EOS Study 'European Payment Practices 2025': Payment morale in Europe continues to decline.

European companies primarily cite short-term liquidity bottlenecks of their private customers (54 percent) and forgetfulness (51 percent) as reasons for late payment or even payment default. In Germany, every second company suspects liquidity bottlenecks as the reason for payment delays, with forgetfulness being the second most frequently mentioned reason by respondents (47 percent).

For business customers, the European average primarily cites payment defaults by their own customers (61 percent) and the exploitation of supplier credits (57 percent) as reasons. However, slow, non-digitized processing procedures (48 percent) also likely cause delays, according to the respondents. 43 percent see over-indebtedness and insolvencies of their business partners as the cause of unpaid invoices.

In Germany, 47 percent of respondents each suspect that payment defaults by their own customers and the exploitation of supplier credits are reasons for poor payment morale.

Particularly challenging for companies: Some customers apparently do not pay late by mistake. Around a third of European companies assume that both business customers (31 percent) and private customers (34 percent) deliberately do not pay their invoices. German companies have more trust in their customers' payment morale: here, only 18 percent suspect intentional non-payment from their business customers and 24 percent from their private customers.