The Best Way to Get Paid on Invoices Faster
The fastest way to get paid on invoices is to remove friction: send the invoice the day the work is done, include a pay-now link that accepts both card and ACH, use short and specific terms, and follow up on a fixed schedule. For repeat clients, keeping a card or bank account on file with their written authorization is usually the biggest speed-up, because payment no longer depends on someone remembering to pay you.
Key takeaways
- Most late payments come from friction (wrong contact, missing PO number, no easy way to pay), not unwillingness, so fix the invoice before you chase the client.
- A pay-now link with card and ACH options lets a client pay in minutes instead of waiting for a check run.
- Card payments usually fund within one to two business days and ACH within a few business days, while checks add mail time, deposit time, and possible bank holds.
- Early-payment discounts like 2/10 net 30 are often far more expensive than they look; do the annualized math before offering one.
- Compare each method on fees, staff time, and days waiting for cash together, not on processing fees alone.
Why invoices get paid late (it's usually friction)
Before changing payment methods, look at what happens to your invoice after you send it. In many businesses, especially B2B, the invoice lands in a shared inbox, waits for someone to match it to a purchase order, goes to a manager for approval, and then waits for the next scheduled payment run. Any missing detail can send it back to the start.
Common stalls: the invoice went to the person who hired you instead of accounts payable, the PO number is missing, the amount doesn't match the quote, or the client can only pay by a method you don't accept. None of these are fixed by sending a sterner reminder. They are fixed by sending a better invoice to the right place the first time.
Ask every new client two questions at kickoff: who receives invoices, and what do they need on an invoice to approve it? Write the answers into the client record and use them every time.
Send an invoice that can be paid in one click
Send the invoice the same day the work ships or the milestone is hit. Every day you wait to bill is a day added to your collection time, and the client's payment clock doesn't start until they receive it.
Put a pay-now link at the top of the invoice, not buried at the bottom. The link should open a hosted payment page or virtual terminal where the client can pay by card or by ACH bank transfer without creating an account. Giving both options matters: some clients want card rewards or float on a corporate card, while others have policies that require bank transfers for larger amounts.
Include everything AP needs to approve without emailing you: PO number, client reference, itemized line items that match the quote, a clear due date (a calendar date, not just 'net 30'), and remittance details for anyone who still mails a check.
If you invoice the same client every month, ask for authorization to charge a card on file or debit their bank account by ACH on the due date. Recurring authorization removes the single slowest step, which is waiting for a person to initiate payment.
Terms, deposits, and reminders that change behavior
Shorter terms only help if clients can meet them. Net 15 with a pay-now link often gets paid faster than net 30 with check-only instructions. For new clients or large projects, ask for a deposit up front and bill in milestones so you are never carrying the full project cost.
Set a reminder schedule and automate it: a friendly notice a few days before the due date, a reminder on the due date, and follow-ups at fixed intervals after. Each reminder should include the pay-now link again. A reminder that makes the client hunt for the original invoice is a reminder that gets ignored.
If you are thinking about passing card fees to clients through a surcharge or a cash discount, be careful. Rules vary by card brand and by state, so confirm the current requirements with the card brands and your state before adding any fee to an invoice.
Run your own numbers
Compare what each invoice payment method really costs you in fees, staff time, and days waiting for cash.
Open the free Card vs ACH vs Check: B2B Invoice Payment Cost Comparison Book a 15-minute callHow fast each payment method actually lands in your account
Cards: when a client pays, the transaction is authorized immediately, then settled when you batch (often automatically each night), and funded to your bank account, commonly within one to two business days. Your cost is interchange (set by the card brands and paid to the card-issuing bank), card brand assessments (a small percentage paid to the networks), and your processor's markup and per-transaction fee. On large B2B tickets, a new account may see a hold if a payment is much larger than the ticket size you described during underwriting, and some accounts carry a reserve, a portion of funds held back to cover potential chargebacks. Tell your processor your real average and largest invoice amounts up front to avoid surprise holds.
ACH: the client authorizes a debit or pushes a credit, and funds typically settle in one to three business days, faster when same-day ACH is used. Fees are usually a small flat per-item amount or a low percentage, often with a cap. The catch is returns: an ACH payment can come back after the funds appear, for example for insufficient funds, so watch for returns before treating large payments as final.
Checks: add mail time, the time someone takes to deposit, and possible bank holds on large deposits. The check itself has no processing fee, but staff time to open, log, deposit, and reconcile it is a real cost, and so is the extra week or two you wait for cash.
