Email and SMS Templates for Overdue Invoice Reminders

According to research by ezyCollect, most overdue invoices aren’t paid until the third reminder. That implies a supplier will usually have to request payment twice or thrice before paying an invoice.

Reminders for overdue invoices may be effective if you use the correct style, tone, and, most importantly, timing. If done correctly, your reminders may be a valuable tool for your clients’ payables department. Your reminder is a business message and an excellent opportunity to demonstrate professionalism and strengthen your business’s connection with its customers.

The tips in this article will assist your clients with overdue invoices in understanding their obligation and responding quickly to your requests for digital payments.

How to Write Late Invoice Email Reminders Effectively

Email remains a ubiquitous and popular form of communication for contacting customers whose payments are overdue. However, merely sending an email does not guarantee that your consumer will read it. While emails are reasonably inexpensive – and accounts receivables automation makes them even more so – an unproductive email is a waste of money and time.

Here’s how you can make it smoother for your customers to get back to your email reminders:

• Add a degree of personalization to your emails: Your signature and ‘from’ address should include names that your customers will be able to relate to and recognize. Extend the personalization to the salutation you give to your customers as well.
• Keep subject lines brief: Short subject lines can work wonders, and they should convey to your customers what your email contains. Experiment with various subject lines to discover which ones receive the most responses.
• Make the emails mobile-friendly: Based on a 2016 Adestra Consumer Adoption and Usage Study, 50% of all emails are read on mobile devices. 72% of individuals trash emails that fail to appear correctly on their phones, and 22% opt-out.
• Target the right people: Determine who in your customer’s company should get your reminder emails. As debtors approach the danger zone for default, copy in their management and your manager.
• Be courteous: Your consumer may have just forgotten about your invoice. Start with kind words to avoid jeopardizing your connection needlessly. Send a thank-you email in response to completed payments.
• Consolidate overdue invoices: Discuss the overall account instead of communicating about each invoice individually. You’ll combine all past-due invoices into every reminder, with the oldest invoice taking precedence.
• Choose the suitable days to send the reminders: Your reminder mail should be sent on time if you know your customer’s payment schedule, such as the end of the month. If Monday through Thursday are the days they stay operational, don’t send the reminder emails on a Friday.
• Set up an email sequence: One reminder may not be sufficient, but you don’t want to spam your customer’s inbox every day. Plan out a series of emails to send to your consumer over time. You can also combine email reminders with other forms of communication, such as SMS reminders.
• Keep your content concise: Use brief paragraphs and bullet points. According to HubSpot, plain-text emails boast the best open rates. So, pick a plain text for those reminder emails and ditch HTML.
• Attachments are mandatory: You should always attach the overdue invoices to your reminder emails. If there are several, combine them into a single table in the email’s body and attach invoice copies.
• Proofread: Your reminder emails shouldn’t contain tone, grammar, and spelling errors. Double-check URL links as well. Also, ensure that you do away with default template materials before sending the emails.
• Make it simple for your consumers to act: Add a Pay Now button that takes your client to your online payment system, where they can pay their debts in just one click.
• Contact every overdue consumer: It’s next to impossible to get in touch with every consumer if you’re issuing a huge volume of invoices without AR automation or significant labor investment. If you fail to follow up on delinquent bills, consumers might easily slide between the cracks.
• Include clear calls to action

‘Please pay immediately’ is pretty straightforward. Be sure to include a name and number should your customer need to contact someone in your business to discuss their overdue invoices.

Template for an Overdue Invoice Reminder Email

Subject: Reminder: Your account from <your company name> is overdue

Dear <Customer name>,

I hope you are well. A friendly reminder that our payment terms are <payment terms in days>. Your oldest overdue invoice is now <number of days> days overdue. The total amount overdue is <total amount overdue>.

The table below summarizes all overdue invoices.

<table of overdue invoices>

I have attached invoice copies for your reference. We would appreciate immediate payment. We welcome your payment by the following methods:

<include all payment methods>

To pay via credit card, please click the Pay Now button below:

<Pay Now button>

Please contact us immediately for any queries about your account.

Kind regards,

<Contact name, email, phone number>

Template for Overdue Invoice SMS Reminder

Your SMS reminder will be much shorter than your email reminder. Here are some tips to craft your SMS reminder:

• Use SMS for bulletin or alert style messages.
• Be brief and to the point.
• No salutation is required.
• Keep characters to around 200.
• Preview your message to ensure the reader doesn’t need to scroll too far.

Get Paid Faster with AR Automation

Discover the benefits of seamless B2B payments. Try ezyCollect and learn how it works with your Acumatica software.