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02Delivery & Controls

Payment chain calculator

Add up the payment periods in the rule that governs your contract, in the unit the rule is written in, and see the wait in calendar days and what financing it costs on every certificate.

The seamThe office that signs the payment order and the contractor financing the work until it clears. The days are the owner’s design and the cost of them arrives in the bid, so the owner pays for the chain without ever seeing a line for it.

This page does two things. It converts a payment rule to calendar days, which matters because these rules are written in different units and one of them, Article 109, uses both inside a single chain, so they cannot be compared as they stand. Then it prices the wait: the certificate value and the rate below are used to work out what financing the gap costs the contractor for one certificate, which is the figure that arrives in the bid.

The values are an example: the Saudi chain on a five-day week with no public holidays, which is where the 80 days comes from. Replace them with the rule and the calendar that govern your own contract. Nothing is uploaded; the arithmetic runs in this page.

Five published rules, each read at the document, or your own periods.

Only affects a rule written in working days. A calendar-day rule is unmoved by it.

Holidays that fall on what would otherwise be a working day. Left at zero the output is the rule's own arithmetic; raise it and the wait lengthens.

Where the rule restarts a period on a return. Only Article 109 does, of the five.

The sum being waited for: one monthly or provisional certificate. Drives every money figure below and nothing else; the days are unaffected by it.

1,000,000

What the wait is priced at. The rate the contractor borrows at, not the owner's, because it is the contractor carrying the certificate. That difference is the stated reason in Directive 2011/7/EU for capping public payment periods.

% a year

A label only. The arithmetic is the same in any currency, and this puts a unit beside the money figures so they do not have to be remembered.

Saudi Executive Regulations, Article 109. The only one of the five written in two units, and the only one that restarts a period when the payment order is returned.

Against a real calendar

The arithmetic above spreads the working week and the holidays evenly across the year, which is the only honest thing to do when comparing rules with no start date. Give a submission date and the chain runs against real days instead, which is where the mixed units show what they do: a holiday lengthens a period written in working days and leaves a period written in calendar days exactly where it was.

Holidays are yours to enter. Nothing here tracks an announcement or a moon sighting, and a holiday nobody typed in does not exist as far as this page is concerned.

The day the first office received the statement and its supporting documents. Every one of these rules gates its clock on completeness, so a package short of its evidence has not started anything. Leave empty to skip this section.

Saudi Arabia, and most of the Gulf, closes Friday and Saturday. This affects only periods written in working days.

Which day of the restarting period the document came back on. Zero models a clean run. This is the input that costs the most, because the period then runs again in full from resubmission.

How long the office that raised the payment order needs before it goes back. Working days, so a return that lands inside a holiday cannot be answered until the office reopens, which is where a chain quietly gains weeks.

Public holidays

None entered, so the chain stops only for the weekend.

The preset is the 1446 pair on the official Umm al Qura calendar: Article 127 of the civil service HR regulations closes government offices from the 25th of Ramadan to the end of the 5th of Shawwal, and from the 5th to the 15th of Dhu al Hijjah, while the Labour Law gives an employee of a private firm four days at each. Under Article 109 the supervising consultant is the private firm and the agency is the government office, so one certificate passes two doors that are shut for different lengths of time. Check the dates against what your own offices announced, and type those instead if they differ.

Payment chain calculator

2026-10-01. projects-advisors.com/tools/payment-chain

Rule
Saudi Executive Regulations, Article 109
Working week, for the comparable figure
5 days, 0 public holidays a year
Returns modelled, for the comparable figure
0
Certificate value
1,000,000
Cost of money
8% a year
Submission date, which drives the dated run
not entered, so the dated run is off
Holiday dates, which drive the dated run
none
Return modelled on the dated run
none

From invoice to cash, every office on time

80 days from invoice to cash

25 working days and 45 calendar days, a chain in two units, with the working part converted on a 5-day week and no public holidays, in the rule as written. Every office meets its deadline in this figure, so it is the floor rather than the experience. One return of the payment order would add the whole of the last period again.

