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The average payment delay for Spanish businesses reached 14.36 days in Q2 2026, slightly below the previous quarter, according to INFORMA's Spanish Business Payment Behaviour Study. It therefore remains above 14 days, a figure it had fallen below in the final quarter of 2025, although it is down by half a day year over year.
Nathalie Gianese, Director of Research at Informa D&B, states: “During Q2 2026 the average payment delay for Spanish businesses remained above 14 days, as was the case last year with the exception of the last three months, when it fell to 13.97 days”. The delays recorded represent a direct cost for Spain’s business fabric of nearly €3.1 billion.
Informa D&B has conducted its study on invoicing habits amounting to €18.738 billion. Of the total, 35% corresponds to on-time payments, 62.5% to payments within 30 days and nearly 2% to payments delayed by more than 60 days.
The proportion of on-time payments, 43.26%, fell both quarter over quarter, by 0.68 percentage points (pp), and year over year, by 2.03 pp. Payments made after more than 60 days accounted for 5.39%, down 0.67 pp compared with the same period a year earlier.
Hospitality is the sector with the longest payment delays against agreed terms in Q2 2026, with a 23.75-day delay. Public Administration follows with a 23.19-day delay, despite posting the most notable year-over-year decline, down 4.27 days. Energy, Hospitality, Healthcare and Other services paid worse than a year ago.
Six sectors have an average delay below the overall figure: Construction and Real Estate Activities, with a 13.80-day delay, Communications, 13.44 days, Education, 13.37, Trade, 12.60 days, Extractive Industries, 11.06 days, and Manufacturing, 10.19 days. Comparing payment terms between the Hospitality and Manufacturing sectors, the gap is 13.56 days.
Compared with the same period a year earlier, the average payment delay increased in six autonomous communities: the Balearic Islands, the Canary Islands, Castile-La Mancha, Galicia, Melilla and Navarre. The most significant declines were recorded in Ceuta, Cantabria and Aragon, down 9.02, 1.31 and 1.24 days, respectively. In Q2, Melilla was the region with the highest average delay, at 26.25 days, followed by the Canary Islands, at 21.84, and the Balearic Islands, at 20.98 days, the only ones above 20 days.
In Navarre the delay does not reach 10 days, at 9.88. In the Basque Country it stood at a 10.18-day delay, Asturias at 10.73 days and Cantabria at 11.07 days.
In Q2 only the Basque Country reached 50% of on-time payments, at 51.34%. Navarre stood at 49.89%, Castile and León at 49.46%, and Asturias at 48.99%. At the other end, the Canary Islands had the lowest percentage, with only 26.77% of payments on time, followed by Madrid, 40.41%, Ceuta, 40.74%, and the Balearic Islands, at 40.82%.
The percentage of on-time payments among large corporations stood at 14%
48.6% of payments by micro-enterprises and 44.4% by small businesses were on time, compared with 29.4% for medium-sized businesses and 14.3% for large corporations in Q2 2026. Although most payments by medium-sized and large corporations were made with a delay of up to 30 days, at 64.9% and 80.7%, respectively, compared with 40.5% and 49.3% for micro-enterprises and small businesses.
With delays of more than 60 days, micro-enterprises reached 7.5%, small businesses 4%, medium-sized businesses 3% and large corporations, slightly over 2%.
Small businesses recorded the lowest average delay, at 12.14 days, 0.18 days lower than the same quarter in 2025. For medium-sized businesses it reached 12.71 days, up 0.08 days. For large corporations the delay came to 13.79 days, a reduction of nearly half a day year over year, while micro-enterprises had the highest delay, at 16.81 days, although it fell by 0.75 days over a year.
