The president of the Catalan employers’ association of SMEs, Antoni Cañete, demanded this Monday in Brussels the creation of a European observatory that applies coercive measures to large companies that use their “dominant position” to lengthen payment terms. If it is not done, he argued, “they will continue to close SMEs.”
Cañete participated in the event ‘The fight against late payment in Europe’, held at the headquarters of the European Economic and Social Committee in Brussels. In his speech, he warned that the delay in payment terms of large companies is behind the closure of many SMEs because this habitual behavior “harms the treasury and cuts their margins.” And he considered it essential that the EU make structural changes, to set deadlines and avoid “abusive deadlines.”
This delay in paying invoices is common practice in European companies. According to the study on payment behavior of companies in Europe published by Informa D
The act in which Pimec participated yesterday comes in the middle of discussions on the reform of Directive 2011/7/EU on the fight against late payment, an instrument that the president of the community executive, Ursula Von der Leyen, promised to update in her speech on the State of the Union of 2022. According to Pimec, this represents “an opportunity” to carry out “structural changes” in the member states most affected by late payment, which are Spain, Italy, Belgium and Greece.
Together with the Catalan employers’ association, the event included the participation of the Italian association Confartigianato Imprese, also a member of SME United and the Multisectoral Platform against Late Payment.
The measure that Pimec demands from Brussels is also being developed at the national level, although without direct sanctions. The draft of the royal decree on digital invoicing includes the creation of a State Observatory of Private Delinquency that will serve to publish an annual list of delinquent companies, understanding as such those that fail to comply with the deadlines set by law to pay more than 10% of their invoices and that the amount of unpaid invoices exceeds 600,000 euros
The Capital Companies Law and the Late Payment Law already include the obligation for large companies to indicate in their annual reports, in addition to the average payment period to their suppliers, the volume and number of invoices paid in a period less than the established maximum. in late payment regulations.
