Australian Construction Payment Statistics 2026

Large construction organisations reported average payment terms of 34 days and an average payment time of 33.5 days, but it took 68 days for 95% of small-business construction invoices to be paid. Construction also directed a larger share of procurement value to small businesses than any other industry in the regulator's comparison.

This page was checked on 12 September 2026. Payment figures come from the Australian Government's reporting scheme; construction output comes from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

Key Australian construction statistics

34 days: average common payment term reported by construction entities.
33.5 days: average time taken to pay small-business invoices.
47 days: time taken to pay 80% of construction invoices.
68 days: time taken to pay 95% of construction invoices.
64.8%: construction invoices paid within agreed terms.
54.7%: construction invoices paid within 30 days.
43.3%: construction procurement value sourced from small businesses.
266: construction reporting entities in the regulator's analysis.
2,012: controlled entities represented by those construction reporters.
$82.5 billion: seasonally adjusted Australian construction work done in Q2 2026.
1.3 million: people employed by construction in the ABS's 2023-24 industry profile.
7.0%: construction's share of Australian GDP in that ABS profile.

How long do large construction companies take to pay small suppliers?

The construction average was 33.5 days, six days slower than the all-industry average of 27.4 days. The more revealing comparison is at the tail: 80% of construction invoices were paid within 47 days and 95% within 68 days.

Payment measure	Construction	All industries	Construction difference
Common term	34 days	29 days	5 days longer
Average payment time	33.5 days	27.4 days	6.1 days longer
80th-percentile payment time	47 days	39 days	8 days longer
95th-percentile payment time	68 days	64 days	4 days longer
Paid within terms	64.8%	66.5%	1.7 points lower
Paid within 30 days	54.7%	68.2%	13.5 points lower

The source is Table 9 and Table 8 of the Payment Times Regulator's January 2026 report. It covers qualifying large reporting businesses paying small-business suppliers, not household customers paying local trades.

Where does construction rank against other industries?

Construction had the second-longest average payment time, just behind manufacturing.

Industry	Average payment	80% paid by	95% paid by	Paid within 30 days
Manufacturing	33.7 days	47 days	67 days	54.3%
Construction	33.5 days	47 days	68 days	54.7%
Mining	30.0 days	39 days	70 days	63.5%
Wholesale	29.3 days	41 days	65 days	64.1%
Retail	28.7 days	40 days	77 days	65.3%
All industries	27.4 days	39 days	64 days	68.2%

Construction's 54.7% paid-within-30-days rate was only 0.4 percentage points above manufacturing, the lowest result in the industry table. However, construction's paid-within-agreed-terms result was 64.8%, because its common terms were longer.

How important are small businesses to construction procurement?

Construction sourced 43.3% of procurement value from small businesses—the highest proportion among the 19 industries reported. The industry accounted for 266 reporting entities, 8.6% of the 3,098 entities used in the analysis, and represented 2,012 controlled entities.

Industry	Procurement value sourced from small business
Construction	43.3%
Administrative & support services	41.9%
Agriculture, forestry & fishing	41.5%
Education & training	39.3%
Other services	37.6%
All industries	28.7%
Mining	21.1%

Because construction depends heavily on smaller suppliers, its payment cycle has an unusually direct relationship with subcontractor and trade-business cash flow.

How large is Australian construction activity?

Australia recorded $82.5 billion of seasonally adjusted construction work in the June quarter of 2026. The ABS preliminary release reported:

Construction category	Q2 2026 value	Quarterly change	Annual change
Total construction	$82.516bn	-2.1%	+2.7%
Building	$45.844bn	+1.3%	+10.0%
Residential building	$27.867bn	+1.7%	+9.1%
Non-residential building	$17.977bn	+0.5%	+11.5%
Engineering construction	$36.672bn	-6.0%	-5.1%

The trend estimate was $82.0 billion, 0.7% higher for the quarter and 4.5% higher over the year. The preliminary release had an approximately 80% response rate and is subject to revision.

How many people and businesses depend on construction?

The ABS's construction industry profile reported approximately 1.3 million people employed in construction, a 7.0% contribution to GDP in 2023-24, and industry income of $633.6 billion. Those scale measures are older than the quarterly payment data and are labelled by reference period rather than presented as 2026 observations.

What was happening to small construction sales in 2026?

Xero's anonymised platform data showed Australian small-construction-business sales growing 10.8% year over year in Q2 2026, ahead of the all-industry small-business result of 6.5%. Mining grew 14.0% and utilities 13.1%. The same national dataset recorded 22.9 days to be paid and 6.0 days late across small businesses. Xero did not publish a construction-specific late-payment figure in that release, so the national payment number should not be labelled a construction result. See Xero's Q2 2026 release.

Methodology and citation notes

The Payment Times Reporting Scheme generally covers businesses with annual consolidated revenue above $100 million and certain Commonwealth entities. Its payment figures describe their payments to qualifying small suppliers during the January-June 2025 cycle. ABS construction-work figures are chain-volume measures with a 2023-24 reference year. Xero measures its own anonymised customer sample. These datasets answer different questions and are intentionally kept separate.

Suggested citation: “InvoiceSonic, Australian Construction Payment Statistics 2026, checked 12 September 2026.” Retain the linked government or original data source when citing a particular number.

For a practical billing workflow, use the construction invoicing software guide, create a contractor invoice, or structure staged work with our contractor payment-schedule example.

Australian Construction Payment Statistics 2026