bad customers and court cases - summary

Fri Jan 31 08:44:33 PST 2003

Alvin,

I don't want to ruin your day, but it sounds like there's an
aspect of lawsuit with which you're unfamiliar.  Just because you
win doesn't mean you get paid.  If it is a small-claims case,
with the limit of $5K maximum, there is no particular recourse if
the client is ordered to pay but does not pay.  In small-claims,
too, the judgement is final and there is no appeal.

If the amount is greater than $5K, and it is a regular court case,
ie a "real" lawsuit, there is still no guarantee that you will
actually be paid, and you will also have to pay legal fees whether
or not the client ever pays.  Collecting a judgement in a lawsuit 
can be quite difficult.  They can also choose to appeal, which will
tie up the case and cause you to spend more in legal fees.  

You may want to think about other ways to resolve this if you are
counting on getting the money anytime soon on this.  Without any
speculation as to who is "in the right" here, or which party has
contributed more to the disagreement, I will say this:  they
almost certainly have deeper pockets than you do, and if you get
someone there annoyed enough they may be willing to spend several
times what they actually owe you in order to get out of paying
you.  People are not generally rational about these things.

cheers, and best of luck,
Strata  

alvin at maggie.linux-consulting.com wrote:

> i hope they dont bother to show up .. :-)  win by default..
> and make it easy...
>         - paperwork is hopefully been served properly...
>         ( finding good/reasonalbe/knowledgeable process servers is
>         ( no trivial matter either

-- 
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Strata Rose Chalup [KF6NBZ]                      strata "@" virtual.net
VirtualNet Consulting                            http://www.virtual.net/
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