How you get paid, and what to do if a customer does not

Most jobs are paid without anyone having to think about it. This page is for the rest: the evidence to keep on every job, and the official steps - most of them free or cheap - when a customer will not pay.

How payment works on Ultra Task

1. You finish the job, add your photos in the Ultra Tasker app and tap Mark job done.
2. The customer confirms it is done too. A job is paid once you both confirm it.
3. That evening the customer is emailed a secure payment link. Each job gets one link and it can only be paid once.
4. When they pay, Stripe - our payment provider - sends your share to the bank account you gave Stripe when you set up payouts. Ultra Task never sees or stores your bank details.

If you have not set up payouts yet, a customer cannot pay you: do it from the Payouts page in the Ultra Tasker app. It takes about five minutes.

Your evidence: photos on every job

If a customer ever says the job was not done, or disputes the card payment with their bank, your photos are what settles it. Upload them in the app - we record when each one arrives and a fingerprint of the file, which a photo sent later by message cannot prove.

• Before you start: one wide photo of every room or area you will work on. These cannot be taken later.
• When you finish: the same shots from the same angles, plus close-ups of the detail work - the oven, the shower, the grout, the assembled item.
• One photo that shows the place, such as the front door with the house number.
• Never photograph people, mail, ID, screens or family photos.
• Keep the originals on your phone for at least six years - the time limit for claiming an unpaid debt in most states (three years in the Northern Territory).

If the customer has not paid

Under Ultra Task's terms we are not the provider of the service: the agreement for the work is between you and the customer, so an unpaid job is a debt the customer owes you. These are the usual steps, in order.

1. Reminders - we send these for you

We re-send the customer's payment link on days 1, 3, 7, 14 and 21. On day 14 we also email you, and you can reply to that email for us to send a final reminder on your behalf. Keep any contact of your own polite, factual and at reasonable hours - the ACCC and ASIC guideline on collecting debts applies to anyone chasing their own money.

2. A letter of demand

A formal letter giving the amount, what it is for and a deadline - usually 14 days. In South Australia you must serve a Final Notice giving 21 days, and in the Northern Territory a letter of demand is a required step before a claim. Send it by email and by registered post. business.gov.au has a guide and a template; here is the same thing filled in for an Ultra Task job:

[Your name or business name] - ABN [your ABN]
[Your address] - [your email and phone]

[Date]

[Customer name]
[Customer address]

LETTER OF DEMAND - Invoice [number] dated [date] - [amount]

On [date] I carried out [the job, e.g. four hours of end of lease cleaning] at [address], booked through Ultra Task (booking [reference]). The work was completed that day; photos and the completion record are attached.

The payment link for [amount] was sent on [date] and reminders on [dates]. It remains unpaid.

Please pay [amount] by [date - 14 days from this letter; 21 days in South Australia] using the payment link.

If payment is not received by that date, I intend to lodge a claim with [the forum for your state, e.g. QCAT] to recover the debt and my filing costs, without further notice.

If you dispute the amount, please reply in writing by that date and say why.

[Your name]
Attached: invoice, booking confirmation, completion photos, reminders.

3. Free help to sort it out

• The Australian Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman's Dispute Support tool asks a few questions and points you to the right free or low-cost service for your state.
• Your state's small business commissioner offers free advice and low-cost mediation - mainly for disputes between two businesses, which includes any dispute you have with Ultra Task itself.
• The Fair Work Ombudsman is not the place for this: it says it cannot enforce a contractor's unpaid invoice, and it points contractors to the Ombudsman tool above.

4. Small claims in your state

Every state and territory has a small claims court or tribunal for debts like this. You do not need a lawyer, the process is informal, and your photos, the job record and your emails are exactly the evidence it looks at. If you win you can usually recover the filing fee from the customer, and fee waivers exist if paying it would be a hardship.

Fees checked 24 September 2026. They change every 1 July - confirm on the court's own page before you file.

If the customer disputes the card payment

A customer can ask their bank to reverse a card payment, usually within about four months. When that happens Ultra Task answers the bank with the job record and your photos, so the same evidence that wins a small claim also answers a chargeback. Upload your photos on the day - an answer is due within days, not weeks.

Invoices, ABN and GST

Put your ABN on anything you send. If you are not registered for GST (you only have to be once your turnover reaches the GST threshold), call it an invoice, not a tax invoice. Not being registered for GST does not stop you claiming a debt.