Sure, Let Me Just Teleport That Right To You!

[Andara Bledin]

It's the weekend, and the CFO & Manager are out of the office on a trip for the weekend, and our A/P clerk isn't in, so I'm the next in line to get this call.

Guy calls up and starts talking about a payment. Now, since I'm actually the A/R clerk these days, I think he wants to make a payment. It takes several tries for me to get enough information to learn that this guy actually wants to receive a payment.

I finally get enough info to ID him and learn that we placed an order with him last week which was received in our system as of yesterday. Unfortunately, the order doesn't have any information on it that would be helpful like, say, how we plan to pay or what type of terms, so I have to tell the guy that I'm sorry, but he'll have to call back on Monday when people are back in the office.

He immediately cops an attitude and starts in on how it's taking soooo long for us to get his payment to him. A payment which, I strongly suspect, hinges on inspection of the parts, which happened only yesterday (if it happened at all), and if he's to be paid by check, we do that once a week on Wednesday.

He finally accepts that I can't do anything for him and as a parting shot he tells me, "this is why I stopped doing business with you guys... it always took forever to get my money."

If the jerk was that hard up for cash, he could have insisted that we prepay. But I guess he's such a crotchety sourpuss, he'd rather send it ahead, then browbeat the staff when he didn't have his money the instant we got the parts. Feh.

^-.-^

[Gerrinson]

I'm the A/P lead at work, so I get a ton of these calls. Had the one vendor call me up asking when she could expect her check which was "already over due by several weeks!" and we take so long blah blah blah.

I checked, but I didn't have the invoice posted nor in my inbox. I tell her I'll call her back. Research it, and find out that the invoice was dropped off four DAYS ago. Dated four DAYS ago. Our terms with her are net 15, so payment wasn't even due for another week and half.

When I spoke to her again, she didn't believe me at first. Even though I have the invoice she gave us. Apparently, she dates her A/R based on order date, not invoice date. That's A) not remotely proper accounting and B) not legally enforcable as the terms clearly state Net 15 from invoice date.

After getting her settled and explaining the real due date, and the way we cut A/P checks (every other week, opposite payroll) I told her she could expect her check in the mail after Colombus day (US holiday falling on Mon Oct 12th this year.)

She called me up today to complain that she hadn't gotten the check yet. After explaining it to her again, she says 'Oh, I expected you to send it last week right after I called.'

Bravo. To paraphrase: Expect with one hand and poo in the other. Let me know which one fills up first.

Or better yet, don't call back. Ever.

[bainsidhe]

On the other side of the coin, some business customers are difficult to deal with as well. First off, they are customers, so our company tries to maintain a polite and friendly attitude, even when we're being jerked around. Sorry to hear some vendors don't get that concept.

We have a few customers that suddenly decide what terms they should pay us with. Suddenly deciding that they'll pay in 90 days after receipt of product, for example. Um, no? We have terms with our own vendors and we still need to pay our bills, pay for labor, etc. It's always the companies that don't do much business to begin with.

Then there's the accounting staff that act like it's a real inconvenience to pay invoices at all. How dare we want to get paid. Fortunately, this isn't most of our customers. Many people are tickled just to get paperwork off their desk and are downright pleasant to talk to. But there's always a few exceptions.

[PepperElf]

tho i also suspect maybe he called on the weekend .. hoping to trick you into giving him more money than what he had coming to him

[Can I Help Your A$$?]

People do believe in teleportation.

You ever hear those customer service stories about people confused by fax machines? They really believe the paper gets "sent" physically to the other party, and some even ask if they can fax cash.

[fma_fanatic]

Ugh..yeah, I have to deal with that. I'm part of the admin staff in the sales office, supporting 5 offices in our marketplace. The account office does not get into invoice issues, so I have to take care of it. Corporate's policy is that if there are no defined net terms, then our terms are what is used, which is 45 days.

Every month I have to deal with the same vendor who complains about not being paid on time and they have no defined net terms on their invoice. Every month I explain to the AR person that if they want to get their payment in a specific time, they NEED to put net terms on their invoices.

I finally had enough of her insults about me not doing my job that I gave her the name and number of the corporate purchasing manager, as well as e-mailed the manager to let her know what was going on. I imagine I'll have to deal with them again next month.

[Shalom]

People do believe in teleportation.

You ever hear those customer service stories about people confused by fax machines? They really believe the paper gets "sent" physically to the other party, and some even ask if they can fax cash.

I was filling in at the real estate office my mother works in, and the fax machine rings and spits out a document. A minute later it rings again, and spits out the exact same document again. Then the regular phone rings.

Hi, this is Mr C. Did you receive the fax I sent?
Yes, in fact we got it twice.
Oh, that's because I sent you the original and the copy.


You know, fax machines have been around since before the telephone was invented. You'd think people would know what they do by now.

[Dips]

Every month I have to deal with the same vendor who complains about not being paid on time and they have no defined net terms on their invoice. Every month I explain to the AR person that if they want to get their payment in a specific time, they NEED to put net terms on their invoices.

We've been on both sides of this. If you search under my name for the word "prepaid" you'll find a few posts.

But this is just...

I mean which thing is more work?

A. Scrawling the words "Payment is due within 30 days" on an invoice.

B. Calling someone again and again to chase money for two weeks until day 45 hits.

The fact that they are clearly choosing B just offends me as a lazy person.

[draftermatt]

Opposite end of the spectrum, my company often has to pay to get money we're owed.

We are in Maryland, but 90% of our work is in New York (the owners actually have to pay NY income tax). Often (and I mean often) we get people that are past 90 days overdue. In fact we got a check two weeks ago that was 2 years past due.

We don't charge interest (we'd never get it), but we do file liens when we can.

That said, often we get calls from people asking us to "pick up the check" from their office in/around NY, they then refuse to send it, or offer to mail it (when we may need it the next day, especially now with cash flow almost at 0). So we end up using our Fed-Ex account to have it shipped to us next day.

[Andara Bledin]

Update!

The guy called back yesterday and spoke with the A/P clerk, who was in. She came to talk to the CFO, who was also in and has a desk behind mine, and I asked her if she had him on the line.

Her comment about him? "He's mean."

But wait, it got even better: We asked for his address to mail the payment, and he wouldn't give it to us. He said it was on the invoice included with the shipment, which had accidentally been discarded.

He eventually gave the information to the CFO, and I found it (mostly) with a reverse look up. His check went out with this morning's mail, but sheesh, what a sourpuss!

....

In other news, we have a customer that has decided they get a discount (they're a good long-term customer, so we let them have it), but they can't manage to get the check to us within terms. They have 2% 10, Net 30 terms, which means that if they pay within 10 calendar days, they can take a 2% discount. They are routinely late on this. Their excuse? They don't get the mailed invoice in time.

Hogwash.

They have the acknowledgement, which has the full price on it. They get their parts shipped freight collect, so there's no extra cost at all. Then they get the parts, so they can check the packing slip against the acknowledgement, and they get the invoice number as well. They don't need a copy of the actual invoice, although we send then one anyway. So they know how much they owe, they know when it's due (we ship 99% of our orders the same day), and they still dither about paying on time.

We got a check from them today. With the 2% discount taken out. For an invoice dated September 14th. I get to send them a "gentle reminder" about how discount terms work, and that we're being nice in even letting them have them.

^-.-^