷ invoices due | About half (our data) | Monthly payer tracking | | DSO | AR ÷ credit sales × days | Varies; see [reduce DSO](https://www.paidnice.com/blog/how-to-reduce-dso) | Cash flow planning | | Days late (past terms) | Due date to payment date | 4.7 (NZ) to 8.5 (US) days | Comparing across terms | | Unpaid at 75 days | Open 75 days past due | 5.6% NZ to 13.9% Canada | Spotting bad debt early | Source: late payment rate and unpaid at 75 days are our analysis of credit invoice data from over 1,000 Paidnice customers; days late is [Xero Small Business Insights](https://www.xero.com/us/resources/small-business-insights/latest-united-states), June 2026 quarter. DSO rises with longer terms. To work out your own late payment rate for a month: Late payment rate = invoices paid after the due date ÷ invoices that fell due in the month × 100 Count only invoices with credit terms of 1 day or more, so point-of-sale receipts do not inflate the result. Paidnice shows on-time payment, DSO and days to pay on its dashboard; the [AR metrics help article](https://support.paidnice.com/en/articles/10146200) lists each one, and [accounts receivable reporting](https://www.paidnice.com/accounts-receivable-reporting) covers the reports behind them. ## How Paidnice measured these credit control statistics Every figure on this page comes from our analysis of invoice data from over 1,000 Paidnice customers on Xero and QuickBooks Online, covering more than 1 million invoices. - **Base:** credit invoices, meaning invoices with terms of 1 day or more that were not paid on or before the issue date. Counting due-on-receipt invoices lifts every market's on-time rate (New Zealand to 64%, Australia to 62%). - **Outcome:** an invoice counts as unpaid if it is still open 75 days after the due date, unless the stat says 180 days. Still unpaid includes invoices a business stopped chasing without voiding. Without its largest senders, the UK pays about 4 fewer invoices in every 100 on time. The spread between businesses covers businesses with 100 or more invoices and is not an industry benchmark. - **Before-and-after comparisons:** the late fee and reminder results compare businesses that started a lever with similar businesses, matched by region, that did not. Fee businesses paid slower beforehand, so some adopt fees after a bad patch. The matched reminder test gives a smaller gain (about 2 more invoices in every 100 paid on time) than the same-business figure. - **Same-business comparisons:** the send day, weekend due date, December, free email and invoice size results compare invoices inside each business, so business mix cannot explain them. - **The reminder event study:** invoices on the days after a reminder against invoices at the same days overdue with no reminder. Some invoices get no reminder on purpose, so the comparison invoices may be harder to collect. Later reminders go to harder cases. Follow-ups (reminders, escalations, SMS, late fee emails and statements) are counted on chased invoices followed for 180 days. The no-reminder-after-due-date share covers businesses that send 100 or more reminders. - **Payer patterns:** these results show habits and prediction, not proof that one late payment causes the next. Stacked payers differ in other ways, and some payers stop being invoiced because they did not pay. The serial late payer result covers payers with 5 or more invoices; the turnaround result covers 10 or more. - **Fees:** the fixed-versus-percentage result is a cross-section at one point in time, so businesses that pick fixed fees may differ from those that pick percentages. ## FAQ ### What percentage of invoices are paid late? About half of credit invoices are paid after the due date. In our analysis of invoice data from over 1,000 Paidnice customers, 55% are paid on time in Australia and New Zealand, 49% in the UK, 47% in the US and 43% in Canada. ### How many days late is a payment on average? [Xero’s Small Business Insights for the June 2026 quarter](https://www.xero.com/us/resources/small-business-insights/latest-united-states) put the average at 8.5 days late in the US, 8.3 in the UK, 6.0 in Australia and 4.7 in New Zealand. In our data, only 1 credit invoice in 8 is paid on the exact due date, and 19% are paid in the week after it. ### What are the consequences of late payments? The UK government’s late payment research estimates that late payments [cost the UK economy almost £11 billion a year](https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/688a089a6478525675738ff9/late_payments_research_impact_on_uk_economy.pdf). In our data, an invoice 90 days overdue has a 6 in 10 chance of never being paid. ### How do I calculate my late payment rate? Divide the invoices paid after the due date by the invoices that fell due in the period, then multiply by 100. Count only invoices with credit terms of 1 day or more, so point-of-sale receipts do not inflate the result. ### Do payment reminders reduce late payments? In Paidnice data, overdue invoices are paid about 3 times as often on the day a reminder is sent as comparable overdue invoices with no reminder. After a business turns on reminders, 71% collect more invoices within 30 days; a matched test against similar businesses gives a smaller gain. Share this post ## About the editorial team Written byDenym BirdCo-founder & CEO of Paidnice Denym started Paidnice in 2022 after customers paying late left his own business short on payroll. He has led it to $1 billion collected on time across more than 1 million invoices, and writes about credit control, late fees and getting paid on Xero and QuickBooks. Reviewed byAshley SchroderCo-founder of Paidnice Ashley is a co-founder and lead developer of Paidnice, and builds the Xero and QuickBooks connections that put reminders, late fees and payments on the ledger. Before Paidnice he co-founded A2X, ecommerce accounting software for Xero and QuickBooks. ## More from the blog ### Latechaser is now Paidnice 2 min read ### New: Adhoc Actions + More Control and Flexibility Over Policies and Contacts 2 min read ### Credit control software compared by turnover, seats and cost 20 min read ### Best credit control software for recruitment agencies 15 min read ### New: Use Custom Payment Links From Any Payment Provider 1 min read ### Credit control and collections software for Acumatica (2026) 7 min read ### Try Our Free Accounts Receivable Calculators Optimize your cash flow with our suite of financial tools designed for AR professionals. Calculate DSO, aging analysis, late fees, and more. Explore Calculators ## Start getting paid on time with Paidnice Connect Xero or QuickBooks and Paidnice prepares draft policies for you. Nothing runs until you approve them. 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