1. Send statements before you need to
The single most effective habit is the least confrontational one: send every credit party a statement on the first of the month, whether or not anything is overdue. It normalises the paperwork, surfaces disagreements while both sides still remember the load, and means a genuine reminder later does not arrive out of nowhere. Shops that do this recover faster and argue less than shops that only make contact when there is a problem.
2. Work the list by age, not by memory
A ninety-day balance deserves attention before a fifteen-day one regardless of size, because age predicts recovery far better than amount does. A ranked outstanding list means the morning calls go where the risk actually is rather than to whoever came to mind. Shops that work the list weekly recover noticeably faster than shops that chase occasionally and intensively.
3. Show the working, not the figure
A reminder that carries the party's own statement reads completely differently from one that states an amount. The customer is being shown the detail rather than asked to trust you, and most people settle when they can see it laid out. It also leaves a dated record that a reminder was sent, which matters if the account eventually has to go further.
4. Credit limits stop the problem earlier
The most useful recovery tool is the one applied before the material leaves. A limit set against a party produces a warning at billing time, while you still have leverage. It also gives your counter staff a straight answer to give a regular customer without making the decision themselves, which keeps an awkward conversation away from the counter and with you.
5. Recognising an account that has turned
Three signals appear in the figures before instinct catches them: a balance growing while payments stay flat, an ageing profile getting older month on month rather than turning over, and a party who has started part-paying only the oldest bills. Any one is a reason to tighten terms rather than to stop supplying. Handled early it is a conversation about terms; handled late it is a write-off.
6. When it has to go further
If an account genuinely stops paying, what you need is not a balance but a documented history: every bill with its number and date, every delivery with its vehicle and receiver, every payment with how it was allocated, in order, printable. That is what a lawyer, a settlement negotiation or a formal notice is built on. A ledger reconstructed from a register months later usually will not stand up, and the gap between the two is exactly where money in this trade gets written off.