

Ask HN: Show me the money - Advice needed - SandB0x

<i>I'm not asking for legal advice (it's trivial to use the small claims system in the UK). I mostly need advice on dealing with people here.</i><p>DETAILS<p>I am owed money for some web design by a small (~5 man) company. As a student this represents a couple of months rent and forms a significant part of my budget for the summer.<p>We are both in the UK, and the client was invoiced about five weeks ago. A friend of mine works at this place, and most of my correspondence has been with him, rather than the company owner.<p>I have twice chased it up with my friend, who has in turn nagged his boss. All I'm getting is that it's on the to-do list, cashflow is tight but it's coming at <i>some</i> point. I asked "does <i>some</i> point mean before the end of the month?", and got an "oooh, not sure". I know the boss is not short of money, and I'm not getting a good vibe from this. We did not set a credit period, but the under UK law this defaults to 30 days.<p>THE PART I NEED ADVICE ON<p>I spoke to my friend and said I would write to the boss directly. It shouldn't come across as threatening but I need to give them a kick up the ass. How should I handle this?
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ErrantX
What I would write:

Dear X,

Approx. 5 weeks ago I sent you an invoice (reference XXXX) for £XX after
completion of the following work by myself: XXXX.

So far payment has not been made on this invoice; could you please give me a
call on XXXX so that we can discuss this in person and arrange a suitable
time-scale for transfer of funds. I will try to call you myself in the next
few days so that, at some point, we are able to discuss this directly.

As a student this represents a substantial portion of my income so I am sure
you understand how important timely payment is to me.

Thanks, X

(or in other words: get him on the phone with you)

~~~
SandB0x
Looks good, thanks.

I'm a touch wary of him phoning me up with a sob story. What if he says
"Sorry, it's been a tough few months - I can pay you in July" - do I take that
or say that the payment is already late^ and demand it be paid sooner?

^
[http://www.businesslink.gov.uk/bdotg/action/detail?r.s=sc...](http://www.businesslink.gov.uk/bdotg/action/detail?r.s=sc&r.l1=1073858790&r.lc=en&r.l3=1074002362&r.l2=1074453392&type=RESOURCES&itemId=1073792169)

~~~
jodrellblank
Whichever you need to. What are and aren't you willing to accept? His sob
story should not make you _feel bad_ and the fact that you are imagining in
advance a sob story which will then compell you to do something you don't want
to is ... a bug in your behaviour which you should notice about yourself and
solve one day.

"I completed this work in good faith 5 weeks ago; early July is another four
weeks and that's going to be tough for me, but if you are struggling we can
work something out - can you pay half of it now and the rest in July?".
Perhaps.

You are his equal, a business person discussing a transaction. You have the
right to chase this payment without feeling guilty.

~~~
SandB0x
What I had in mind when I wrote the grandparent/reply is that bringing in
guilt in the form of

 _As a student this represents a substantial portion of my income so I am sure
you understand how important timely payment is to me._

would make it fair game for _him_ to bring up any of his problems. I
completely agree with you that business is business. He's not running a
shelter for orphaned kittens or anything.

~~~
mirkules
"As a student this represents a substantial portion of my income so I am sure
you understand how important timely payment is to me."

