I was speaking to a vendor on a Monday. He had product ready for me. He sent me the bill on Friday. I told him I’d get the bill paid right away and he said something along the lines of “I never worry about getting paid from you.”. Big businesses are well known to drag out payment terms to as much as 90 days. My philosophy is simple. If you have the money to pay what you owe, you should do it. Your vendors will appreciate it because they have bills to pay and potentially a cash crunch of their own.
There are caveats, of course. If your business doesn’t have the cash it needs without extending payments to improve cash flow then you’ve got to stretch the payments out. But if you have the cash in your bank pay the bill. Whatever interest you might earn on that cash is a poor investment versus being known as a good customer at an important vendor.