Germany Corporate Payment Survey 2021: Learning to live with the pandemic

The 5^th edition of Coface’s survey on corporate payment experience in Germany was conducted in July and August 2021, with 819 companies participating.

One of the main takeaways is that German companies seem to have acclimatised to the pandemic environment. More companies are offering payment terms compared to last year when the figure had fallen sharply. Although Germany experienced a strong recession in 2020 and early 2021, payment discipline continued to improve in 2021 compared to already good results in 2020. Furthermore, the average duration of payment delays shortened by over a week.

The business outlook from surveyed companies is very positive. However, this assessment must be put into perspective as it comes after a recession in 2020. 41% of participants have a positive economic outlook for 2021. While the share of respondents with a positive outlook for 2022 remains high, it falls to 32%, reflecting lower certainty. Although the effects of COVID-19 remain a major risk, companies perceive disruptions of global production chains as the main risk for their exporting operations in 2021.