Your best supplier might be the one who never bid
Payvio | ~2 min read
Western Australia's government commits to paying small business suppliers within 20 days (SBDC). Nationally, the picture is different, according to the Payment Times Reporting Regulator's latest data (Payment Times Reporting Scheme): the average agreed payment term is 29 days, but it takes 64 days to clear 95% of small business invoices, and around one-third of invoices aren't paid within the term actually agreed for that deal.
The real cost isn't the wait: it's who doesn't show up
A supplier who can carry that cash gap prices it in and bids anyway. A supplier who can't, doesn't bid at all. That second group never appears in procurement data, because a tender you didn't submit isn't recorded as a loss, it's just absent.
That's not only a payment problem. It's a competition problem. Government wants more SME participation in tenders, more competitive pricing, and more genuine choice. But long or unpredictable payment cycles quietly narrow the field before a single bid is compared on price or quality, filtering for balance-sheet size rather than capability.
Where Payvio fits
Payvio is B2B transaction credit: buyers keep their agreed payment terms in full, and suppliers get paid fast on approved invoices. For WA tender buyers, that means:
Suppliers are paid within 24–48 hours of invoice approval, on their own terms.
Buyers retain their standard payment terms and cash-flow position, without taking on new debt or balance-sheet strain.
A capable supplier's decision to bid stops being a cash-flow decision. The tender they would have skipped becomes one they can actually price and submit.
The suppliers government most needs at the table are often the ones its own payment cycle has already priced out. Payvio removes capital as the barrier between a capable SME and a bid they'd otherwise win.
Sources: WA Small Business Development Corporation, government payment terms policy; Payment Times Reporting Scheme Regulator's Update (January 2026).
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