Who holds the paperAs writtenCalendar daysCumulative
Consultant verifies on site and reports10 working days1414
Government agency approves and issues the payment order15 working days2135
Ministry pays (restarts on a return)45 calendar days4580

What the wait costs, on one certificate

Financing 1,000,000 for 80 days at 8% a year costs 17,534.25, which is 1.75% of the certificate. A contractor who has read the rule can price that cost into the bid, and the FIDIC commentary listed below says longer payment periods raise contractors’ prices. An owner who has never computed it may be paying it without seeing a line for it.

The other published rules, in the same unit

RuleCalendar daysYours is longer byWhat those days cost
EU late payment directive 2011/7, Article 430+5010,958.9
UK Procurement Act 2023, section 6830+5010,958.9
US federal prompt payment rule, 5 CFR 1315.430+5010,958.9
FIDIC Red Book 1999, Sub-Clauses 14.6 and 14.756+245,260.27

Your chain is compared at the total shown at the top, returns included, because a chain that restarts is the length it restarts to. The other rules are shown at zero returns, since none of the other four has a restart provision to apply, and that asymmetry is the finding rather than a distortion. A negative figure means the rule you chose is the shorter one.

Who bears the chain's own slowness

Three of the five rules put the cost of lateness on the party that owns the chain. FIDIC runs financing charges from the due date whether or not the certificate was issued on time, so an Engineer's lateness costs the Employer. The US rule pays interest automatically, without the contractor claiming it. The UK Act voids a term that stretches the period. Article 109 restarts its longest clock when a payment order is returned, which puts the cost of a query on the party that raised the invoice. None of that is in the arithmetic above, which assumes everybody is on time; it decides who pays when they are not.

What this page cannot tell you

Whether the chain is worth its length. What a longer chain buys is verification before public money leaves, and whether the second and third verifications catch what the first would not is an empirical question nobody has published an answer to. The figure that would settle it is how many payment orders the later offices returned last year, for what, and what the return was worth. This page will not supply a verdict in its place, because a rating would be an opinion with arithmetic attached to it.

It also cannot tell you what actually happens. No dataset of real payment times against any of these five rules was found, so nothing here says whether they are met in practice, on either side.

Periods read at the document 6 and 7 September 2026: Saudi Executive Regulations Article 109; FIDIC 1999 Sub-Clauses 14.6 and 14.7 via a published clause commentary; Directive 2011/7/EU Article 4; Procurement Act 2023 section 68; 5 CFR 1315.4. The 2019 Saudi law and its regulations are replaced by the law gazetted on 4 September 2026 when it takes effect, and whether the new regulations change Article 109 is a review owed by January 2027. The conversion from working days to calendar days is this page's arithmetic, not any rule's. Without a submission date it spreads the working week and the holidays evenly across a year, which is the only honest thing to do when comparing rules that have no start date between them. With one, it walks the calendar you entered, day by day, and that is the figure your certificate is paid on.

The period that runs after completion, rather than during it, is a different clock and has its own page: the handover date calendar computes the defects and warranty periods from the same law.

