Department 07 · Money
Somebody else
does the asking.
Asking for money is nobody's favourite job, which is why it is always the one that slips. Hobfolk gives it to a desk that has no relationship to protect and no reason to feel awkward.
You go home. It doesn't.Every promise gets a row and a due dateAnswered the same day, not the next working dayA drawing before the quoteUnverifiable is never a passNine desks, one address eachNothing is sent that a human cannot read backThe folder exists before you price itYou go home. It doesn't.Every promise gets a row and a due dateAnswered the same day, not the next working dayA drawing before the quoteUnverifiable is never a passNine desks, one address eachNothing is sent that a human cannot read backThe folder exists before you price it
The case for it
Invoices out, cash in
The person who did the work should never be the person chasing the money for it.
When the maker chases the invoice, two things go wrong. The chase is late, because they like the client. And it is soft, because they have to work with them again next month.
A separate accounts desk fixes both. It knows the invoice number, the date and the amount, and deliberately nothing else — so it cannot be drawn into discussing the work, and your commercial people can overrule it in one sentence when there is a genuine reason.
What the desk does
Six things, every day, without being asked
Take the whole desk or one line of it. Everything below is included in the department retainer — there is no menu underneath the menu.
01
Invoices raised on time
Deposit on order, stage payments where they were agreed, balance when the work is actually ready. Not a fortnight later when someone gets round to the paperwork.
02
Staged credit control
A defined ladder — a reminder, a firmer one, then a decision that comes to you. Courteous, specific, and it never argues about the work because it does not know about the work.
03
The bank reconciled
Continuously, so the cash position on a Tuesday morning is a fact rather than an estimate. A payment that is short by the carriage line is flagged, not quietly forced to balance.
04
Deposits and balances, gated
The deposit is asked for at order. The balance is asked for only once the thing is genuinely boxed and a dispatch date exists — because asking early is how a good client is taught to distrust your dates.
05
Supplier and VAT admin prepared
Purchase records, receipts matched, quarterly figures assembled for your accountant. Prepared, not filed — your accountant owns the presentation of your return.
06
A cash view you will actually open
What is in, what is owed, what is due out, and what is overdue and by how long. One page.
Depth
What this desk actually knows
Contracting cash is not retail cash. The desk knows the mechanisms that decide whether you get paid on time in this industry specifically.
The payment regime
- Applications for payment raised on the contract's own dates, not when somebody remembers.
- The Construction Act notice regime understood and used — payment notices, the final date for payment, and the pay-less notice that a payer must serve in time if they intend to pay less. A payer who misses it usually owes the notified sum.
- Retention tracked to the release date, and chased at it. Retention is the money most contractors quietly write off because nobody diarised it.
VAT and tax
- The domestic reverse charge for construction services applied correctly — who it catches, who it does not, and what the invoice has to say when it does.
- CIS deductions and the monthly return where the work falls inside it.
- Zero-rating on exports supported with real proof of export, retained, because the assessment arrives long after the goods have gone.
- Quarterly figures assembled for your accountant. Your accountant owns the return.
Getting paid
- A staged chase ladder — a reminder, a firmer one, then a decision that comes to you.
- Chases from a separate accounts desk that does not know about the work, so it cannot be drawn into arguing about it and your commercial people can overrule it in one sentence.
- Standing instructions are machine-read. Mark an account protected and it is never chased automatically — not a warning note beside the record that nothing reads.
The books
- Bank reconciled continuously, so Tuesday's cash position is a fact and not an estimate.
- Payments matched to invoices, not to the bank total — a receipt short by the carriage line is flagged, never forced to balance.
- Aged debt, work in progress and committed spend on one page you will actually open.
🔴 And the boundary that never moves: this desk never contacts a creditor. Money going out is a human decision, on every plan, for ever.
The run of it
How a job moves through
The order is won
Deposit invoice raised the same day.
The work runs
Stage invoices where they were agreed, not improvised.
It becomes ready
Boxed, dispatch date set — then, and only then, the balance is asked for.
Payment lands
Matched against the invoice, not against the bank total.
Or it does not
The ladder starts. Courteous, dated, and from a different desk.
You decide
Anything beyond the ladder is a commercial decision and comes to you.
The limits
What this desk will not do
Every department has a written boundary. A service that claims no limits has simply not found its own yet, and you will find it for them.
Where this desk stops
- It never contacts a creditor. Money going out is yours, personally and always. There is no automated desk on that side of the ledger and there never will be — a system that chases money in must not be able to speak to someone you owe.
- It does not move money. It prepares payments; you release them.
- It does not negotiate or agree settlement. It asks when an invoice will be paid. That is the whole remit.
Questions
Asked before, answered here
Will it chase our best client too aggressively?
No. Standing instructions override the ladder — mark an account and it is never chased automatically, and the instruction is machine-read, not a warning note beside the record that nothing reads.
Does it have access to our bank?
Read access, to reconcile. It cannot move money. Payments are prepared for you to release.
Does it replace our bookkeeper or accountant?
No. It keeps the records current and assembles the figures. Your accountant owns the return and how it is presented.
What about a client who disputes the work?
The accounts desk stops immediately and hands it to you. It is deliberately kept ignorant of the work so it cannot argue about it.
Next department
Enquiries & quoting
Back to the start of the loop.
Which of the seven is costing you the most this month?
That is the one to start with. Tell us and we will tell you plainly whether we are the right shape for it.