Rachel, this is a problem in the US as well. All of my smaller clients, when expecting to pay me late, have always been fairly up-front about it. But large businesses, to your point, wait until the last possible moment, and then stick you with having to run the gauntlet of accounts payable staff and finance procedures. Even when a contract stipulates that late charges can be assessed, getting those from a large company has always been impossible, in my experience.

As someone who has worked both sides of this — I’m usually at the big company hiring friends for contract work — I can say that I’ve actually been told by finance types that they always intend to pay late to small businesses, precisely because the little guy has next to no recourse than to wait to be paid. So, I usually caution my friends about this before they sign a contract with whatever company I’m at — and I usually try to get them some portion paid up-front to help mitigate late payments later.