Asking for an Akonto as an electrical contractor: what the law provides — and what it does not

A sizeable renovation, three months on site, material already ordered and installed — and the contractor would like a payment before the next stage begins. Whether that is permissible does not depend on whether the customer would agree to it, but on a single question: what the quote says about partial payments.

Payment falls due only on delivery — even for parts of the work

The article on quote variations already shows that under a contract for work and services (Werkvertrag) payment in principle falls due on delivery of the work (Art. 372 para. 1 OR, the Swiss Code of Obligations). The law provides an exception, but a narrow one: if the work is to be delivered in parts and the price has been set per part, each part is to be paid for on its delivery (Art. 372 para. 2 OR).

This second rule is the legal basis for an Akonto — a payment on account — by construction stage. But it only applies if both have been agreed: the division into parts and a partial price for each. If the quote states only a total price for the work as a whole, there are legally no "parts" for which anything would fall due while the job is under way — the full price is owed only on delivery of the entire work, however far the work has progressed.

Without that agreement, an Akonto is purely a matter of contract

The Code of Obligations does not itself know the term "Akonto"; in practice it denotes a payment against a debt that has not yet fully fallen due. As with Skonto, the early-payment discount: a payment term the law does not regulate applies only if it has been agreed.

There is a second reason a customer may refuse a demand for an Akonto that has no contractual basis: under a bilateral contract, neither party can require the other to perform without having performed itself or offering to perform — unless the contract provides otherwise (Art. 82 OR). Under a Werkvertrag, the contractor performs first: it owes the work (or the agreed part of it) first, and the customer owes payment only afterwards. An Akonto reverses that order for the amount concerned, and a reversal needs an agreement — it does not follow by itself from the size of the order or the value of the material already installed.

The one exception: when the customer's ability to pay falters

There is one case in which the contractor may demand security without any prior agreement. Art. 83 OR deals with it expressly, for exactly the situation in which a contractor is bound to perform first and the other party runs into financial difficulty while the work is in progress:

• If the other party to a bilateral contract becomes insolvent — notably through bankruptcy or an unsuccessful seizure of assets — and the claim to the counter-performance is endangered as a result, the party bound to perform first may withhold its own performance until the counter-performance has been secured (Art. 83 para. 1 OR).
• If no security is provided within a reasonable time, the party bound to perform first may withdraw from the contract (Art. 83 para. 2 OR).

For the contractor this means: if, during an ongoing order, it receives well-founded indications that the customer has become insolvent — bankruptcy proceedings, an unsuccessful seizure, circumstances equally clear-cut —, it may stop work until security is provided. That security can be a payment on account, but it need not be: the law does not prescribe its form. If the security is not provided within a reasonable deadline that has been set, the contractor can withdraw from the contract rather than carry on working at its own risk.

What Art. 83 OR expressly does not provide: a general delay in payment or mere doubts about the willingness to pay are not enough. What is required is an actual deterioration in the customer's financial position that concretely endangers the claim to the counter-performance — not a vague uneasy feeling about a customer who has simply been slow to pay so far.

For the contractor, a clear order follows

An Akonto belongs in the quote, not in an extra demand halfway through the job. Anyone who wants to invoice by construction stage divides the work expressly into parts in the quote and sets a price for each part — Art. 372 para. 2 OR then applies, and the partial payment falls due as naturally as the final invoice. Without that agreement, only Art. 83 OR remains, and it applies solely where a deterioration in the ability to pay has been shown — not as a general lever against a customer one is unsure of.

Related articles

Which pricing form — fixed price, cost estimate or Regie — determines when payment falls due and whether a variation is possible is covered in the article "Quote variations". What applies when the final invoice stays unpaid — default, default interest, Skonto and a contractual retention — is covered in the article "Unpaid invoice: default, default interest, Skonto and retention".

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Sources: Swiss Code of Obligations (OR, SR 220), Art. 82, 83 and 372, fedlex.admin.ch, version retrieved on 5 September 2026. Where the articles are quoted, they are rendered from the official text. This article does not replace legal advice: whether, in a given case, there is a deterioration in financial position within the meaning of Art. 83 OR, and which Akonto or security arrangements apply in the contract concerned, is a question of the individual case and, in a dispute, for the court.