How many times should you chase an unpaid invoice?

There is no correct number, but there is a correct shape: each email should ask for something different from the last one and escalate what it puts on the record. Four or five emails that each move — reminder, ask for a date, find the right person, state the consequence, final notice — do more than ten that repeat. If you have sent the same email three times, the problem is not frequency.

Is it better to email or to call about an overdue invoice?

Email creates the record, which is what you need if this ends up anywhere formal. A call gets an answer. The combination that works is to call for the answer and then email the same day with what was agreed, in writing, which is exactly what this template asks the customer to do themselves. A promise that exists only in a phone call is a promise nobody can point at later.

Second invoice reminder — ask for a payment date in writing

One question, asked plainly, with a reason attached. The answer becomes the thing every later email in the sequence points back to.

One week overdue
Neutral tone

The email

Subject

Invoice [Invoice number] — can you confirm a payment date?

Body

Hi [Customer name],

Invoice [Invoice number] for [Amount] was due on [Due date] and is now seven days outstanding. My earlier reminder on [Date] has not had a reply.

Can you confirm the date it will be paid? I am not asking you to pay it today — I am asking for a date I can rely on, so I stop chasing and you stop hearing from me.

If the invoice needs correcting or re-issuing before it can be paid, say so and I will do it today.

Thanks,
[Your name]
[Your business]

Fill in before you send

[Customer name]
[Invoice number]
[Amount]
[Due date]
[Date]
[Your name]
[Your business]

When to send this

A week past due, to a business customer, when a first reminder got no reply.
When you need something in writing to refer back to later — a named date is the most useful sentence a customer can give you.
When the amount is large enough that you need to forecast around it rather than just hope.

When not to send this

The wrong reminder at the wrong moment costs more than no reminder at all.

Without filling in the date of the earlier reminder.: Instead: Look it up and put the real date in. A reminder that references a previous reminder but cannot say when it was sent invites the reply 'I never received anything', and you have nothing to answer with.
To a customer who has just told you they are in financial trouble.: Instead: Use the payment plan email. Demanding a single date from someone who has already said they cannot meet one produces either silence or a date you both know is fiction, and the fiction costs you another month.
When you have no intention of honouring the promise in it to stop chasing.: Instead: Cut that sentence. If your process will send another reminder next week regardless of what they answer, saying otherwise here trains them to treat everything else you write as boilerplate too.

Notes on this one

The trade in the middle of this email is real and it is why people answer it: you are offering to stop emailing them in exchange for one piece of information. That is a genuinely good deal for a busy accounts clerk, and it converts far better than another restatement of the amount.

Questions this comes with

How many times should you chase an unpaid invoice?: There is no correct number, but there is a correct shape: each email should ask for something different from the last one and escalate what it puts on the record. Four or five emails that each move — reminder, ask for a date, find the right person, state the consequence, final notice — do more than ten that repeat. If you have sent the same email three times, the problem is not frequency.
Is it better to email or to call about an overdue invoice?: Email creates the record, which is what you need if this ends up anywhere formal. A call gets an answer. The combination that works is to call for the answer and then email the same day with what was agreed, in writing, which is exactly what this template asks the customer to do themselves. A promise that exists only in a phone call is a promise nobody can point at later.

All 19 reminder templates

Collectly does this across every invoice, on its own

You just picked the email to send on one invoice. Collectly does the same thing continuously for every unpaid invoice you have — reads the replies, works out why each one is unpaid, estimates when it will land, and drafts the follow-up for you to approve.

With 15 rules it cannot talk its way around

A paid or written-off invoice is never chased again. Follow-ups are switched off permanently, not deferred.
A disputed invoice stops automated chasing entirely and goes to a person to resolve.
A promise to pay on a date pauses reminders until that date has passed. Collectly checks back the day after, not on the day.
At least three days between reminders on the same invoice, so re-running the analysis cannot turn into nagging. A resent or corrected invoice the customer has just asked for is not a reminder, and still waits for your approval.

Try it on your invoices See how it works

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