When a payment becomes late
You can claim interest and debt recovery costs if another business is late paying for goods or a service.
If you agree a payment date, it must usually be within 30 days for public authorities or 60 days for business transactions.
You can agree a longer period than 60 days for business transactions - but it must be fair to both businesses.
If you do not agree a payment date, the law says the payment is late 30 days after either:
• the customer gets the invoice
• you deliver the goods or provide the service (if this is later)
| As required under the Public Contract Regulations 2015 we are publishing information to show how well we have met the need to make payments within 30 days where invoices are valid and undisputed. | |||
| Financial Year | Interest paid to suppliers £ | Interest liable to be paid to suppliers £ | Proportion of valid and undisputed invoices paid within 30 days |
| 2016/17 | 0.00 | 101,588.92 | 98.00% |
| 2017/18 | 0.00 | 80,246.65 | 96.00% |
| 2018/19 | 546.99 | 593,683.40 | 59.10% |
| 2019/20 | 0.00 | 375,467.39 | 78.39% |
| 2020/21 | 1,902.58 | 293,785.26 | 82.85% |
| 2021/22 | 1,865.76 | 435,281.08 | 82.21% |
| 2022/23 | 125.48 | 501,625.52 | 84.66% |
| 2023/24 | 313.21 | 399,443.07 | 83.57% |
| 2024/25 | 0.00 | 270,489.32 | 87.73% |
| 2025/26 | 129.20 | 318,004.08 | 87.90% |
*The above data may not accurately reflect all legitimate late payments. Late payments are calculated solely on the invoice and payment dates. Additionally, some suppliers do not send invoices directly to the Accounts Payable team, routing them through service areas instead, which can cause delays, especially if there are disputes. Unless an invoice marks as disputed on our ERP system, they will be included in the dataset, making invoices appear unpaid beyond the 30-day threshold, even when there are valid reasons for the delay.