Heineken UK Limited reported an average of 93 days to pay its suppliers in the six months to 30 June 2026, with 60% of its invoices paid more than 60 days after it received them.
The next slowest were Diageo Scotland Limited at 79 days, DigitasLBi Limited at 77 days, McCormick (UK) Limited at 63 days (the six months to 31 May 2026) and Baxters Food Group Limited at 62 days (the six months to 30 September 2026). Those reports cover the six months to 30 June 2026 unless shown.
Across the 69 companies, the median company paid 75% of its invoices within 30 days, against 64% for all UK reporters. In all, six of the Edinburgh companies said half or more of their invoices were not paid within the terms agreed with the supplier; the median share paid late was 8%, against 15% nationally.
The largest shares of invoices paid outside agreed terms were reported by Baxters Food Group Limited (89%), JDR Cable Systems Limited (80%) and DigitasLBi Limited (68%).
The fastest payers were Clearbridge Investment Management Limited, NatWest Markets PLC and The Royal Bank of Scotland Public Limited Company, at 5 days each.
Of the 64 companies that also reported for a period ending about a year earlier, 26 were paying faster on average and 33 slower.
Construction and retentions
Of the Edinburgh companies, 17 reported construction contracts in their latest period, and 10 said those contracts include retention clauses, which let the paying party hold back part of each payment until the work is finished or its defects period ends. The typical standard retention rate was 5%. Companies reporting retention clauses include Avant Homes (Scotland) Limited, Miller Homes Limited and Edinburgh Airport Limited (5% each). The construction and retention questions were added to the reports filed from July 2025, so they appear only in the most recent filings.
How the figures were worked out
Large companies and limited liability partnerships must publish their payment figures every six months under the Reporting on Payment Practices and Performance Regulations 2017. The figures here are what each company filed on the government’s Check payment practices service, published as open data under the Open Government Licence v3.0, as downloaded on 3 November 2026. Each company’s latest report is used, counting only reports for periods that ended on or after 4 May 2025. Companies are placed in Edinburgh by the registered office address held by Companies House (data as at 1 September 2026), using postcode districts EH1 to EH17. A registered office is where a company is registered, not necessarily where it trades or employs people. The median is the middle company when all are ranked. Reports with figures that cannot be right, such as an average above 365 days or a share above 100%, are left out. Figures for groups are as filed by each subsidiary.
Every company’s full payment record, report by report: Fair Payment.
Chart: Edinburgh Business News, from Check payment practices open data.
Fair Payment is published by Domain Farm Limited, which also publishes Edinburgh Business News.