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Licensed Credit Reference Agency
Licence Number: 627272 |
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Featured Bad Debtor Stories |
| NOTE: We are forced to delete actual names and places in order to comply with data protection. |
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| Story 1 |
I have been sub-contracting to a company called XXXXXXX since September 2009. They have never made a payment on time and have refussed to pay me money that has been out standing since November 2009.
In January 2010 we registered with money claim online and this is now at the point of a request for warrant of execution and has caused me to outlay an additional £160 of money we did not have so this has put our company into dept with our bank.
There are other out standing payments where they have not even given us a final pay rate so we cannot yet invoice them. One other job was not completed on time due to many contractors working on the same sight at the same time and we were not allowed back to complete our work.
We have been accused of doing sub standard work and they refuse to pay for any amount of money on this Job. The out standing work was 5 night shifts at 6 hour each shift no rates given our normal day rate is £15 per hour. The incomplete job has a total of 28 hours plus travel.
Even with a warrant of execution we have not yet been paid. The warrant of execution is for other works completed with no compliants. The other work they refuse to talk to me about and do not take my calls or answer my emails.
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| Story 2 |
My company have worked for an accountant Mr. XXXXXXXX of The XXXXXXX, whose practices from; XXXXXXXX, Chartered Accountants. My company provided labour and materials for the renovation of a property of his in France.
Mr. XXXXXXXX bought this property to renovate, and being centuries old, presented my company with many problems. Damp, wood rot, Fire damage, movement, etc, many problems associated with a property of this age and condition.
Mr XXXXXXXX refused to have any building professionals (architects, surveyors etc.) as advised by myself, to assess the site and works involved. At first everything was fine, my company provided services for over two years on a part time basis,
however as the property came near completion and materials became more expensive (especially for Mr. XXXXXXXX tastes) and labour become more specialist, Mr. XXXXXXXX became more and more cost conscience cumulating in him finding fault with our tradesmen,
interfering with our schedules and finally refusing to pay the full amount for the final two invoices.
My company instructed solicitors to pursue this case but Mr. XXXXXXXX has flatly refuse to improve his derisory offer of £5000.00, in fact when we tried to compromise he reduced it.
Part of his counterclaim to the court is for a sum of £5000.00 for familiarisation of for three trades. We remove our services after non-payment, so three trades (local labour) needed to familiarise themselves with the project.
These three trades were a Painter, a Plasterer and a Plumber. Please! He is also trying to charge us for completing the project!!
Mr. XXXXXXXX has twisted and turned and turning this fairly straight forward case into a contractual nightmare. Setting aside the subject of materials and workmanship.
Obviously Mr. XXXXXXXX knows the legal system and is playing it to his advantage knowing the costs involved and the fact the sum involved is too high for small claims court. I know this is not the first time he has had disputes from builders.
Mr. XXXXXXXX has refused mediation and obviously any compromise. It's a shame the legal and mediation system is so ineffective in these situations.
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| Story 3 |
Commenced a double extension contract worth approxamatly £50000.00 for Mr and Mrs XXXXXXX of XXXXXXXX.
We were excavating foundations for the rear extension when we found the plans were wrong.
The Architect had placed the mains Sewer in the road in front of the property when in fact it was at the rear.
So the drains he had drawn on the plans were all going in the wrong direction and we had priced the build based on these plans.
We dug a pilot hole to assitain where we would have to connect as we could not price the new drains untill we had done this and agreed a plan of action with building control.
At this point Mr and Mrs XXXXXXX were told what the cost of the drains extra to the plans would be infront of 2 witnesses.
They said they didn't know where the money was coming from but he thought they would have to go after the Architect for it.
We continued with the drains because 1 of the manholes already existing was within our foundations and we couldn't concrete them and they were collapsing daily costing us more money in materials.
So we had to complete the drains before we could construct our foundations in order to remove the existing manhole.
Upon completing the oversite and drains Mr and Mrs XXXXXXXX would not pay for the extra drains or give us our next stage payment due before commencing the next stage at dampcourse.
I contacted the Architect who agreed as the mistake was his he would pay half the money towards the drains.
So I offered Mr and Mrs XXXXXXXX the other half in order that they would continue but they would still not come up with their next stage payment.
They now wanted to change the terms from paying at the beginning of the stage to paying at the end of it.
