Quick answer
Aged receivables is a report listing the money customers owe your business, sorted by how long each invoice has been outstanding, usually in columns for current, 30, 60 and 90-plus days. Lenders use it to judge how quickly you get paid and which invoices are good enough to lend against. Older debts are worth less, and invoices past 90 days are often excluded entirely.
Key points
- Groups every unpaid customer invoice by age, normally in 30-day buckets
- Invoice and debtor financiers lend against the younger buckets, not the whole total
- A slow-paying debtor can drag otherwise fresh invoices from the same customer out of the funding pool
- Your accounting software produces it in seconds; reconcile it before a lender sees it
Open Xero, MYOB or QuickBooks, ask for an aged receivables report, and you get a table with one row per customer and a handful of columns: current, 1 to 30 days overdue, 31 to 60, 61 to 90, and older. The total on the right is your accounts receivable. The columns are what turn that total into something a lender can judge.
What each column is really saying
Some packages age invoices from the date they were issued and others from the due date, so check the setting before you print one for a lender. Either way, the story reads left to right:
| Column | What a credit assessor tends to think |
|---|---|
| Current | Healthy. Most of this will turn into cash on time. |
| 30 days | Common in wholesale and the trades. |
| 60 days | Starting to slip. Who are these customers, and is there a dispute? |
| 90 days and over | Doubtful. Often treated as worth nothing for lending purposes. |
A business can carry $400k of receivables and still be short of cash if half of it sits in the right-hand columns. The report shows that instantly, which is why it’s often the first document an invoice financier asks for.
Why the ageing matters more than the total
With invoice finance and debtor finance, your customer invoices are the security. The funder advances a percentage of the eligible ledger, not the whole thing, and eligibility is decided largely by age.
Three adjustments come up again and again:
- Old invoices drop out. Anything past roughly 90 days from invoice date is usually excluded.
- Bad payers can taint good invoices. Many funders apply a rule where, once a big enough share of one customer’s balance goes past 90 days, every invoice from that customer is excluded, including this month’s. Ask any funder exactly where it draws that line.
- Big customers get capped. A concentration limit restricts how much of the funding can rest on a single debtor.
There’s also a quieter point. Under the Payment Times Reporting Scheme, large businesses must lodge reports on their supplier payment record, and those reports are published. If a big customer lives in your 60-day column, their own published figures can give you firmer ground when you chase them.
Wondering how much of your ledger a funder would actually count? Send us the basics and we’ll give you an honest read.
Worked example: a Melbourne electrical wholesaler
The wholesaler’s aged receivables total $300k:
| Bucket | Amount |
|---|---|
| Current | $150k |
| 30 days | $80k |
| 60 days | $40k |
| 90 days and over | $30k |
The $30k in the oldest column comes off first. Then the funder spots that $12k of the 60-day balance belongs to a builder who also owes $20k of that 90-plus amount, so the builder’s whole account is removed. That leaves an eligible ledger of $258k. If one customer makes up $90k of what’s left and the concentration cap is 25%, a further slice drops out.
So a “$300k ledger” might support an advance worked out on something nearer $230k. Our invoice finance calculator lets you test the numbers with your own figures.
How to tidy the report before a lender reads it
- Reconcile it with your bank account so paid invoices aren’t still showing as owing.
- Apply credit notes and unallocated payments, which often sit in the older columns by mistake.
- Write off invoices you know won’t be paid; leaving them in only hurts the picture.
- Be ready to explain any disputed amounts and anything with a retention attached.
- Track your debtor days alongside the report, because a falling figure is persuasive.
For collection habits that keep the right-hand columns small, see our guide on managing slow-paying customers.
Turning a clean ledger into working capital
If your report is full of good customers who simply take 45 or 60 days to pay, that money can usually be unlocked well before they settle up. Tell us roughly what your receivables look like, how old they are and who owes them. Filling in our form is roughly a sixty-second job, and asking leaves your credit history untouched because no check is run at that stage. We keep what you send in-house instead of broadcasting it to dozens of funders; a person who knows debtor funding reads it and phones you. Share the true ageing, older invoices included, so our first suggestion actually fits.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between aged receivables and accounts receivable?
Accounts receivable is the total owed to you on a given date. Aged receivables is the same total broken down by how long each invoice has been unpaid, which shows a lender the quality of the money, not just the amount.
Why do lenders exclude invoices over 90 days?
The longer an invoice goes unpaid, the less likely it is to be paid in full. Most invoice financiers treat anything past 90 days from invoice date as too risky to advance against, although they still expect you to keep chasing it.
How often should I run an aged receivables report?
Weekly is a good habit for most small businesses, and daily if cash is tight. If you use debtor finance, your funder will usually want an updated ledger at least monthly and often link directly to your accounting software.
Can a bad aged receivables report stop me getting a business loan?
It can count against you, particularly for invoice finance, because the report is the security. For a property-secured loan it matters less, although a lender will still read a heavy 90-plus column as a sign of cash flow strain.
Does the report include GST?
Usually yes, because your invoices include GST. Some funders calculate their advance on the GST-inclusive amount and others on the GST-exclusive figure, so ask which applies when comparing offers.