Short version: "Upon signing" ties a payment to the day the contract is executed, not to a date on the calendar. "Net 30" means 30 days from an event the contract names. If a contract sets no date at all, New York and Illinois set one for freelance work: 30 days after the work is done.
Three phrases show up in payment clauses again and again. "Upon signing." "Upon delivery." "Net 30." Each one starts a clock. What changes is the thing that starts it, and that's the part you read back.
Every payment term is a clock. The words decide what starts it.
"Upon signing" names an event, not a date
"Upon signing" ties the payment to the contract being executed. Cornell Law School's Legal Information Institute defines execute as "to sign or complete the formal requirements necessary to make a legal document effective."
Its example is "signing and delivering a contract." So your signature and the finished contract aren't always the same day. If the other side signs a week after you, the clock that "upon signing" starts can start a week later too.
The NFL's standard contract uses the same word. The NFL Player Contract, Appendix A of the league's 2020 collective bargaining agreement with the players' union, has rules for a contract "executed" after the regular season begins.
A signed contract doesn't always pay at signing
That same contract shows how far apart signing and payday can be. Paragraph 6 says a player is paid "100% of his yearly salary" in "equal weekly or biweekly installments."
Those installments run "over the course of a 34- or 36-week period," starting "with the first regular season game played by Club." A contract signed in March pays its salary from the first game in September. That's six months between the signature and the first check.
Paragraph 6 opens with a condition: "Unless this contract or any collective bargaining agreement in existence during the term of this contract specifically provides otherwise." Any other timing has to be written in.
"Upon delivery" and installments
A deal can also pay on the work instead of the signature. New York's Department of Labor publishes a free model contract for freelance work, the Freelance Worker Agreement. Its payment section has three boxes to check.
One pays "on or before the agreed-upon date." One pays "no later than 30 calendar days after the completion" of the services. The third is installments, each with an "Amount due" line and a "Date due" line.
That's a state's own menu: a fixed date, a clock that starts when the work is done, or pieces on set dates. Each one answers the question "upon signing" leaves open, which is what day the money is actually due.
What "net 30" counts from
"Net 30" is shorthand for 30 days. The real question is 30 days from what. The words around it answer that, and some contracts don't say.
The federal government's own payment clause is one public example. Under Federal Acquisition Regulation 52.232-25, Prompt Payment, the due date is the later of two days: the 30th day after the billing office gets "a proper invoice," and the 30th day after the government accepts the work.
So under that clause, the clock waits for an invoice. An invoice missing what the clause requires goes back to the contractor "within 7 days after receipt," with the reasons. A brand deal isn't a federal contract. It shows how much rides on the starting event.
When the contract names no date
Some deals say what you'll be paid and never say when. Two states have written an answer for freelance work.
New York's Freelance Isn't Free Act took effect August 28, 2024, the state's Department of Labor says. Pay is due "on or before the date such compensation is due under the terms of the contract."
If the contract sets no date, it's due "no later than thirty days after the completion of the freelance worker's services under the contract."
The law covers a person hired as an independent contractor, meaning not an employee, to provide services for $800 or more. That's one contract alone or added to that payer's contracts from the previous 120 days.
It also requires the contract in writing, with the date payment is due or how that date gets set.
Illinois' Freelance Worker Protection Act, in effect since July 1, 2024, uses nearly the same words. Without a date, pay is due "no later than 30 days after the completion of the freelance worker's services under the contract."
Illinois' line is $500, counted the same way. The act applies only to contracts that took effect after July 1, 2024.
Both laws add one more rule. Once the work has started, the payer can't make you accept less than the contracted amount as a condition of being paid on time. Whether a given deal fits either law turns on its facts and each statute's own definitions.
The date also decides the tax year
When money arrives can decide which year's return it lands on. IRS Publication 538 says that under the cash method you include in income what you "actually or constructively received during the tax year."
Constructive receipt means an amount is "credited to your account or made available to you without restriction," even if you haven't touched it.
So a payment due upon signing in late December and one due net 30 from a December invoice can land in two different tax years. That one's easy to miss. What you owe depends on your own situation.
What Leave does with this
Upload a contract and Leave reads the payment terms back in plain words: how much, when, and who pays. The payment dates go on Home.
Leave takes 0 percent of any deal. It doesn't send invoices or chase a late payment. You decide what to sign. Every source is linked at the bottom.
Questions people ask
Does "upon signing" mean the day I sign?
It ties the payment to the contract being executed. Cornell's Legal Information Institute defines execute as to sign or complete the formal requirements that make a document effective, such as signing and delivering it. Your signature and the finished contract can land on different days.
What does net 30 mean?
Thirty days from an event the contract names. In the federal government's Prompt Payment clause, the 30 days run from a proper invoice or from acceptance of the work, whichever comes later. A contract that names no starting event leaves that open.
What if my contract never says when I get paid?
In New York and Illinois, freelance laws set pay as due no later than 30 days after the work is done, for someone who fits each law's definition of a freelance worker. New York's line is $800 and Illinois' is $500, counting the same payer's contracts over 120 days.
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