• Late payment Dec 2024

  ---

  European SMEs urge EU-Council to adopt new Late Payment Regulation proposed by the European Commission in 2023

  Joint declaration by European Entrepreneurs CEA-PME and European Small Business Alliance ESBA for the EU-Council of Ministers responsible for Internal Market & Industry Nov. 28th 2024

  We, the representatives of 2 European Confederations of SME associations, representing together 40 national, regional and sectoral associations of SME and Mid-Caps in the EU and in neighbouring countries, and with more than 1.5 Million member companies from all over
  the Continent

  Call European Member States’ Ministers responsible for the Internal Market and Industry,gathered on Nov. 28th 2024 in Brussels for the EU-Council on Competitiveness to pave the
  way for the full adoption of the new Late Payment Regulation proposed by the EuropeanCommission in September 2023.

  The proposed Regulation is sufficiently balanced and adequate to address the challenges of late payments that still weigh as a heavy burden on the financial capacities of millions of micro-, small and medium-sized companies as well as smaller and larger Mid-Caps.

  It is urgent, as the current economic crisis in some EU-member states like Germany and France is spreading more and more to other EU-member states and the EU’s neighbouringcountries, and as we have experienced in the past decades this will also impact heavily onthe payment terms, despite the current Late Payment Directive of 2011 in place.

  Both the financial and sovereign debts crises between 2008 and 2013, as well as the economic shock caused by the COVID pandemic, proofed that the current legislation to prevent public bodies and private companies from paying on time to their service providers is strongly insufficient.

  Hundreds of thousands of smaller and mid-sized companies suffer heavy debt burden and the risk of insolvency, or have already been forced into insolvency, due to late payments by public and private clients, which currently in Europe (2023) exceed 50 days B2B and reach nearly 70 days for G2B with a steady tendency to grow from year to year 1.

  We think that it is high time to make the liquidity of Europe’seconomic backbone a priority, and therefore adopting now the proposed Late Payment Regulation as soon as possible.

  Brussels, Nov. 28th 2024

  12th Dec 2024

Who are we?

The European Small Business Alliance (ESBA) is a respected, apolitical, and influential advocate for European entrepreneurs. We are the campaigning voice for the modern European entrepreneur.

Independent. Knowledgeable. Influential. Challenging. And Loud.

Who are our members?

ESBA campaigns on behalf of a million small businesses throughout Europe, all of whom (whether they are micros, self employed, traditional family businesses, or hi-tech startups), share one very important thing in common.  They are all entrepreneurs.

What do they want?

Our members told us that they wanted an organisation that looks like them, thinks like them, talks like them, and that really understands them.

• They wanted to see innovation and creativity in the way we approach our job of representing their interests.

• They want someone to be a voice for them, to talk about their needs and their problems to the EU institutions.

• They also want an organisation to represent them in a twenty-first century way, using twenty-first century techniques.

• And finally, they said they would like to belong to a truly diverse membership, full of the young (not forgetting the young at heart), women entrepreneurs, those from minority ethnic cultures, the immigrant searching for a better life, the socially responsible environmentally conscious entrepreneur, the disabled, those who pursue modern lifestyles, and those who thirst to learn new ways to grow their business.

They told us. We listened.

What do we campaign for?

In order to improve the lives of all European entrepreneurs, ESBA regularly seeks the views of its membership and uses them to create the ‘ESBA Manifesto for Change‘. Then we campaign hard to convince government to make these changes.

Click here for more details.

What are the benefits of membership?

We offer the help, advice, information and support that our members seek, with services based on listening to their needs and concerns. We campaign on behalf of our members using our unique ‘Manifesto for Change’, a policy stance that they help design.

But the biggest benefit our members enjoy is that we provide them with a voice where it matters, in Brussels.

An independent voice.

A voice for change.