I'm blessed of late with clients who pay very promptly. Early, for the most part! But that doesn't mean that I shouldn't keep on top of things. To this end, I made sure and to set up a project management and invoice/billing tool so that I could easily create invoices through it, mark them as paid through it, and more importantly be reminded when the invoice came due.

For the first time yesterday I got a reminder that an invoice was overdue. I looked and sure enough, it hadn't been paid, though it was for a client that tends to be early time after time. 

The first time I approach someone about something like this I always try to assume that there's been a mistake somewhere. I wrote giving the invoice number and including a copy of the invoice, explaining that it was past 30 days, and sure enough due to a trip and some other things it had gotten missed and not submitted. Not a problem. Taken care of.

It's funny how tickled I was that I actually had a system that called it to my attention. Five years ago it may have taken me ages to notice the mistake. A system that requires this little effort is really wonderful. Way better than my "piles of paper" solution from before.

If you're freelancing professionally, I invite you to join me in my organization fetish on this one. ;) Feel free to share your methods for handling invoices/billing here!