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Govt say SME bills being paid on time

Wednesday, January 30 15:41:00

Government departments and agencies continue to comply with the Government requirement to pay business suppliers within 15 days of receiving a valid invoice, according to John Perry, Minister for Small Business, today.

He said that Quarter 4 figures show that Government Departments made a total of 62,013 payments amounting to E1.28bn.

Of the 62,013 payments made in this quarter, a total of 49,604 payments valued at E1.25bn were paid within 15 days.

This represents 98pc in value terms of payments made by Departments, an increase of 5pc over the previous quarterly figures.

This clearly demonstrates the Government's commitment to be an exemplar in terms of prompt payment in Ireland, the Minister said.

"However, the issue of late payment is not just an Irish problem, it is a European-wide problem. To combat this issue, the Commission has adopted Directive 2011/7/EU, known as the Late Payment Directive on 16 February, 2011. The proposed legislation will act as a deterrent to late payment and a driver for payment on time by establishing a clear expectation in law that payment will be made according to agreed terms that creditors will not be penalised financially when paid late and debtors will not benefit. This Directive came into force on 15 March, 2012 and must be transposed into Irish Law by 16 March, 2013. "

"Both myself and Minister Bruton recently spoke at a seminar hosted by the Commission in Dublin to raise awareness of the issue of late payments in Europe and Ireland. This seminar was part of a pan-European information campaign, focused on ensuring key Irish stakeholders, SMEs and business leaders learnt of the current legal framework of the Late Payments Directive, an understanding of its applications and benefits, as well as practical examples of how best to implement them to support their businesses."