[sunshine windows]

Since joining the GoCardless brigade around 6 months ago, I gave my customers a choice. Sign up to GoCardless or pay your own postage and still send a cheque.

I've recently had 2 notices from the Royal Mail, informing me of unpaid postage on mail. These would cost me £1.53 each to retrieve and a wasted journey of around 45 mins to the sorting office.

Out of principle I'm not wasting my time collecting these and will undoubtedly have someone next month claiming they've paid already. Just wondering which of my customers are the tight arses....... I mean forgetful ones. 

[groundhog]

I don't use Go Cardless yet, but I stopped putting stamps on my addressed envelopes years ago for any customer paying less than £50.

[AuRavelling79]

I don't even provide envelopes...

[8weekly]

I don't even provide envelopes...

Neither do I and never have. I offer bank transfer. If people opt to send cheques instead then they must pay the postage.

[bravo20]

I don't even provide envelopes...

Neither do I and never have. I offer bank transfer. If people opt to send cheques instead then they must pay the postage.

Me too, it's their bill to pay. I've never had a stamped envelope from gas, electric, bt, water etc.
They can pay online for free or send a cheque at their cost, most pay online but still get a few cheques every week.
Some still pay in good old fashioned cash though, may have to start charging a cash handling fee!!!

[Mike #1]

Since joining the GoCardless brigade around 6 months ago, I gave my customers a choice. Sign up to GoCardless or pay your own postage and still send a cheque.

I've recently had 2 notices from the Royal Mail, informing me of unpaid postage on mail. These would cost me £1.53 each to retrieve and a wasted journey of around 45 mins to the sorting office.

Out of principle I'm not wasting my time collecting these and will undoubtedly have someone next month claiming they've paid already. Just wondering which of my customers are the tight arses....... I mean forgetful ones. 

How big is the cheque or envelope £1.53 each 

[paulben]

I would collect cheque and keep envelope with no stamp as proof and charge them extra next month to cover costs

[Chris Cottrell]

I would collect cheque and keep envelope with no stamp as proof and charge them extra next month to cover costs

Thats exactly what i would do, they wont forget to stamp it again then

[dazmond]

I always put a second class stamp on envelopes for SAE customers. to be fair most pay online these days.I spend around £70 a year on stamps.no biggie really esp when I'll be earning £17,000 -£18,000 more a year than I was 5 years ago!!!!!happy days!

[Window Lickers]

How much more. ??

                                          ?




                 ??                            ??

[dazmond]

Sarcasm doesn't come through well on the internet matt!!!I bet your earnings in the last 5 years is at least double mine!

On topic for me providing a stamp means I get paid quicker plain and simple.saves fuel collecting etc.I only use them for higher paying jobs a nd customers who owe 2 or 3 cleans.

[SB Cleaning]

I'm surprised Daz ain't driving around in a porshe the ammount he must be earning lol

[Don Kee]

I'm surprised Daz ain't driving around in a porshe the ammount he must be earning lol

No need! got a v6 car (soon to get a 17year olds dream car) and uses 5 star hotels...

[dazmond]

Why? It's not a lot more money?it's a lot better than years ago but it's certainly not in Porsche territory!

now my brother. well he makes serious money.a lot more money than me in the last 5 years but I'm happy!

[Frankybadboy]

i supply envelope to my non bank transfer customers but dont put stamps on them

i do get them printed with my name and address which cost £10 for a 1000 envelopes

so happy days

[sunshine windows]

Well, I've just discovered one culprit of this incident is a £105 one off clean. Emailed her earlier regarding late payment and got a response saying she'd sent payment by cheque already.

I've emailed her my bank details for a direct transfer, which she said she'll do once she confirms the cheque has been cancelled.

It never bothered me in the past stamping the envelopes, but now they have the option of GoCardless which is far cheaper for me to use, I don't see why I should pay 53p a time for collection.

I was spending at least £600 a year on stamps, that's an extra trip to Center Parcs with the family each year.

[PoleKing]

Well, I've just discovered one culprit of this incident is a £105 one off clean. Emailed her earlier regarding late payment and got a response saying she'd sent payment by cheque already.

I've emailed her my bank details for a direct transfer, which she said she'll do once she confirms the cheque has been cancelled.

It never bothered me in the past stamping the envelopes, but now they have the option of GoCardless which is far cheaper for me to use, I don't see why I should pay 53p a time for collection.

I was spending at least £600 a year on stamps, that's an extra trip to Center Parcs with the family each year.

Not to nit-pick but...
If you don't get charged to bank the cheque it's actually cheaper for you to supply the stamp.
GoCardLess will charge you £1.05 to collect that payment but the stamp is half that...

[sunshine windows]

Even cheaper if the customer paid the postage. This is why I stopped stamping the envelopes giving the GoCardless option. I knew most people would happily pay the postage and with no banking charges I'm saving quite a bit through the year.

I did have one customer cancel over this decision though, wrote a rather snotty letter declaring we're only on her property for 10 mins and charge her £17 blah blah blah.

[Ian101]

I stopped about a year ago ... just leave envelope for them to post cheque ..... did it to get them to move over to bank transfer which most of mine now do.

Was getting to point that with bank charge and stamp cost it was costing me nearly £1 to process a cheque payment 

Leave 1st class stamp on all jobs over £30

[sunshine windows]

I've got just over 10% of my round on GoCardless now which I'm happy with. I don't trust any new customers to send Bacs payments as I've been let down too many times in the past. I have around another 10% of existing customers on Bacs though, but I find it a pain checking for payments.