The Late Invoice Recovery Guide

Three weeks past due feels like a crisis. It usually isn't — it's a queue problem, and queues respond to structure, not to feelings. What follows is a fixed ladder with dates attached, the exact wording for each rung, and the decisions you need to make before you climb it, so you stop rewriting the same anxious email and start getting payment dates.

1. Decide what "late" means for you

Open your last ten invoices. For each one, write down two dates: when you sent it, and when the money actually landed. Not the due date — the deposit date.