Computed from

  • Executive Regulations of the Government Tenders and Procurement Law (2019 Executive Regulations, amended 1 September 2026; to be re-issued with the new law; read 2026-09-03)https://www.mof.gov.sa/en/Knowledgecenter/newGovTendandProcLow/Documents/Executive%20Regulations.pdf
  • Saudi Government Tenders and Procurement Law, Royal Decree M/128 (Royal Decree M/128 (1440), in force from 1 December 2019; replaced from about 2 January 2027; read 2026-09-03)https://www.mof.gov.sa/en/Knowledgecenter/newGovTendandProcLow/Documents/The%20Government%20Tenders%20and%20Procurement%20Law2.pdf
  • Government Tenders and Procurement Law, new law published in Umm Al-Qura 22/3/1448 (4 September 2026), Arabic (gazetted 4 September 2026; in force 120 days after publication; read 2026-09-05)https://www.uqn.gov.sa/decisions-and-regulations/4001762
  • Tyson, FIDIC 1999 Red Book, Clause 14 Contract Price and Payment, clause commentary, International Construction Knowledge Hub (FIDIC 1999 first edition, clause commentary; read 2026-09-07)https://internationalconstructionknowledgehub.com/wp-content/uploads/Clause-14.pdf
  • Directive 2011/7/EU on combating late payment in commercial transactions (OJ L 48, 23 February 2011; read 2026-09-07)https://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2011:048:0001:0010:EN:PDF
  • Procurement Act 2023, section 68, implied payment terms in public contracts (as in force 24 February 2025; read 2026-09-07)https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/54/section/68
  • 5 CFR 1315.4, Prompt payment standards, Office of Management and Budget (eCFR, current to 3 September 2026; read 2026-09-06)https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-5/chapter-III/subchapter-B/part-1315/section-1315.4
  • Executive Regulations for Human Resources in the Civil Service, Saudi Arabia, Article 127 (as amended to 2024; read 2026-09-07)https://www.hrsd.gov.sa/sites/default/files/2024-05/%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%84%D8%A7%D8%A6%D8%AD%D8%A9%20%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D9%86%D9%81%D9%8A%D8%B0%D9%8A%D8%A9%20%D9%84%D9%84%D9%85%D9%88%D8%A7%D8%B1%D8%AF%20%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A8%D8%B4%D8%B1%D9%8A%D8%A9.pdf
  • Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development, Holidays and Leaves, Labour Law entitlements (authored 15 November 2019; read 2026-09-07)https://www.hrsd.gov.sa/en/knowledge-centre/articles/322

