Getting paid on time is a challenge faced by most businesses. With high volumes of customers generating recurring revenue, this is especially the case for window cleaning businesses. Not getting paid on time, having to chase for payment and investing time and money into collecting payments are all common complaints. Enter GoCardless – we decided to take a look at 5 reasons it should be next on your to-do list as a window cleaner. We’ll also see if our customers agree, but first, you might be wondering what GoCardless is.
What is GoCardless?
GoCardless is a UK-based service that allows you to easily take direct debits from your customers. Not the kind of direct debits that get taken on a set date each month, but rather the kind that you can initiate each time you complete the job. GoCardless take a flat fee of 1%, capped at a total of £2 per transaction, and funds take 3-5 days to clear in your bank account.
Why use it?
1) Take control of your payments
As we’ve mentioned, late payments are a common problem for most window cleaning businesses. It can have a big impact on cashflow, and chasing customers for money is a drain on your resources which simply magnifies the problem. Utilising GoCardless allows you to take payment as soon as you complete the job, every time – with no delays or chasing required. The result is a payment you control, and the more customers you have signed up to GoCardless, the more of your total revenue you can bank on receiving exactly when you should.
“…GoCardless integration has put me in control of when my customers pay – in fact it’s also massively convenient for them too, which is why more and more of my customers are signing up for it.”
Damian at LGB Vision
2) Reduce debts and time spent collecting
The results? Quite simply, less customers owing you money, and less time needed to chase for and collect payment. This frees up time that can be spent on other money-making activities like developing new business.
“The GoCardless integration with CleanerPlanner has almost eliminated the problem of debts and collecting for me. Most of my customers that used to pay by cash or cheque are now signed up to GoCardless – that’s about 45% of my round – and the rest pay by bank transfer. It’s so easy, you can start a GoCardless payment run for the work that day by clicking a button”
Paul Westcott at Impact Window Cleaning
3) Save on admin time with CleanerPlanner
GoCardless integrates seamlessly with CleanerPlanner. You can bulk-process GoCardless payments in CleanerPlanner at the click of a button. The system then automatically updates who has paid. Even when you compare that to receiving bank transfers, which need to be manually attributed to you customers, the time savings are huge.
Not only that, but CleanerPlanner provide a widget for your website that your customers can use to sign up to GoCardless. It’s simple to implement on your website, looks professional and makes it incredibly easy to sign your customers up.
“We used GoCardless before we were on CleanerPlanner, but it still meant clicking on each individual customer to process a payment. Now, we can process everything with the click of a button, and over 40% of our customers are signed up so that makes a big difference.”
Carrie at Odd Bods Cleaning
“It’s so easy, you can start a GoCardless payment run for the work that day by clicking a button, and there’s no manually updating records to say they’ve paid, CleanerPlanner does it for you automatically!”
Paul at Impact Window Cleaning
4) Retain problem payers
You probably have or more importantly, have had customers that do pay…eventually. Maybe you ended up carrying out the job a few times before you received payment and a pattern formed. It can be challenging scenario for any window cleaner – you are still receiving income that you likely need, but in the meantime you have to deal with the impact that receiving that money late has on your cashflow. Signing these customers up to GoCardless, and maybe even setting that as an ultimatum, eliminates this problem. You get to keep the work, and get paid on time – win, win!
“GoCardless – that has helped hugely with our debts. We insisted any bad payers sign up to pay us via GoCardless, and now we control when they pay us.”
Lance at Sunshine Window Cleaning
5) Offer your customers modern, convenient payment methods
Contrary to what you might think, GoCardless is an easy sell to most customers. It’s incredibly convenient – they don’t have to write a cheque, have the right cash, or even login to their online banking. It requires zero effort on their part, and they simply get an email letting them know the payment has been taken. With virtually every industry moving away from traditional payment methods, you can bring your business up to speed and offer modern payments methods that your competitors might not.
“Being able to offer GoCardless as a payment option is also fantastically convenient for our customers – they don’t have to worry about having the right money or posting cheques and it means we don’t have to hassle them for payment either, we can just take it at the click of a button.”
Lindsey at Green Team Cleaning
If you’d like to find out more about how CleanerPlanner and GoCardless can benefit your window cleaning business, contact us. You can also take out a 30 day free trial of CleanerPlanner here.
