Factoring of accounts receivables

The factor is a business partner who buys your receivables and pays for it. The factor in turn will collect the amount from your customers (pay-by business partners). If the original pay-by business partner partner is notified to pay directly to the factor, the original pay-by business partner of the sales invoice is replaced by the factor.

You usually receive a factor's advance from the factor against the receivables factored with it. Usually, the factor's advance is 70% to 80% of the factored amount.

Factoring can be:

  • With recourse: The factor makes a loan against a receivable. Your company continues to assume the credit risk, and you must reimburse the factor if the customer does not pay. If the customer's credit check is not favorable, factoring with recourse can be used.
  • Without recourse: The factor purchases the value of the receivable, and takes the risk that the customer will not pay the invoice. To avoid bad debts, the factor usually performs a credit check on the customer before deciding to purchase the receivable.

You can factor the receivables as and when they arise, or you can have a general agreement to factor receivables of specific customers for a given period of time and for a given credit limit. If you factor the receivables as and when they arise, your customer is notified to pay to the factor after the customer has received your invoice. If you have a general agreement to factor the receivables, your customer is notified to pay to the factor by printing the factor’s address on the invoice as the pay-to address.

You can factor your receivables with more than one factor. Therefore, you can assign the receivables of one business partner to more than one factor.

If your customer fails to pay the invoice and if factoring with recourse applies, you must reimburse the amount due to the factor. In such a case, you will try to recover the amount due from the original pay-by business partner. As a result, the information about the original pay-by business partner must remain available in the system.

If you create a credit note for your customer, the amount receivable from the business partner decreases. As and when credit notes arise, they are sent to the factor so that he is informed of the actual outstanding amount receivable from the business partner.

In a multicompany structure, the factoring of accounts receivable is controlled per financial company. If you decide to factor your receivables, you can switch on the accounts receivable factoring for the financial company, and you can switch it off if this is required.

Generally, the factoring of accounts receivable consists fo the following steps:

  • Assign a factor to an invoice.
  • Send the receivables to the factor.
  • Settle the factored invoice when your customer has paid the invoice.

For details, refer to To process factored sales invoices.

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