What this computes from

Read the sources

  • Executive Regulations of the Government Tenders and Procurement Law2019 Executive Regulations, amended 1 September 2026; to be re-issued with the new law; read 2026-09-03.Free in full. Article 127 sets the receipt procedure, 128 a warranty period of not less than one year, 99 the ten-year liability, and 109 the payment chain. Note that the 2007 regulations of the superseded 2006 law are still hosted on the same site and number these provisions differently. Searched in the Arabic on 7 September 2026 for a late payment remedy: فائدة and فوائد, interest, appear zero times in the 117 pages of the law and its regulations. What exists instead is the claims route under Article 68 of the Law: the contractor files within 60 days of the event, the consultant reports within 21 days of a COMPLETE claim, the agency studies within 45, the committee under Article 86 decides within 45 of a complete claim, compensation is capped at 20% of the contract value and anything beyond that goes to the Administrative Court. So the contractor must initiate, evidence and win, where FIDIC 14.8 accrues charges automatically and without notice. Article 108, immediately before the payment chain, is the offset and was read in the Arabic on 7 September 2026: يجوز, may, not shall, the government authority MAY disburse an advance payment not exceeding 10% of the total contract value, against a bank guarantee equal to it, recovered from the contractor’s dues in instalments at a percentage equal to the advance percentage, from the value of each certificate, starting with the first. So the advance is discretionary, capped, costs a guarantee fee, and amortises to zero across the contract rather than standing as a buffer.
  • Saudi Government Tenders and Procurement Law, Royal Decree M/128Royal Decree M/128 (1440), in force from 1 December 2019; replaced from about 2 January 2027; read 2026-09-03.Free in full from the Ministry of Finance, in English. Issued 16 July 2019, in force from 1 December 2019.
  • Government Tenders and Procurement Law, new law published in Umm Al-Qura 22/3/1448 (4 September 2026), Arabicgazetted 4 September 2026; in force 120 days after publication; read 2026-09-05.Free in full, 101 articles, in the Official Gazette. Article 100 replaces Royal Decree M/128 (1440); Article 101 brings it into force 120 days after publication; Article 99 requires new Executive Regulations within the same period. Article 2 names life cycle cost, execution quality, operational efficiency and risk management among the law’s objectives. Article 59, read on 25 September 2026, keeps the final guarantee at 5% of the contract value, lodged within 15 working days of notice of the award and held until the contractor has performed its obligations and the project is finally received. Read on 5 September 2026.
  • Tyson, FIDIC 1999 Red Book, Clause 14 Contract Price and Payment, clause commentary, International Construction Knowledge HubFIDIC 1999 first edition, clause commentary; read 2026-09-07.Free. This commentary quotes the periods and, more usefully, what starts and stops them. The Engineer has 28 days to issue an Interim Payment Certificate "which states the amount the Engineer fairly determines to be due", so a statement is not thrown out because parts of it are disputed; the disputed part is trimmed and the rest certified. Sub-Clause 14.7 requires payment "within 56 days from the date the Engineer receives the Statement AND supporting documents", and the commentary states plainly that "the trigger for payment is the Engineer’s receipt of the Statement and supporting documentation", so an incomplete submission has not started the clock. Certification may be withheld only where the amount falls below the minimum in the Appendix to Tender, where work is not in accordance with the Contract (and then only the cost of rectification), or until the Employer has received and approved the Performance Security. Once issued, the Employer "must make payment in full, irrespective of any entitlement to compensation arising from any claim", which goes separately under 2.5. Financing charges run from the due date (14.8) and the Guidance offers 42 days as the alternative. It also states that longer payment periods raise contractors’ financing costs and their prices. Read 7 September 2026.
  • Directive 2011/7/EU on combating late payment in commercial transactionsOJ L 48, 23 February 2011; read 2026-09-07.Free, Official Journal text. Article 4: where the debtor is a public authority the payment period may not exceed 30 calendar days from the invoice, 60 at most where objectively justified, and any verification procedure may not exceed 30 days. Recital 23 gives the reason: public authorities have more secure revenue and cheaper finance, so long payment periods impose unjustified costs on undertakings. Read in full 7 September 2026.
  • Procurement Act 2023, section 68, implied payment terms in public contractsas in force 24 February 2025; read 2026-09-07.Free. Every public contract carries an implied term that sums due are paid within 30 days of a valid invoice; a term restricting it is without effect; regulations may change the period but not beyond 30 days. In force 24 February 2025, replacing regulation 113 of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015. Read 7 September 2026.
  • 5 CFR 1315.4, Prompt payment standards, Office of Management and BudgeteCFR, current to 3 September 2026; read 2026-09-06.Free. The US federal rule: payment due 30 days after receipt of a proper invoice where the contract does not say otherwise, an improper invoice returned within 7 days, and interest paid automatically when payment is late. Read 6 September 2026.
  • Executive Regulations for Human Resources in the Civil Service, Saudi Arabia, Article 127as amended to 2024; read 2026-09-07.Free in full, Arabic, 67 pages, published by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development. Article 127 sets the official holidays for civil servants: the weekly rest is Friday and Saturday; National Day is the first day of Libra, 23 September, and Founding Day 22 February, each with a stated substitution if it falls on a Friday or Saturday, as amended by Ministerial Decision 109878 of 9/7/1444; and the Eid holidays run from the 25th of Ramadan to the end of the 5th of Shawwal, and from the 5th of Dhu al-Hijjah to the end of the 15th. Article 128 adds that a single working day falling between two official holidays is itself a holiday. Read 7 September 2026.
  • Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development, Holidays and Leaves, Labour Law entitlementsauthored 15 November 2019; read 2026-09-07.Free, the ministry’s own labour education page, tagged “business sector” and written throughout of “the worker”, so it states the private sector entitlement. A 4-day Eid al-Fitr holiday beginning the day after 29 Ramadan on the Umm Al-Qura calendar, a 4-day Eid al-Adha holiday beginning on Arafat day, and the National Day on the first day of Libra with substitution if it falls at the weekend. Authored 15 November 2019. Read 7 September 2026. Set beside Article 127 of the civil service regulations it shows two different holiday regimes reaching two different steps of the same payment chain.

What the output feeds

Computed in your browser. Nothing you enter is sent to Projects Advisors or to anyone else.