You measure how many days each customer takes to pay you with days-to-pay and median days on that party, which is the Habits tab, part of Reports+. A customer payment speed report in this shop is that Habits view per retailer, read next to Team Speed as median days to collect per salesman. Recovery sits inside Collect, available on request, and Habits is the tab that stops you treating a slow-and-honest chemist the same as a slipping one. At 8:40 a Guwahati owner opens two parties both at 62 days on ageing: Barpeta Chemist has paid in 60 to 70 for years, the Tezpur grocer used to pay in 25 and has stretched to 62 for the first time this year. Same bucket. Different Tuesday. Tally still holds every receipt date. Habits and Speed are how those dates become a person and a pattern.
Key Highlights
- Habits shows payment behaviour per customer, how many days they take to pay and the median days, and it sits in Reports+
- Team Speed is median days to collect for the money each salesman actually brought in
- Two parties at the same ageing bucket can be a steady payer and a slipping payer; median days is how you tell them apart
In This Article
- How do I measure how many days each customer takes to pay me?
- What a customer payment speed report actually shows
- Habits: days to pay and median days
- Speed on the Team board
- Two parties at 62 days
- Reading speed next to DSO
- Frequently Asked Questions
How do I measure how many days each customer takes to pay me?
How do I measure how many days each customer takes to pay me is a median question, not a last-bill question. One receipt at 12 days and one at 110 days is not "about 60." The middle payment, in days, is the number you can brief on. That number lives on Habits for the party: days to pay, and median days. The salesman-level twin lives on Team as Speed, median days to collect.
Ageing as of today, on Parties, is a stock. It tells you the chemist is at 62 days right now. It does not tell you whether 62 is where he always lives. A receivables ageing view is still the working list. A customer payment speed report is the behaviour behind that list. The payment recovery dashboard holds both: Parties for the stock, Habits for the pattern, Team for the person collecting.
Without Habits, every 62-day party gets the same call script. With it, the owner can say the chemist is on his normal clock and the grocer has slipped, and only the grocer needs the Tuesday visit. That distinction is the whole report.
What a customer payment speed report actually shows
Two cuts, one idea.
Per customer, Habits: how many days this party takes to pay, and the median of those days. Open Collect, open Recovery, open Habits. You are looking at payment behaviour, not at a new set of bills. Bills remains bill-by-bill outstanding. Habits is the pace those bills have historically cleared.
Per salesman, Team Speed: median days to collect, for the money that person actually brought in during the period. Ramesh at 22 days and Suresh at 71 days can recover the same rupees. Speed is how you see that the rupees were different jobs. The collection team board is that card. Habits is the customer underneath it.
Habits is the Reports+ tab that sits next to ageing and holds payment behaviour.
Tally remains the neighbour. Receipt dates and invoice dates in the books are the inputs. Habits does not invent a payment that is not in Tally. If receipts were posted late in a lump, median days will look worse than the retailer's actual behaviour. Fix the posting, then trust the median. Garbage in, a calm median of garbage out.
Habits: days to pay and median days
Days to pay is the spread: this party sometimes clears in 18, sometimes in 90. Median days is the middle of that spread, so one disaster bill does not rewrite the chemist into a villain.
Use median, not average, for the same reason Team uses median for Speed. A single 180-day receipt on an otherwise 25-day grocer should not move the headline number to 70. The median stays near 25, and the 180-day bill is a Bill you chase as a one-off. The average would lie.
A party with too few receipts has a weak median. Three payments is a hint. Thirty payments is a pattern. Do not brief the board on a new retailer's "median" after two bills. Let Habits sit until there is a year, or at least a season, of receipts. Until then, ageing and the follow-up log are enough.
Habits will not tell you who promised ₹45,000 yesterday. That is the log. Habits will tell you whether that chemist promising 62-day money is in character. If his median is 28, Tuesday's promise at 62 is a slip and you treat it as one. If his median is 65, Tuesday is on brand and you still want the ₹45,000, without a moral speech about 30-day terms he has never kept.
Credit terms on the invoice are the contract. Median days is the observed contract. The gap between them is the real terms. Owners who pretend the printed 30 is the observed 30 will over-order for parties whose median has been 55 for three years. Read Habits before you raise the limit.
