DPO (Days Payable Outstanding)

What this report shows

DPO (Days Payable Outstanding) is the average number of days PolitiFast takes to pay a vendor bill after receiving it. Computed over bills paid in the last 90 days, comparing each bill's receipt date to its payment date.

Higher DPO usually means better working capital — but stretching vendors too long damages relationships and can mean lost early-payment discounts.

How to read it

• DPO (overall) — average days-to-pay across every bill paid in the window. Compare against your typical agreed payment terms (e.g. Net 30, Net 60).
• Bills paid — sample size. A handful of bills makes the average noisy.
• Cash paid out — total spend in the window.
• Slowest-paid vendor — the vendor we pay the most slowly. Investigate before they put us on hold.

Common questions

• Is high DPO good or bad? It depends. If your agreed terms are Net 30 and DPO is 45, you're behind. If terms are Net 60 and DPO is 35, you're paying faster than required (giving up the cash buffer).
• Why doesn't a draft bill count? DPO only measures bills that were paid. Drafts and unposted bills aren't in the population.
• Why is the page empty? Either the purchase-invoices schema isn't installed (migrations 135 + 138) or there are no paid bills in the last 90 days.

What to do if numbers look wrong

1. Open `/admin/accounting/purchase-invoices` and confirm the bills include a `received_at` and a `paid_at` timestamp.
2. Spot-check the slowest-vendor row — sometimes one big bill that was paid late dominates the average.
3. If DPO seems impossibly low, check whether some bills were back-dated when imported.