Tutors are chronic under-billers: sessions run long for free, four lessons pile up uninvoiced because the family is lovely, and summer arrives with a balance nobody remembers agreeing to.
You're not imagining it: Bonsai's analysis of 100,000+ freelancers found 29% of invoices are paid at least a day late, and QuickBooks reports 47% of small businesses carry invoices 30+ days overdue.
What works specifically for tutors
- Prepaid packs or monthly auto-charge - never lesson-by-lesson invoicing. Families genuinely prefer one predictable charge; you stop being your own collections department.
- Overtime is a policy, not a favor: "lessons are 60 minutes; extended time bills in 15-minute increments" - said once, on the enrollment form, forever.
- Invoice the day of the lesson if you do bill per-session - a same-day pay link gets paid; a month-end summary becomes a negotiation with memory.
The universal layer
- A pay link in every invoice - payment friction is measured in taps.
- Due-soon reminders before the deadline, automatic nudges after. Consistency collects better than charisma.
- State terms before work happens - on the agreement or intake form, signed. Terms announced after the fact are requests.
Need the words for an overdue balance? Our payment reminder templates cover the full sequence, and the get-paid-faster guide has the structural fixes.
Invoicing that runs itself
Ivy sends invoices with pay links, auto-charges cards on file, and nudges overdue balances automatically - payments go straight to your Stripe, 0% platform fees.
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