What Are the Differences between Invoice Financing and Invoice Factoring?

Editor's Note: Take a look at our featured best practice, Activity Based Costing (29-slide PowerPoint presentation). Activity Based Costing (ABC) analysis is a methodology for assigning costs to those activities that truly drive these costs. It is tangibly more accurate than traditional costing methods. Traditional costing methods overlook product-specific R&D, advertising, distribution/channel, and [read more]

* * * *

Invoice financing and factoring both provide great solutions for cash flow problems, but they do differ slightly in terms of structure and how payment is collected. So what are the differences and what’s the best option for your business?

What’s invoice financing?

Invoice financing allows businesses to access funding to help manage cash flow.  Simply put, invoice financing involves borrowing money against your outstanding account receivables. In short, you will sell the invoice to a third party who will pay you up to 90% of the invoice in the form of a loan. This means that you can pay your staff on time, whilst waiting for your customers to pay their invoice. When the invoice is paid, this is transferred to the lender to pay for the loan.

Advantages of invoice financing:

• Invoice financing is an easy and accessible solution.
• It keeps small businesses in charge of their finance as it allows companies to extend net terms to their clients. This in turn keeps clients happy but avoids the business being stuck with little cashflow.

However, there is a caveat. Whilst invoice financing is a good way to keep finances in check for many small businesses, it can be risky. As the lenders charge fees on the loan, if an invoice goes unpaid, it can land the business in a difficult position. If clients are avoiding the outstanding invoice, the costs can soon add up, and may end up costing the business more in the long run.

What’s invoice factoring?

Invoice factoring is where businesses sell their invoices to a factoring company (such as a bank) for some immediate cash release whilst waiting to be paid in full. From here, the bank will take on the responsibility for getting payment from your customers and will manage the invoice processing for the business.

Advantages of invoice factoring:

• As the finance company will take over the management of your sales and invoicing process, they will be actively chasing the customer, so you don’t have to. They will even carry out the necessary credit checks. So invoice factoring can save you significant time and frustration if you have any clients that are serial invoice-dodgers.
• Invoice factoring is less risky compared to invoice financing. Whilst allowing you access to cash quickly, invoice factoring also reduces the risk of having bad debts as the factoring fees tend to be lower.

However, with this option the client will need to be aware of the factoring company, so you will need to trust that they will uphold the same standards of customer service as your own business.

Choosing the right option for your business

On the whole, invoice financing is riskier to small businesses compared to invoice factoring as the burden is on the business to chase invoices. With invoice financing, businesses can end up paying increased fees to the lender which can add up over time – especially if your clients tend to pay their invoices late.

Invoice factoring is often a good option for small businesses struggling with cash flow, and is less risky compared to financing, but you will need to choose your factoring company wisely. However, ultimately, the best invoicing solution depends on each individual. What’s best for one business may not be suitable for another.

Do You Want to Implement Business Best Practices?

You can download in-depth presentations on Management Accounting and 100s of management topics from the FlevyPro Library. FlevyPro is trusted and utilized by 1000s of management consultants and corporate executives.

For even more best practices available on Flevy, have a look at our top 100 lists:

• Top 100 in Strategy & Transformation
• Top 100 in Digital Transformation
• Top 100 in Operational Excellence
• Top 100 in Organization & Change
• Top 100 Management Consulting Frameworks

These best practices are of the same as those leveraged by top-tier management consulting firms, like McKinsey, BCG, Bain, and Accenture. Improve the growth and efficiency of your organization by utilizing these best practice frameworks, templates, and tools. Most were developed by seasoned executives and consultants with over 20+ years of experience.