With the reform of payment terms, the bosses of VSEs hope to be able to concentrate on their activity rather than running following customers, often large companies, to get paid. Nothing is won in advance. For the Competition Council, the reform project is laudable, but requires a certain number of adjustments so as not to bias competition.
Payment deadlines are governed by the Commercial Code, but countless companies, even those that have a storefront, don’t care. Paying your bill very late has become a kind of generalized national sport, laments the Competition Council in its opinion on the current reform.
At 420 billion dirhams, inter-company credit is the preferred source of financing for many companies, the outstanding amount exceeding the total of bank loans to private non-financial companies. If payment terms constitute one of the components of the commercial relationship in the same way as the rebate or rebate, for example, the practices have been diverted from their primary objective. And the attempts of the public authorities to change behavior have not yielded the expected results.
It remains to be seen whether the current reform will be more successful and, above all, will provide better protection for small and medium-sized enterprises, the first to suffer from this scourge.
“The envisaged reform might constitute an element of economic security for companies and will send a positive signal to both national and foreign investors, especially since the health crisis has only accentuated the deterioration in payment behavior” , believes the Competition Council.
At the same time, he suggests to the initiators of the reform to review their copy so as not to bias the game of competition. The bill sets payment terms at a maximum of 60 days. Both parties can agree to a period of up to 90 days.
As a transitional measure, until the end of 2023, a maximum payment period of 120 days has been set. In case of violation, the application of the fine will only concern invoices of more than 10,000 DH not paid or paid outside the legal deadlines.
For Ahmed Rahhou’s teams, this threshold is likely to exclude VSEs. However, they are the first victims of payment delays. The Competition Council therefore recommends removing it and keeping the scope of the law open to all invoices, whatever their amounts.
With regard to declarations, it is advisable to reduce the filing of invoices from an annual to a quarterly frequency and to establish a global declaration of both invoices received and those issued.
A sanction adapted to the amounts of the invoices and the size of the companies
Failure to comply with the legal payment deadlines will, under the reform, be punishable by a pecuniary fine corresponding to 3% of the amount of the invoice excluding VAT (unpaid) for the first month of delay, increased by 1%. per month or fraction of a month of additional delay.
The fine is payable voluntarily by the debtors who must pay it when filing the declarations with the tax administration services. Judging the method of calculating the fine to be inconsistent and the indiscriminate treatment of infringements to be abnormal, the experts of the Competition Council recommend the introduction of a sanction mechanism proportionate to the amounts of the invoices and the size of the companies.
It will also be necessary to exclude disputed invoices from the scope of the fine. In addition, they require total transparency on the final use of fines by including in the Finance Act, the provisions relating to the institution of the special allocation account intended to receive the proceeds of fines and to define the operating mechanisms. of said account.
Derogations, the opinion of the primordial Council
Within the meaning of article 3 of law 49.15 amending and supplementing law 15.95 forming the commercial code and enacting specific provisions relating to payment terms, derogatory agreements must be submitted for the approval of the government by decree following consulting the Council. competition. L
he draft law does not take this into account, notes the Council, which is requesting the rewriting of Article 3 with a view to reintegrating these provisions insofar as consultation on the standardization of payment deadlines within a professional organization might constitute an anti-competitive practice, he argues.
On the other hand, the institution calls for the establishment of a clear and precise framework defining the conditions for granting exemptions from payment of pecuniary fines.
The sectors where the scourge is most severe
At the origin of a significant number of business failures, abnormally long payment terms pollute the business climate and fuel unemployment. Abusive practices are primarily the work of large companies.
According to the data analyzed by the Conseil de la concurrence, VSEs are systematically in the position of lender, with customer lead times exceeding supplier lead times by 53 days. They pay their suppliers in 104 days, on average, and get paid in 157 days, on average.
The situation is less tense for SMEs for whom the differential is positive at 4 days (an average supplier lead time of 111 days once morest 107 days for customer lead times). On the other hand, large companies collect their receivables in 92 days, on average, but pay their suppliers in 118 days, on average, a positive difference of 26 days.
At the sectoral level, the shortest payment terms are observed in the hotel and catering industry, in particular because these activities are oriented towards individual customers who generally pay in cash. On the other hand, in B2B relations, the situation is much more tense, particularly in transport and warehousing and in the manufacturing industry.
In the first sector, average customer lead times are 220 days once morest 102 days of supplier lead times. They are, respectively, 188 days and 146 days in the manufacturing industry.
Frank Fagnon / ECO Inspirations