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SME's owed staggering £18.6bn in outstanding payments

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A massive £18.6 billion is the figure put on outstanding payments owed to Britain’s small-to-medium sized enterprises – a leap of £2.6 billion in the last year, according to new research commissioned by Bacs.

When quizzed as part of Bacs’ annual business omnibus, SME owners from around the country claimed fewer of them were experiencing late payment problems than a year ago (59% in 2006 versus 51% today).

However, further probing about the value of outstanding money unearthed a bleaker picture. Figures showed that the average amount owed to an SME at any one time is £30,000 - an alarming figure considering almost a third (29%) of those surveyed claimed they could go bust if faced with overdue invoices of up to just £20,000.

The research also showed that almost a fifth of SMEs (19%) now employ a dedicated person to chase in late payments – losing an average of 17 working days a year to this onerous task.

Figures also revealed some stark differences in the regions, with SMEs from Greater London faring far worse than their counterparts in other areas. They are:

• the most likely to experience a problem with late payments – 65% versus the national average of 51%.
• owed an average of £51,000 at any one time, that’s £21k over the national figure
• spending, on average, 38 days a year chasing in late payments – that’s more than double the amount of time spent by companies in any other region.

In comparison, SMEs in the North East (including Yorkshire & Humberside) are the least likely to experience problems – 42% have issues with late payments at one time or another versus the national average of 51%. And North West SMEs have the best results when it comes to chasing in overdue invoices – 45% have experienced late payments from customers from time to time, far less than the national average, and they spend an average of just 12 days a year chasing guilty suppliers.

Posted January 21, 2008