I was not prepared to continue on this basis as we had agreed the first 3 stage payments would be payed at the beginning of there respective stages and especially as they had already taken me for the drains.
This was prior to Christmas, when speaking on the phone to Mrs XXXXXX she told me she would not have me back on site if I was the last builder on the planet.
Despite us not having done anything wrong and everything being passed by building control.
On the 5th January 09 she wrote me a letter sent recorded delivery asking me why I had not returned to site as she had reckoned I had said so before Christmas.
Why would we have returned having not recieved the next stage payment as agreed prior to the job commencing and what she had already told us prior to Christmas.
Solicitors action has now commenced on both sides.
The first mailing recieved from their Solicitor contained an extra letter dated the 20th December 08 which I have never recieved making me wonderful offers obviously to make themselves seem more reasonable.
My Solicitor has told them that they are in breach of contract and that he will be sueing them for loss of profits as effectivly they have put me out of work as this job should have lasted untill April 09.
Also for monies already owed and the return of the materials and equipment on site.
The 4th February 09 their Solicitor wrote correspondance to mine saying we were to remove our property.
On the 13th February we returned to site to find that despite the freezing weather and it only being 9 days including weekends the extension was nearly ready for its roof and that our materials had been used and also our skip.
My equipment had been moved to the front of the property where it was at risk of being stolen and all the feet to my Tower Scaffolding were missing.
It looks like we will be taking Mr and Mrs XXXXXXX to court I wonder with what outcome.
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| Story 4 |
THIS COMPANY MAKES A HABIT OF EMPLOYING TRADESMEN TO WORK FOR XXXXXXXXXXX
BUT ON COMPLETION INFORM SUBCONTRACTORS, ALSO TRADESMEN ON THE BOOKS, THAT THEY HAVE NOT BEEN PAID
THEREFORE CANNOT PAY.I HAVE NOW HAD A CHEQUE FOR £738.00 BOUNCE TWICE AND HAVE BANK CHARGES.
THE MD OF THIS COMPANY A MR XXXXXXXXXXX TOLD ME HE ONLY ARRIVED BACK AT HIS DESK TODAY AND KNOWS NOTHING.
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| Story 5 |
XXXXXXXX owes me £3400 for works done over 3 months ago the total bill was over £5000.
They have paid me £2000 2 months ago but no more since. I have heard since that they are having problems paying other sub contractors.
If any one asks about doing work for them i tell them to stay clear.
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| Story 6 |
I carried out work for a restaurant called XXXXXXX.
To date the customer has taken 60 day`s to issue cheques that have been referred & then bounced for the job.
This guy is opening other restaurants & bars in XXXXXXX and he has no intention of paying when the job is completed.
He has several tradesmen still awaiting to be paid, if this guy rings you be careful.
He has stung several companies in XXXXXX already, dont be the next.
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| Story 7 |
We are a cleaning company and had one customer who complained after the first time we provided our service.
They complained that the area we cleaned did not smell of our disinfectant. I visited the customer the next day and as is our policy did not charge and agreed that the area should have a stronger smell of disinfectant.
The customer agreed for us to carry on with our regular cleaning service.
The next time we provided our servivce I personally supervised the cleaning and added extra disinfectant myself so the area was not only clean but smelled strongly of disinfectant.
We spent longer than required cleaning the area and did a really good job. I supervised the service like this for two months until I was satisfied my staff were doing a great job.
We did not hear from the customer and carried on providing the service (with extra disinfectant) for a total of 4 months, each time sending the customer an invoice.
After 4 months we had not received any payment so I called the customer. They said they wanted to cancel our service and will send a cheque for what is owing.
A month later when we hadn't received any money, I telephoned again and left a message on their answerphone reminding them to send payment.
The next day we got a message on our answerphone saying that they are not going to pay as we "didn't stand up to our side of the bargain".
I wrote them a letter saying that "we definitely did a really good professional job and it is unacceptable for them not to pay after receiving 4 months of good service. If they weren't happy with our service they should have told us earlier. They still refused to pay!
It is our opinion that this customer deliberately set out to steal from my company and never had any intention of ever paying. I wouldn't be surprised if they have got another contractor in to provide the service and will refuse to pay them after they have received the service for as long as they can get away with it.
This is the sort of unreasonable behaviour that wears you down when you are trying to run a small business!
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