The bad news is, advertisers and agencies are taking longer to pay their bills than ever before. Although GetRelevant's been in business for more than a year, Harad says timely pay-up has only become a problem over the past four months. GetRelevant's not alone. Whenever we've scrutinized AR, we've definitely identified accounts that are probably bad debt or very, very late. I definitely concur with others that it has been going on.
Some vendors feel the problem is isolated to insolvent dot- coms.
That's just horrible for everyone. We've had a few we had to write off. Others note that big advertisers can be equal offenders. We often find ourselves waiting 90 days or more for final payment from some of the larger companies. Things don't seem to be any easier for European vendors.