Speed on the Team board
Speed is median days to collect on each member's card, next to Recovered, Outstanding, dealers worked, promises, rank. It is the salesman-shaped version of Habits. If Ramesh's parties have medians around 25 and his Speed is 22, he is collecting in line with his book. If his parties have medians around 25 and his Speed is 71, he is either collecting old residue or letting current bills rot while he celebrates Recovered.
Attribution still follows the recovery owner on the party. A receipt does not carry a salesman's name unless the party does. Reassign from the app when the route moves, or Speed will keep scoring a man who has left.
Do not hunt Speed as a prize in the first month. A week of cleaning 90-day names will worsen Speed while doing the right work. Say that in the meeting. Recovered up, Speed worse, unchased line shorter is a good week. Recovered up, Speed better, unchased line longer is a week of easy money.
Company roll-up Speed is the firm median. Use it as temperature, then drop into people. A roll-up of 48 with Ramesh at 22 and Suresh at 71 is a mix, not a market.
Two parties at 62 days
Barpeta Chemist, 62 days on Parties, median 64, years of receipts in a 60-to-70 band. He pays the full bill when he pays. Tuesday's job is the dated promise, not a lecture about discipline he has never shown. Habits says this is his clock.
Tezpur grocer, 62 days on Parties, median 24 until this quarter, now stretching. Same ageing bucket. Different job. Tuesday is a visit, a recovery owner if he lacks one, a next-action date, maybe a hold on the next dispatch once the owner has decided that. Habits is how you noticed the stretch while ageing still said "both 62."
A third party at 62 with almost no receipt history is a new account. Do not invent a median. Watch the first five bills. Log every chase. Habits will catch up.
This is why a customer payment speed report cannot be replaced by the 0–30 / 31–60 / 61–90 print. Buckets are a filing system. Median days is a biography. You need both. Parties for the filing. Habits for the biography. Team Speed for whether the person working those biographies is himself slow.
Reading speed next to DSO
Days sales outstanding is the company ratio. Collection efficiency is another company ratio. Both can move while the mix underneath rots or improves. Habits and Speed are the mix.
DSO from 58 to 64 with Habits showing three big parties stretching, and Team Speed worse on the salesman who owns them, is a people-and-party story. DSO from 58 to 64 with Habits unchanged and a seasonal billing spike is a calendar story. The ratio cannot tell you which. The customer payment speed report can.
Reminders still run company-wide. Cadence does not change because one chemist's median is 64. You do not put him on a private clock. You put him on a log, with a promise, with an owner. Frequency stays the firm's. Behaviour stays the party's.
When payment collection is active, after KYC, WhatsApp reminders can carry a UPI link, 0% MDR, no cap, no monthly fee, and the platform figure remains 100+ businesses and ₹17Cr+ collected monthly. Paying faster on UPI will improve median days only after those receipts sit in Tally. Habits reads the books, not the bank notification.
On that Tuesday the ageing report still shows two parties at 62 days. Habits shows which of them has always lived there. Team Speed shows whether the man collecting them is matching their clock or fighting it. Tally keeps the dates. The owner keeps the distinction.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: How do I measure how many days each customer takes to pay me?
A: Use days-to-pay and median days on that party in Habits, which is part of Reports+. Median is the middle payment in days, so one very late bill does not rewrite the party. Ageing tells you where they sit today. Habits tells you whether that seat is normal for them.
Q: What is a customer payment speed report here?
A: It is Habits per customer, days to pay and median days, plus Team Speed as median days to collect per salesman. Both live in Recovery inside Collect. Habits is the retailer pattern. Speed is the person collecting those retailers.
Q: Why median days instead of an average?
A: An average moves when one 180-day receipt lands on an otherwise 25-day grocer. The median stays near 25 and the 180-day bill stays a bill you chase as a one-off. Team Speed uses median for the same reason.
Q: How is salesman Speed different from customer median days?
A: Customer median days is Habits, how that party pays. Salesman Speed is median days to collect on the money he actually brought in. Read them together. Fast Speed on slow-median parties means he collected old residue. Slow Speed on fast-median parties means he is letting current bills slip.
Q: Can I set reminder cadence from a party's median days?
A: No. Reminder cadence is company-wide. A slow median is a follow-up log, a recovery owner, and a conversation, not a private schedule in the party master.
Q: Does Habits replace the ageing report?
A: No. Parties is ageing by customer as of today, with editable slabs. Bills is bill-by-bill outstanding. Habits is behaviour. You need the stock and the pattern. Tally remains the book of record for the dates underneath both.
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