Canadian Businesses Wait 41 Days to Get Paid

Canadian businesses are waiting longer than ever to realize the revenue from their sales. Today, the average days sales outstanding (DSO) reported by Canadian firms is 41 days, according to Accelerating The Time To Realized Revenue: Canada Snapshot, a PYMNTS and Mastercard collaboration that interviewed 100 Canadian corporate executives.

Get the study: Accelerating The Time To Realized Revenue: Canada Snapshot

Among large-market firms — those generating more than $500 million CAD ($390 million USD) in annual revenues — the average DSO is 39 days. Among mid-market firms generating between $10 million CAD ($7.8 million USD) and $500 million CAD ($390 million USD) in annual revenues, the average DSO is 43 days.

Canadian businesses believe real-time payments are one of the key digital payment innovations that can alleviate their mounting DSO woes. Thirty-seven percent of all Canadian businesses are “very” or “extremely” interested in implementing real-time payments when they become available. Another 57% are somewhat or slightly interested, while only 6% are not at all interested.

These businesses also expect the real-time payments capability to yield several additional benefits. The most cited benefit is being able to send and receive 24/7 year-round; 35% of the Canadian firms that are at least “somewhat” interested expect that to be the most important benefit from real-time payments. Other expected benefits include instant deposits, which were cited by 14% of the firms, more flexibility, cited by 13%, and improved reconciliation, cited by 11%.

Among mid-market firms, the top three benefits expected from real-time payments are being able to send and receive 24/7 year-round, cited by 47%, and instant deposits and improved reconciliation, each cited by 12%. Among large-market firms, 24% cite being able to send and receive 24/7 year-round, 16% cite instant deposits and 16% cite more flexibility.