Web designer Frank Jonen has taken extreme action against his late-paying client, San Francisco-based gym chain Fitness SF.
Mr Jonen's web design firm has been working on the new Fitness SF website and brand identity for over six months; but he ultimately took the decision to replace their homepage with a simple text statement.
Read more: Frank Jonen Plays Hardball With Late Paying Fitness SF
Many small businesses are caught out when clients refuse to pay their invoices. For a small startup, a handful of unpaid invoices can make the difference between a healthy bank balance and a full-on cash flow crisis.
When your non-paying client is located outside of the UK, unpaid invoices become even more of a headache. Chasing the debt yourself might be expensive, impractical and fruitless. If you’ve researched debt collection online, you’ll probably have noticed that there’s plenty of self-help when your client is in the UK - but if they’re overseas, there’s very little official advice on what you should do.
Small firms in Ireland are waiting an average of 62 days for their invoices to be settled, but when it comes to debt collection Ireland's entrepreneurs are still reluctant to take action.
These are the findings of the Small Firms Association's Late Payment Survey, published in early January, which looks at the issues affecting the credit control and debt recovery Ireland's small businesses use to keep their accounts - and their non-paying customers - in check.
Late payments are a pain for all of us, clapping the irons on our cashflow, disrupting client relationships and generally causing a world of stress until they're resolved either directly or through the intervention of a debt collections specialist like Safe Collections.
But on an international scale, late payments cause even bigger headaches for economies across the EU, leading to an annual debt of €23.6 billion (£19 billion) according to European Commission figures.
Read more: The €23.6 Billion Bankruptcy Burden of Late Payments