To see these trade-offs with your own numbers, use our free Card vs ACH vs Check: B2B Invoice Payment Cost Comparison tool at touchsuite.com/tools/. Enter your invoice volume and average invoice size, and it compares what each method really costs you in fees, staff time, and days waiting for cash.
What most articles get wrong: early-payment discounts
Plenty of advice recommends offering '2/10 net 30': a 2% discount if the client pays within 10 days instead of 30. It sounds cheap. It usually isn't. You are paying 2% to get your money 20 days sooner. Annualized, that is roughly 2/98 x 365/20, or about 37% per year.
Example (illustrative numbers): on a $2,500 invoice, a 2% discount costs you $50 to get paid 20 days early. Under an example interchange-plus setup using an assumed average B2B interchange of 1.85%, assumed assessments of 0.14%, an assumed 0.20% markup, and a $0.10 per-transaction fee, a card payment on that same invoice would cost about $54.85 and could fund within a day or two of the client paying, potentially 30 or more days earlier than a net 30 check. ACH would likely cost less than either. Estimates are based on published industry averages and are not a quote. Actual rates depend on card mix, ticket size, industry, and underwriting.
The point is not that discounts are always wrong. A discount can make sense if cash is tight and you have no cheaper option. But compare it against simply making card and ACH easy to use before you give away margin on every invoice.
Worked example: putting it together
Example business (made-up numbers): a distributor bills $40,000 a month across 16 invoices averaging $2,500. Today, every client pays by check and payment arrives about 38 days after invoicing. The owner covers the gap with a line of credit at an assumed 10% annual interest.
After changes: invoices go out the same day with a pay-now link, and the example assumes clients start paying in roughly 18 days on average. Speeding up $40,000 of monthly billing by 20 days reduces the amount carried on the credit line, saving about $40,000 x 10% x 20/365, or roughly $219 a month in interest, before counting staff time saved on check handling.
If 30% of that volume ($12,000) shifts to card at an example blended effective rate of 2.8%, card fees are about $336 a month. If the other 70% moves to ACH at an assumed $0.50 per payment, that's about $5.50 for 11 payments. Whether the trade is worth it depends on your borrowing cost, your staff time, and your actual rates. Estimates are based on published industry averages and are not a quote. Actual rates depend on card mix, ticket size, industry, and underwriting.
If you want help setting up invoice payment links, card-on-file, or ACH for your clients, talk to a payments specialist at touchsuite.com/contact.
Frequently asked questions
What is the fastest way for a client to pay an invoice?
Usually a card or ACH payment through a pay-now link on the invoice, because the client can pay in minutes without waiting for a check run. Card payments commonly fund within one to two business days, and ACH within a few business days. Recurring card-on-file or ACH autopay, with the client's authorization, is faster still for repeat billing.
Should I offer an early-payment discount to get paid faster?
Run the math first. A 2/10 net 30 discount works out to roughly 37% annualized, which is often more expensive than a card fee or a short-term credit line. A pay-now link with card and ACH options may get you paid sooner without discounting every invoice.
Why did my processor hold a large invoice payment?
Holds often happen when a payment is much larger than the ticket size the processor expects for your account, which is common with B2B invoices. Share your typical and largest invoice amounts with your processor during setup, and contact them before running an unusually large payment.
Can I add a fee to invoices paid by card?
Rules for surcharges and cash discount programs vary by card brand and by state. Confirm the current requirements with the card brands and your state before adding any fee to an invoice.
How do I know which payment method is cheapest for my business?
Compare fees, staff time, and days waiting for cash together. Our free Card vs ACH vs Check: B2B Invoice Payment Cost Comparison tool at touchsuite.com/tools/ lets you enter your own invoice volume and sizes to see the trade-offs.
How we put this together
The mechanics described here (interchange, card brand assessments, processor markups, per-item fees, batching and funding, holds, reserves, and ACH settlement and returns) reflect how card and ACH payments generally work in the U.S. The example interchange, assessment, markup, per-transaction, and effective-rate figures are illustrative assumptions drawn from published industry ranges and the stated assumptions in our free tools; they are not TouchSuite's rates or a quote, and actual interchange depends on the card type, how the transaction is entered, and the data submitted with it. The line-of-credit rate, payment timing, ACH per-item fee, and invoice volumes are made-up examples. Card brands update their interchange tables periodically, so check current published tables and your own merchant statement for your real effective rate, funding schedule, any reserve, and your ACH return history. Estimates are based on published industry averages and are not a quote. Actual rates depend on card mix, ticket size, industry, and underwriting.
Estimates are based on published industry averages and are not a quote. Actual rates depend on card mix, ticket size, industry, and underwriting.