When should I first contact a customer about a debt?

On the day they promised to pay, not a week later. Most people pay when reminded early. Waiting also lets the debt grow in their mind from a small thing they forgot into an argument they would rather avoid.

What do I say when I call about money?

State the facts and ask a question. The item, the amount, the date, then when you can expect it. No blame and no speech, because the moment it feels like an accusation the customer starts defending themselves instead of paying.

What if a customer keeps promising and never pays?

Stop extending new credit to them at once, and switch from asking for the whole amount to agreeing a part payment with a date. Something coming in beats a bigger number nobody intends to pay.

What if they deny owing me anything?

Read your record back calmly: the date, the item, the quantity, the amount. A record turns it from your word against theirs into a fact they can check. Without a record you have no case, which is why the writing down matters more than the chasing.

When should I write a debt off?

When the person has gone, has broken three promises without contact, or the amount is smaller than the trouble of pursuing it. Write it off in your records so your figures are honest, and stop giving that person credit.

Should staff chase debts for me?

Staff can remind a customer, but keep the record and the decisions with you. If the person who gave the credit is also the one who says it was paid, you cannot tell a collected debt from a pocketed one.

How to Collect Money a Customer Owes You

A step by step way to get paid without losing the customer: when to call, what to say, what to do about the ones who avoid you, and when to write the debt off and move on.

Most debts in a small shop are not refusals. They are forgetting. Somebody took a bag of rice on Tuesday, meant to pay on Friday, and by the following Wednesday the whole thing has slipped their mind while you are the one short of money to restock.

That is good news, because forgetting is fixed by a reminder. The small number of customers who are genuinely avoiding you need something different, and the useful part is knowing which is which early.

Call on the day the money was promised

The single change that collects the most money is calling on the day they said they would pay.

A call on the day is a reminder. The same call three weeks later is a confrontation, and by then the customer has been avoiding the thought of you for long enough that avoiding your call is easier than answering it. Early is also cheaper for them: 5,000 this week is manageable in a way that 5,000 plus the two more bags they took since is not.

If you have several debts, the day to call is the day the money was promised. That is the whole schedule.

What to say

Keep it to the facts and one question:

"Good morning ma. It is Emeka from the shop. The two bags of rice from the fourteenth, seven thousand five hundred. When should I expect it?"

The item, the date, the amount, then a question. No speech about how business is hard, no apology for calling, and no accusation. The moment a customer feels accused, they stop thinking about paying and start defending themselves.

Then wait for an answer and write down whatever they say, including the new date. That new date is your next call.

When they promise and nothing comes

The second broken promise is your signal to change tactics.

Stop giving that customer new credit immediately, before anything else. Every shop owner has a story about a debt that doubled while they were still being polite about the first half.

Then stop asking for the whole amount. Ask for part of it with a date attached: "Can you do three thousand on Saturday and the rest at the end of the month?" A smaller number that arrives beats a bigger number that never does, and somebody who agrees to a part payment usually pays it, because it is a promise they can actually keep.

Part of it on an agreed date beats all of it on no date.

When they deny it

This is where your record earns its keep, or where you learn you did not have one.

Read it back plainly: the date, the item, the quantity, the amount. Most denials are honest confusion between two visits, and a date and an item clears it up in a sentence. If you have a signature or a phone number they gave you at the time, you are on solid ground.

If you cannot produce those details, you have no case and you should stop pushing. Take the loss, write it down as a loss, and start keeping the record properly. There is a fuller guide to what to capture in how to record credit sales.

Stop the debt growing while you chase

An old debt and a new sale to the same person are two separate decisions, and shops lose money by treating them as one.

Set the rule before the conversation, so it is a policy rather than a judgement on the person: no new credit while anything is outstanding past its date. "I keep everybody to one debt at a time" is a rule you can say out loud without insulting anybody.

Know what you are chasing in total

Chasing debts one at a time hides how much is out there. Once a week, add up everything owed to you and write the number down with the date.

Every debt with a name, an amount, and a way to reach the person.

Two numbers tell you whether the chasing is working:

Total owed, across all customers.
The oldest debt still open, in days.

If total owed keeps climbing while your stock keeps falling, your shop is lending rather than selling, and the credit itself needs tightening rather than the chasing. If the oldest debt is older than a month, that is the one to deal with today, because a debt gets harder to collect every week it ages.

When to write it off

Some money is not coming back. Write a debt off when the person has moved away or cannot be reached, when they have broken three promises with no contact, or when the amount is smaller than the time it would take to pursue.

Writing it off is a bookkeeping act, not forgiveness. Record it as a loss so your figures stay honest, keep the record of what happened, and never give that person credit again. A debt you have quietly given up on but still count as money owed makes your shop look richer than it is, which is how owners end up borrowing to restock.

Doing it with an app

MyShopGuard groups every debt by customer with the total owed on your home screen, next to the cash you actually took today. Each customer has a tap-to-call button, each debt shows its date so you can see which one has aged, and you can mark a debt settled when the money arrives or written off when it will not. A written-off debt stops counting as money owed while the goods stay counted as sold, so your stock figures stay honest. Staff can record a credit sale and cannot mark one paid.

Start here

Take your list of debts and put today's date next to the ones already past their promised day. Call the oldest one this morning, using the four facts and one question above. Then set your own limit for new credit and say it out loud to the next customer who asks, because collecting is much easier when there is less to collect. If you are not sure your record is good enough to hold up in a disagreement, read how shops actually keep record of selling on credit.