🇦🇺Australia

Nicht abgerechnete Retainer-Leistungen durch manuelle Abstimmung

2 verified sources

Definition

Australian agencies working on fixed monthly retainers often deliver more work than covered by the agreed hours or deliverables (scope creep), but without a tight reconciliation process between time-tracking, retainers and invoices, these additional services never get billed. Industry guidance on invoice reconciliation stresses that line-by-line checks and matching of invoices to underlying records is time-consuming and prone to human error when done manually, making it easy to miss items and leave money uncollected.[1][4] Logic: For a typical AU marketing agency with 15–30 staff and 10–20 retainer clients, it is common for 3–5% of billable hours to go unbilled due to admin gaps, misaligned SOWs and manual reconciliation. At an average blended rate of AUD 180–220/h, this quickly creates substantial annual revenue leakage.

Key Findings

  • Financial Impact: Quantified (logic): 3–5% of annual fee revenue lost. For an agency with AUD 2m in retainer revenue, this equals ~AUD 60,000–100,000 per year in unbilled services.
  • Frequency: Monthly in every retainer cycle; more severe during busy campaign periods and at quarter/year-end when reconciliation is rushed.
  • Root Cause: Manual reconciliation of retainers against timesheets and scopes; lack of automated link between work performed and invoices; no systematic approval workflow for out-of-scope work; poor documentation of change requests.

Why This Matters

The Pitch: Marketing Services players in Australia 🇦🇺 waste AUD 50,000–150,000 per year on unbilled retainer work and missed scope creep. Automation of time capture, retainer drawdowns and invoice reconciliation eliminates this risk.

Affected Stakeholders

Agency Owners, Finance Manager, Account Directors, Project Managers

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Financial Impact

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Current Workarounds

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Methodology & Sources

Data collected via OSINT from regulatory filings, industry audits, and verified case studies.

Evidence Sources:

Related Business Risks

Verzögerter Zahlungseingang durch fehlerhafte Retainer-Abstimmung

Quantified (logic): 10–20 days additional DSO on AUD 500,000 open retainers, implying ~AUD 140,000–280,000 extra working capital tied up and ~AUD 11,000–20,000 per year in interest/opportunity cost at 8–10%.

Überhöhte Personalkosten durch manuelle Retainer-Abstimmung

Quantified (logic): 20–40 hours/month of finance time on manual reconciliation at AUD 50–75/h ≈ AUD 12,000–36,000 per year in labour cost, plus similar hidden cost in account management time.

Fehlerhafte Retainer-Rechnungen und Korrekturen

Quantified (logic): 1–2% of annual retainer revenue lost to write-offs and concessions from billing errors (≈AUD 20,000–40,000 per AUD 2m revenue), plus 5–10 hours/month of rework in finance.

Fehlentscheidungen durch ungenaue Retainer-Abgrenzung

Quantified (logic): 5–10% under-pricing on 20–30% of retainer revenue ≈ AUD 50,000–100,000 per AUD 2m annual retainer base.

Verlust von Markenrechten durch fehlende Lizenzkontrolle

Quantified: AUD 50,000–100,000 per year lost licensing/enforcement value per affected trade mark, plus AUD 20,000–150,000 one‑off legal and rebranding costs if a registration is removed or successfully challenged due to inadequate control/monitoring of licensees.

Ungelöste Lizenzgebühren durch ineffizientes Reporting

Quantified: 5–15 % under‑reported royalties per year, typically AUD 25,000–150,000 p.a. for a mid‑size Australian brand licensing program, compounding to AUD 125,000–750,000 over a 5‑year licence term.

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