This is the first line in the original poster's response I've noticed. In my
opinion, you should NOT include this in your email, as 1) it will not help get
your payment sooner in any way (he seems like the type to have no conscious)
and 2) it gives him leverage, control and power over the negotiations. You
should not give away information like that involuntarily.

~~~
ErrantX
I disagree; I think it's a pretty important line. The aim was less about it
being a sob story and more about introducing the idea, without accusation,
that he is being slow and unreasonable.

You do have something of a point; but I don't think it will open the way for
him to control negotiations. It was deliberately worded to be neutral with no
suggestion that the writer is desperate for money.

On the other hand; if the gp is concerned then anything will do. Perhaps "I
like to ensure a steady inflow of money whilst contracting and, as you can
imagine, a missed payment can affect my bookkeeping"

(that wasn't a very good example - it's early - but yu get the idea).

Finally; if it does amount to leverage it is only a little. On he other hand
the gp has the big gun of the 30 day limit to hand - that is definitely
something not to mention till on the phone :-)

------
apowell
Why start by writing him? Emails are easy to ignore. Give him a friendly call.
That'll kick it up a notch without seeming hostile.

You don't need to act like anything is amiss -- just say you're following up
on the invoice you sent on April 30th. End the conversation with "Great, I'll
look forward to receiving payment by June xxth. Thanks for the project, and if
there's any more work I can do in the future, just let me know."

This (1) sets a firm date (even if his answer is "ah, well in the next week or
two...") and (2) keeps it friendly. Personally, I wouldn't acknowledge that
this is a significant financial issue for you. It doesn't matter. You're
entitled to on-time payment whether you have one dollar or ten million.

------
Mamady
Send him an email stating - "This is just a friendly reminder that the Invoice
sent on XX is overdue."

This is direct, but not hostile. Works wonders.

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anamax
(1) Stop talking with your friend. Don't talk to anyone who doesn't have the
authority to pay you.

(2) Do you have a written contract? If not, what formal/legal obligation do
they have to pay you?

If there's no contract, you might have a copyright or other claim.

You won't get paid until you start acting like the other folks who they pay.

------
jodrellblank
You seem to be very much worrying about money and not bothering him; he runs a
5 person company, apparently has money and hasn't routinely paid your invoice
on time - and so is likely very used to being chased for payment. In other
words, it feels like a big deal to you but it wont feel that way to them.

Stop worrying about whether you deserve it or if it's fair on him, or if he's
had a bad month ( and stop making it your friend's problem). I've found it
pretty disgusting overhearing my boss chasing money from customers to see how
many habitually don't pay and then shamelessly try anything they can to fob
him off - oh no it's past our finance day it will have to be next month, no
the only person who can sign cheques isn't here, no we don't have your
invoice, actually it wasn't completed properly so we're not paying it, the
cheque wasn't signed? You'll have to send it back and we'll redo it next
month, and on and on.

Writing to them feels a bit of a cop out as well, frankly, like you want to
hide behind it; I wouldn't want to do it myself either, but I think you should
call them and ask to speak to him/someone who can help you with an unpaid
invoice and say Hi, I sent you an invoice a few weeks ago and haven't received
payment for it yet, but the work has been accepted with no complaints or
disputes, can you tell me what the status is, please? And go from there.

Don't be surprised if they tell you nobody is available who can help, or that
they have reservations or that some part wasn't as agreed, and be prepared to
take polite but pushy action - i can resend the invoice, i can come and
collect payment, i can hold on the phone, come and see you to talk about it,
etc.

You want to end the phone call with a commitment from them to pay, or with a
concrete problem to solve and a commitment to pay after that, or some concrete
time you can speak to someone when they will be there.

Log when you called, who you spoke to, what they said.

Because you can phone several times and go over several back and forth points
in a few minutes it means you aren't waiting a week for a letter reply. If
it's still going nowhere in several phonecalls or a week or so then write a
stern letter with invoice and reference your phone call logs; you haven't
delayed by much but you are in a better position to justify elevating it
further.

All IMHO, as always.

~~~
SandB0x
Yes, I definitely want to stop making it my friend's problem, and I'm not
worried if it's fair on the boss. I am planning to email him, not to send a
letter. Sorry if that wasn't clear on my post.

You make a good case for calling first, but I don't think writing is a cop out
- I will have a record of the correspondence, it gives him the option of just
transferring the money and replying "done", and there's less risk of saying
something I'll regret (which is unlikely, but still). After this, for sure I
won't let him off the phone before he agrees a payment date.

~~~
jodrellblank
I didn't pick up that it was email, but if it's only email then it should
necessitate much less worry - take ErrantX's template and do it now!

( perhaps without the bit about being a student - I wouldn't put that in
personally either as it's not his concern, but I also think that worrying
about that is one example of where i would be worrying to the point of
delaying or avoiding sending it and wonder if that applies to you as well.
That line isn't going to make a world changing difference if you leave it in
or not, so if using the template as-is makes it easier to send the email then
use it as is).

------
jodrellblank
Did you contact him today or over the weekend? What happened?

~~~
SandB0x
Emailed him the next morning, didn't hear back. I gave it till today and
phoned, got through to my friend who said the boss wasn't in today, but that
they'd just had a load of money come through so my payment will be put through
very soon.

I'm not sure what "very soon" means, but I explained the legal 30 day thing to
my friend, told him to get the boss to respond to my email asap otherwise I'll
have to recover the money through other means. Have emailed to confirm the
conversation took place, will try phoning one more time this week and if
there's nothing by Monday I'll have to use www.moneyclaim.gov.uk.

Annoyingly, the Bank of England base rate (used to charge interest on late
payments) is only at 0.5%, so that's hardly an incentive to pay on time. I can
legally apply a charge of £70 though, but I'd much rather they just paid me
and I never had to deal with them again.

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ddemchuk
record everything you do and put dates on everything

print out all your email exchanges and mail them to yourself as you send and
receive them (physical mail) and don't open them, and include dates in the
body of your emails. Then you can at least have some documented, dated proof
of your attempts.

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hotmind
Do you have ftp access to the website? If you do, take it down. The website is
still yours, not his.

Stop being a pushover or you will never see your money.

