County Court claim

After doing a lot of work for a company client it looks like the sole director has gone to ground.

He keeps his mobile switched off and he doesn't respond to emails or texts.

I've emailed the company secretary and she accuses me of harassing her!

One interesting point is that the registered office address is my address.

I know where the director is working. His company has a contract with a government department.

I phoned the County Court and had the usual hassle with morons.

I suspect the director has moved out of his flat so I asked if I could use the director's work address on the claim form. I was told I couldn't because it's nothing to do with the organisation the director is working for. I asked if I could use the company registered office and I was told I couldn't because it's my address also.

The County Court people didn't really want to get involved. They said that county court judgements attach to addresses whereas I understood they were attached to individuals.

Eventually I was told that I should attach a letter to my claim form explaining the circumstances and the judge would decide what I could do.

I'm sending 7 day letters to the director's and company secretary address as well as the director's work address. I will also send copies to the director's personal email, work email and company secretary's personal email. Amazingly he can't be contacted on the phone at work.

Has anybody got any advice?

Reply to
Peter Saxton
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I find it difficult to understand who you are, and your relationship / involvement. I think you work for a company and have done some work for one of your company's clients.

It looks like you have been unsuccessfully chasing your company's client's director and company secretary.

Is this for payment for the job for one of your company's clients? Are you a sole trader? or do you have your own registered company? (Otherwise why else would you be chasing the debt?) You are quite able to chase a debt, providing you are not doing it unreasonably or threateningly. Normally paperwork would be served to the registered address.

This is where I start to get confused. If you are chasing a debt from one of your company's clients, why is their registered office your address (home or work?)?

It sounds as though there could be more pertinent information regarding relationships than you have already mentioned.

IANAL Iain uk.legal added

Reply to
Iain

His Accountant, perhaps.

tim

Reply to
tim....

Yes, I can see that now. You have to be thinking along those lines. I was thinking of an employee or sub-contractor.

Thanks Iain

Reply to
Iain

Yes, I'm an accountant.

It turns out that the director and his girlfriend/company secretary haven't left their flat although they did ask me to be their referee last year regarding a new flat rental.

After sending an email to his work email I did get a phone call from the director. He wasn't happy. After the conversation I sent the director the following email which set out the background:

"Thank you for phoning me. I would have appreciated it if you had contacted me earlier.

Since I sent my first invoice on 10/01/10 I have tried to communicate with you by several methods.

I emailed you on 12/03/10. You say you don't check your emails very often. That is not a very good excuse but given I copied in XXXXXX and she responded I would be surprised if she didn't think it was important enough to draw your attention to it.

I left messages on your mobile phone and sent text messages to your mobile phone. The number you had given me was 07XXX XXX XXX. You now tell me that you have a new mobile phone number: 07XXX XXX XXX. I am very surprised that you had not given me your new mobile phone number. I am even more surprised that XXXXXX didn't give me your new mobile phone number given that she kept asking me to contact you and not her. This is despite her being the company secretary.

XXXXXX promised to pay me several times but each time it didn't happen.

XXXXXX responded strangely to a reasonable question I asked in a text to her. She also responded strangely to emails. She accused me of harassing her and said I should contact you. Despite this, she either didn't tell you that I wanted to discuss payment with you or she did tell you and you chose to not contact me.

I have previously been round to your home during the day and on an evening and each time nobody answered the door.

The above shows how difficult it was to engage in a rational dialogue.

I thought that the remaining method of communication I had would be to phone you at your workplace. I phoned your switchboard and they explained that you didn't have a phone. This was a great surprise to me. I consider that it must be difficult for anybody to do a job effectively if they couldn't make or receive phone calls. The switchboard advised me to either send an email to you via your website email address or send a letter to the correspondence address on the website. I did both.

You phoned me today and you seemed to be under several misapprehensions.

You said that legally you had three months to make payment. This is not true.

You said that I had been rude to XXXXXX. This is not true. I set out in an email to you what I had texted to her and there was nothing I consider rude. If you are able to enlighten me on what I said that she considers rude I would be most grateful.

You made out that I was slow in producing accounts. This is not true. I produced accounts in a timely manner as soon as I was provided with the information that was needed to produce the accounts. XXXXXX asked why it had taken so long to produce the accounts and I sent her many emails where I had been chasing for information without any success. She accepted the fault was not mine. Why can't you?

You then said: "If you contact me at work again I won't be happy. Do you know what I mean?" This appeared to be a crude threat. It is also quite bizarre given the efforts I had made to contact you previously and in every instance there seems to be nobody to blame but either yourself or XXXXXX for the lack of dialogue between you and me.

You say that you will be able to pay me very soon.

Please let me know before Thursday 25/03/10 when I can expect to receive payment of the outstanding amount of £1,716.75."

The reasons I had been given for non-payment was that XXXXXX had "been busy" (it's amazing how people suddenly become busy or forgetful around payment time!) and they'd both "got food poisoning".

The being "rude" comment relates to me being promised payment on certain days but it didn't happen and then I'd received the following excuse: "Hi, were just waiting for XXXXXX to get paid, he bills quarterly. As soon as his account gets credited will pay u immed. Apologies for the delay."

My response was: "How does that fit in with you saying you were going to pay me w/e 28/02/10? When's the next payment due? Why's he bill quarterly? Wouldn't monthly make more sense?"

"I did not realize that there were not enough funds. How dare u speak to me like that. Call XXXXXX, he owes u money not me!!"

His claim that legally he has three months to pay the invoice is interesting. If there is no agreement then it has to be reasonable and

30 days is considered reasonable. If somebody chased me before payment was due and I couldn't pay I would contact the creditor and explain.

This guy has been penalised by Companies House for late submission of accounts, he's about to be penalised by the VATman for late VAT registration (I'd been trying to get him off that but information required by HMRC has not been produced by him), and penalised by HMRC for borrowing money from his company. All this is due to him not providing information in a timely manner. Earlier I had asked him why he wasn't co-operating to avoid these penalties and his reply was: "I don't like authority"!

The vast majority of my clients are fantastic about paying my invoices as soon as possible but it seems that the more you go out of your way to help some people the more they try to wriggle out of paying you. Without wanting to support any sterotypes, I've had most problems with South Africans, Scots, "upper classes" and Jews.

I've had one client who's company went bust after he took out as much cash as possible and then stole the company's assets. He didn't hand over the company accounting records to the Official Receiver and he didn't attend meetings. I have told the Official Receiver where he works and there is a warrant out for his arrest but the Official Receiver and court bailiffs are incompetent. The Official Receiver says that they haven't seen any evidence that he's withdrawn funds from the company but when I ask them if they have analysed the company bank account they refuse to answer the question!

Reply to
Peter Saxton

You are a fool.

Reply to
Stickems.

You would just laugh off the loss of 1,716.75 ?

Reply to
Steve Walker

I don't think you should take his comment seriously.

It appears more like a cry for help. Amazingly, some people have such unhappy lives that insulting people anonymously over the internet makes them feel better.

Reply to
Peter Saxton

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