The gap between doing the work and being paid is where small businesses lose their working capital. How you close it depends on where your client is standing. Balaana covers the three cases: paying an invoice remotely, paying you in person, and paying you on a schedule. Payment collection is part of the $7/month Plus plan.

Paying an invoice, from anywhere

A Pay now button sits on the invoice itself, so your client settles in the moment they open it rather than adding it to a list.

  • Card. Visa, Mastercard and Amex, straight from the invoice, with no account to create.
  • PayID. Paid from their banking app in seconds, and it usually clears the same day.
  • Bank transfer. Your BSB and account number still appear on every invoice, for the clients who will always pay that way.

Tap to Pay: take a card with just your phone

If your client is standing in front of you, they can tap their card, phone or watch on the back of your phone. No terminal, no card reader, no hardware to buy, rent or remember to charge. It works on supported iPhone and Android handsets, and the payment lands against the right client and the right invoice in Balaana straight away.

This is the part that matters if you finish a session, a cut, a clean or a job and want the money before you walk away. A trainer at the park, a mobile hairdresser in someone's kitchen and a gardener at the gate all have the same problem, which is that the money is easiest to collect in the sixty seconds before you leave.

A Tap to Pay payment is a card payment, so the same rule applies to it as online: from 1 October 2026, no card surcharge. Our guide to credit card surcharges covers what changed and what you can do instead.

PayTo: bill the same client every month, without chasing

PayTo is the modern alternative to direct debit, built on Australia's New Payments Platform. Your client authorises an agreement once, in their own banking app, and after that you draw the payment on the schedule you both agreed. The money moves from their bank account in real time, around the clock, instead of waiting for a batch that only runs on business days.

It suits anything billed on a repeat: a ten-session training pack, a studio membership, term fees for a tutor, a weekly cleaning or mowing round, or a monthly retainer for a bookkeeper or a designer. Instead of issuing the same invoice twelve times and chasing four of them, you set the agreement up once.

One honest limitation: PayTo has to be supported by your client's bank, and coverage is not yet universal. Australian Payments Plus, which runs the scheme, puts it at more than 50 financial institutions, against more than 100 for PayID. Personal accounts are ahead of business accounts, and some account types are excluded, so a client whose bank is not ready yet pays you another way in the meantime.

It is better than direct debit for your client too, which is the reason they will agree to it. They can see every active agreement inside their banking app, along with the amount and the frequency, and they can pause or cancel it themselves without ringing you. That visibility is the whole point of the scheme, and it is why a PayTo request is an easier thing to ask for than a signed direct debit form.

What it costs

$7 a month covers the software. On top of that, any payment Balaana collects for you carries a per-payment transaction fee, whether it is a card on the invoice, a card tapped on your phone, PayID or a PayTo agreement, and you see it before you switch payments on. A client who pays you by direct bank transfer costs nothing at all.

That structure is deliberate: the fee only applies when you have actually been paid, which is the only fair moment to charge a business that is watching every dollar.

Chasing, without the awkward phone call

Plus also sends automatic reminders on a schedule you set: a nudge a few days before the due date, one on the day, and follow-ups after. Most overdue invoices are not disputes, they are things that fell off someone's desk, and a polite automatic reminder settles them without you having to make the call. Our guide to getting paid on time covers the terms and wording that work.

It reconciles itself

When a payment arrives, Balaana marks the invoice paid, records the income against the right client, and files the GST on it into the current quarter. With a bank feed connected, payments made outside Balaana get matched to their invoice too, so the ledger stays right without you ticking anything off.

Related

Frequently asked questions

Yes. Tap to Pay turns your own phone into the card reader, so your client taps their card, phone or watch on the back of it. There is no terminal to buy or rent, nothing to charge overnight, and nothing extra to carry. It works on supported iPhone and Android handsets and the payment reconciles against the invoice in Balaana immediately.

PayTo is a payment agreement on Australia’s New Payments Platform, and it does the job the direct debit form used to do. Your client approves it once inside their own banking app, then you draw payments on the agreed schedule and the money moves in real time rather than in an overnight batch. The difference that matters to your client is visibility: they can see, pause or cancel the agreement in their banking app at any time, which makes it an easier thing to say yes to than a signed direct debit authority.

Yes, that is what PayTo is for. Set the amount and the frequency once, your client authorises it in their banking app, and the payment comes through on schedule without an invoice to chase. It suits training packs, studio memberships, term fees, weekly cleaning or mowing rounds and monthly retainers.

No. Balaana handles the payment setup through its payment provider, so there is no separate merchant account application. You connect your bank account for payouts and that is the extent of it.

PayID payments generally clear the same day. Card payments settle to your account on the payment provider’s standard schedule, which is typically a couple of business days after the client pays.

Not as a surcharge. From 1 October 2026 you cannot add a surcharge to eftpos, Mastercard, Visa or American Express card payments, in person or online. You can build the cost into your prices, or offer a discount for paying by bank transfer, which usually costs you nothing: your BSB and account number are on every invoice.

That still works and costs nothing. Your BSB and account number stay on every invoice. With a bank feed connected on Plus, Balaana matches the deposit to the open invoice and marks it paid for you.