You finished the extension three weeks ago. The client's happy. The snag list is done. But you haven't sent the invoice yet. Sound familiar?
For builders, invoicing often falls to the bottom of the pile. There's always another job starting, materials to order, subbies to coordinate. The admin feels like it can wait. But every week you don't invoice is a week you don't get paid.
What forgetting to invoice actually costs
A £5,000 job invoiced two weeks late means £5,000 sitting in someone else's account for two extra weeks. Multiply that by every job you do in a year, and you could be looking at tens of thousands of pounds in delayed cash flow.
Worse, the longer you leave it, the harder it becomes. The client forgets the details. Disputes are more likely. And some invoices never get sent at all — which means you worked for free.
The fix is embarrassingly simple
Set a recurring task in again: "SEND INVOICES" every Friday at 9am. Every Friday morning, you get a text. You either send your invoices (reply DONE) or you push it to Monday (reply SNOOZE). It takes 5 seconds to deal with the text. The invoicing might take 20 minutes. But at least you do it.
You can also set one-off reminders for specific jobs: "INVOICE SMITH EXTENSION" on a specific date. One text, one action, done.