Payment reminders and dunning notices

Norman reminds your clients of unpaid invoices by email when you switch this on while creating the invoice. You set once for your business when the payment reminder, the first dunning notice (1. Mahnung) and the final notice (letzte Mahnung) go out, and what fee each step charges. Like sending invoices, reminders are part of the paid plans, and your client needs an email address.

Switch on reminders for an invoice

1. Create the invoice as usual and click Next.
2. On the last step, switch on the Remind if unpaid card. It starts switched off.
3. The card shows your rule. Change the rule opens the settings.
4. Save the invoice.

Without this card, your client gets no automatic reminders. You can still send a dunning notice by hand.

You can also switch reminders on later. Open the invoice and turn on the Reminders switch under Emails in the sidebar. Below it, Next reminder then shows the step and its date. The same switch turns them off again for this invoice. If the invoice is already long overdue, Norman sends the steps one after the other with the gaps of your rule, never several at once.

Set up the rule

Open Invoices → Settings → Emails. The switch next to Payment reminders turns all automatic reminders of your business on or off. Below it are the steps:

• Note before the due date: a friendly reminder a few days before the due date. It starts switched off.
• Payment reminder: at first 3 days after the due date.
• First dunning notice: at first 14 days after the due date.
• Final notice: at first 28 days after the due date.

For each step you set the days and a Fee, or switch the step off. The note goes out 1 to 60 days before the due date. Each step comes at least one day after the step before and at most 365 days after the due date. A fee is at most €1,000. After a change, Save appears. Norman names the fee in the email and adds it to the open amount. Your client pays a reminder with a fee by bank transfer. See "What your client receives" below. You edit the texts of the steps under Templates on the same page. Read Send invoices by email.

When reminders go out

• On working days at 9:00 German time, never at the weekend. If a day falls on a weekend, the reminder goes out on Monday. The note before the due date then goes out on the Friday before, so that it arrives before the due date.
• Norman writes each reminder on the day it goes out, with the amount and the email address of that day. If you switch off the rule, the step or the reminders of the invoice before that, it does not go out.
• Two steps are at least as far apart as your rule says. So your client never gets several reminders at once.
• Once the invoice is paid or cancelled, Norman stops. A planned reminder is dropped.
• Every reminder shows the open amount, the fee and the due date. The invoice PDF is attached.

The notice on the working day before

Before each reminder, Norman checks whether the payment may already be there. If Norman cannot see that for sure in your bank account, you get a notice on the working day before, by email and in the Norman app. This happens, for example, when no bank account is connected, when the bank connection has not synced for some days, or when your account has a payment of the invoice amount, with or without the dunning fee, that is not matched to an invoice yet.

• Already paid: mark the invoice as paid. Then no reminder goes out.
• Don't send: this reminder does not go out, and automatic reminders for this invoice are paused.

If you do not answer, the reminder goes out as planned.

Stop reminders for an invoice or a client

• For an invoice: open the invoice. Under Emails you see the next reminder and its date. Turn the Reminders switch off. The same switch starts them again.
• For a client: in the client's details, tick No automatic payment reminders to this client.

In the invoice list, the Reminder planned filter shows every invoice with a reminder ready to go.

Send a reminder or dunning notice by hand

1. In the invoice list, click the invoice's Overdue status.
2. Norman opens the step after the highest one that already went out:
   • Send payment reminder if no reminder went out yet,
   • Send first dunning notice (1. Mahnung) after the payment reminder,
   • Send final dunning notice (letzte Mahnung) after the first dunning notice.
3. Check To, Subject and Message. Norman fills in your template for this step, in the invoice's language.
4. Check the Dunning fee (optional). Norman fills in the fee from your rule.
5. Click Send.

If Norman cannot send the reminder, Norman names the reason. Your text stays, and you can correct it and send again.

Norman counts every reminder sent, automatic ones included. Each reminder is listed with its status under Emails in the invoice's sidebar.

What your client receives

• The email comes from "Your company name via Norman". Replies go to the email address on your invoice.
• The summary shows the open amount and the due date, with a fee also the fee and the total, and your bank details.
• When online payment is on for the invoice, your client pays right away with Pay now.
• A reminder with a fee does not have Pay now. Your client transfers the total of the open amount and the fee.
• The invoice is attached as a PDF.

Invoices from before the rule

Invoices you issued before the switch to the rule get no automatic reminders. This is also true if the earlier automatic reminder was on for them. So no client gets an unexpected dunning notice for an old invoice.

To have Norman remind for such an invoice, open it and turn on the Reminders switch under Emails. Reminders that already went out count: Norman continues with the next step.

Related articles

• Send invoices by email
• Invoice status, drafts and payments
• Set up recurring invoices
• Cancel or correct an invoice