Large UK financial and insurance companies take a median of 22 days to pay supplier invoices, 9 days faster than the UK median of 31 days. The sector ranks 18 of 18, where 1 is the slowest payer.
Figures cover large UK companies paying all their suppliers.
830 financial and insurance filings · United KingdomRank 18 of 18 by median days to pay, where 1 is the slowest. The dark bar is financial and insurance.
At the median company, 14% of invoices are paid late, 1 point below the UK figure of 15%.
The middle half of companies pay in 15 to 29 days. A quarter take longer than 29 days.
3% of invoices take more than 60 days at the median company, against 5% across the UK.
500 financial and insurance companies became insolvent in England and Wales over Oct 2025 to Sep 2026, rank 12 of 18 by number of cases. This is a count, not a rate.
Businesses that sell to financial and insurance companies can compare these figures with their own debtor days, or check how fast a single customer pays. Paidnice is UK credit control software that sends reminders and adds late fees on overdue invoices in Xero or QuickBooks. For the wider picture, read the accounts receivable statistics for the UK.
Activities of other holding companies n.e.c. is the slowest trade at 26.5 days. Banks is the fastest at 17 days.
| Trade (SIC) | Median days | Middle half | Paid late |
|---|---|---|---|
| Activities of other holding companies n.e.c. (64209)123 companies | 26.5 | 21 to 44.2 | 16.5% |
| Activities of insurance agents and brokers (66220)24 companies | 24 | 20 to 29.5 | 17% |
| Financial intermediation not elsewhere classified (64999)204 companies | 22 | 14.5 to 29.5 | 14% |
| Activities of financial services holding companies (64205)66 companies | 22 | 17.5 to 30.2 | 18.5% |
| Non-life insurance (65120)80 companies | 21.5 | 18 to 29 | 14% |
| Other activities auxiliary to insurance and pension funding (66290)21 companies | 20.5 | 15 to 25.5 | 11% |
| Fund management activities (66300)51 companies | 19.5 | 15 to 25 | 16% |
| Credit granting by non-deposit taking finance houses and other specialist consumer credit grantors (64921)20 companies | 19.5 | 14.2 to 23.8 | 14.5% |
| Security and commodity contracts dealing activities (66120)37 companies | 19 | 14 to 24 | 13.5% |
| Financial leasing (64910)21 companies | 19 | 8.8 to 27.5 | 14% |
| Life insurance (65110)23 companies | 19 | 11.8 to 23.5 | 8.5% |
| Banks (64191)78 companies | 17 | 12.5 to 22 | 8% |
Cite: Paidnice (2026). UK financial and insurance payment times. https://www.paidnice.com/payment-times/uk/financial-services. Source: UK payment practices filings (March 2025 to August 2026), Companies House, Insolvency Service. Figures cover large UK companies paying all their suppliers.
Large UK financial and insurance companies take a median of 22 days to pay supplier invoices, 9 days faster than the UK median of 31 days. The sector ranks 18 of 18, where 1 is the slowest payer.
At the median financial and insurance company, 14% of supplier invoices are not paid within the agreed terms. For all UK large companies the median is 15%.
500 financial and insurance companies entered insolvency in England and Wales in the 12 months to Sep 2026. That ranks 12 of 18 sectors by number of cases. This is a count, not a rate, so larger sectors have more cases.
Yes. The Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 lets a business charge statutory interest of 8% a year above the Bank of England base rate on a late commercial invoice, plus fixed compensation of £40, £70 or £100 depending on the invoice amount.
This page reports how long large companies take to pay, from government payment filings. How long small businesses wait to be paid is a different measure on a different group of businesses, and it is on the accounts receivable statistics pages.
The Reporting on Payment Practices and Performance Regulations 2017 require large UK companies and LLPs to report twice a year on how they pay suppliers. We took each company's latest filing with a period ending March 2025 to August 2026, matched it to its first SIC code on the Companies House register, and grouped companies by SIC section. Each company reports its own average days to pay. We take the median of those company averages, so one extreme filer cannot move the sector result. Trades and sectors publish only with 20 or more companies. Insolvency counts are Insolvency Service figures for England and Wales, Oct 2025 to Sep 2026, not seasonally adjusted.
Sources: UK payment practices service, Companies House, Insolvency Service. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Download the sector and trade data (CSV).
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