Guide to cross-border credit and claims management : supporting SMEs in enforcing cross-border claims

With a population of over 500 million the European Union is one of the largest markets worldwide. Particularly for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), there are many opportunities to offer their goods and services not only in their own countries but also in the other 27 EU Member States. However many businesses, particularly small ones, baulk at cross-border operations. Reasons for this vary greatly. One of the biggest obstacles for many entrepreneurs is not knowing whether a customer in another EU country will pay bills on time or how best to proceed in the event that this occurs and default of payment results. This guideline is intended to support SMEs in enforcing cross-border claims in two different ways: by describing measures an entrepreneur can take from as early as the point of submitting a quotation up to the point of initiating European proceedings to prevent and avoid bad debt; by describing measures available to an entrepreneur should an actual case of bad debt come about.