Which balance is due this week?
You have eleven open orders with six factories. Each has a deposit paid when the order was placed and a balance due before shipping, or against a copy of the bill of lading. The spreadsheet that tracks them was last updated by someone who is on holiday. A factory emails to say the goods are ready and they need the balance before they will release the cargo. Another sends an invoice for a deposit you think you have already paid.
Your finance person searches the bank statements and emails to find out what has actually been paid, against which order, at which amount.
Why staged payments are hard to track
Payment terms with overseas factories are tied to events (order confirmation, production complete, inspection passed, goods shipped) rather than to dates. Those events are known by the buyer, not by finance. The invoices, proforma invoices and payment requests come by email in varying forms. And the accounts system knows what was paid but not which stage of which order it covered.
| Stage | Usual trigger | Common slip |
|---|---|---|
| Deposit | Order confirmed | Paid on a proforma, then invoiced again |
| Balance | Goods ready or inspection passed | Paid before inspection result |
| Balance against documents | Bill of lading copy | Documents not checked first |
| Adjustments | Short shipment or claims | Not deducted from the balance |
What payment confusion costs
Late balances hold up shipments, because factories will not release cargo until paid. Duplicate payments take time to recover from an overseas supplier. Paying a balance before an inspection result leaves you with little to hold back if the goods fail. And changes to a factory's bank details by email are a well-known route for fraud; if nobody checks them, a payment can go to the wrong account.
The payment schedule we build
- Each purchase order holds its payment terms as stages, with the trigger event and the amount or percentage.
- Proforma invoices and payment requests are read from email and matched to the order and stage, so duplicates are flagged before anything is paid.
- Stages become due when their trigger happens: for example, the balance becomes payable only when the inspection result is recorded as released.
- Factory bank details are held in a verified record. Any request with different details is blocked and flagged for a call-back check by your team.
- Finance gets a list of payments due, with the order, stage and supporting documents, to approve and pay through your bank.
- Payments made are recorded against the stage and matched to your bank feed or accounts system, and any claims or shortages are shown as deductions from the balance.
- One view of what is owed to each factory, by stage.
- Payments released by events, not by chasing emails.
- Bank detail changes checked every time.
What finance sees afterwards
A clear list of payments due this week, each with a reason and the documents behind it. Nothing paid twice. Balances tied to inspection results. Changes to bank details stopped until checked. And when a factory says they have not been paid, the answer is on screen, with the date, amount and reference.
Does your payment process look like this?
- Deposits and balances are tracked in a spreadsheet.
- Factories chase balances you thought you had paid.
- Balances are sometimes paid before inspection results.
- Bank detail changes arrive by email and are acted on.
- Nobody can quickly total what you owe each factory.