Whether your business supplies concrete, steel, lumber, or any other essential material for a construction project, you understand the challenges that come with getting paid once you’ve delivered your materials. The further down you are on the payment chain, the higher the risk of delayed payments.
This isn’t exclusive to suppliers – it’s an industry-wide problem. Slow payments cost the U.S. construction industry $299 billion in 2025, according to Rabbet. GCs and subcontractors can wait up to three months to get paid, causing a ripple effect that extends to suppliers—you can’t pay your own invoices and costs across the industry go up. It can be hard to be optimistic about the state of payments in construction when it feels like you have no control over when you get paid for your labor.
We’re here to tell you that you can take control over your payments. While it may feel like you’re constantly waiting and relying on someone else, there’s things you can do to speed up your payment cycles, improve relationships with your customers, and get paid faster. Here’s 5 tips on how suppliers can get paid faster in the construction industry.
1 – Invoice Visibility
Oftentimes when you’re waiting on a subcontractor to submit payment on an invoice it’s not because they’re avoiding paying you—it’s because they don’t know where the invoice lives. When they have to dig up physical invoices or search through email threads looking for your invoice, paying the invoice starts to feel like a more daunting task than it is. By providing your customers with one single place to view all their payment requests and outstanding invoices, it completely eliminates that friction point, and your customers will be grateful to have full visibility into what they owe.
2 – Reduce Confusion
An invoice to a subcontractor should clearly state what materials or supplies they’re paying for and the quantity and cost of each. When the initial invoice is difficult to read and this information isn’t clearly documented, it can cause back-and-forth and further delays. Give your customers all the line item details up front—quantities, pricing, dates—so there’s nothing they need clarification on. Fewer questions means less time between invoice sent and invoice paid.
3 – Attach Documents to Invoice
Keeping any required documents, like lien waivers or agreements, attached to the invoice combines one task into two. When the subcontractor can sign required documents in the same place as where they view and pay their invoice, it shortens both your and theirs to-do list.
4 – Payment Flexibility
Paper checks and over-the-phone payments are just another friction point that delays payments. Offering multiple mobile payment options makes the entire process easier for your customer, especially when they know it’s a secure payment option, like by card or connecting their bank account.
5 – Eliminate Manual Work
Delays aren’t always due to the customer—it can also be due to your own team and systems. Having disconnected systems just causes lag and your team loses track of invoices. Having payments flow right back into your core system automatically ensures everyone’s working with the same information, at the same time.
Getting paid in a timely manner in the construction industry may feel impossible, but it doesn’t have to be. Take a minute to look over the systems you’re using now and really think about if they’re improving your payment cycles. If not, maybe it’s time to consider switching to something that benefits your customers, your team, and your business.
Take back control of your payments with the SkyOS Contractor Portal.
