What Should You Do With Non-Payers?

[Lefke Lad]

I'm still new to posting here, so hope this is in the right place.

I've just had my first non-payer and think I should take him to the Small Claims Court.

I started a project with him back at the beginning of August where he wanted some downlighters fitted and switches and sockets changed to fancy Lap flat plate fittings.

I gave him an initial quick verbal estimate, saying it would be over £500, but couldn't be more accurate until I started drilling ceilings, etc, which he was fine with.

I got £250 up front to cover the materials and completed the first fit, drilling all the holes and running in the wires. Then he decided he wanted to split the room in two halves, so I had to chase down to the switch to run an extra switchwire and re run the wiring to the lights. Then he called me back to add an extra downlighter in the hallway and change the 2 gang switch to a dimmer.

I then left him to get the ceilings re-plastered and the walls painted before returning to fit the lights and sockets. He has kept me waiting until last week, claiming the painter was holding him up. Then when I did go back and fitted the lights he revealed that he'd had a new bathroom suite fitted and that had gone over budget. He was clearly hinting to me that I had to keep my price down, so I pointed out that his alterations had already put the cost up to just over £600.

Things started getting sticky when I went to do the damn sockets and discovered that the back boxes were too shallow to accept flat plat sockets. When I pointed this out to him he started accusing me of just pushing the price up.

Then to make matters worse he said I had to fit a new electric fire and chase a horizontal path from the existing socket in the corner to a new fused spur in the middle of the wall. All this was supposedly included in my initial estimate.

I pointed out that I would be breaching regs to do a horizontal cable run and offered to fit trunking along the skirting, but he wasn't having it.

So I packed my tools and said that he would have to find someone else to finish off and I would invoice him for the work done so far. This came to £400 and he has refused point blank to pay, challenging me to take legal action.

So, what experience have you other guys had at getting money? Is it worth going down the small claims route online, or should I engage a solicitor? Also, will I be able to claim costs? I've already given him a cheap deal, trying to grow my business, so I'm not going to let him get away with ripping me off!

 

[markc123]

Im sure some of the lads on here will be able to help you out more than me.

But, when its a small amount of money you're sometimes better off biting the bullet, admitting you've been robbed and blacklisting him forever. The hidden costs in taken action can outweight what you're wanting to claim, so you've gotta ask yourself isit really worth it.

+ The time seeing the solictor, going to court ect... is all eating up time you could actually be out grafting.

The bill that came to 400, was that including the 250 he had already paid? Or was it an extra 400?

 

[adammid]

First of all, if you knew flat plate sockets were being installed then you should have known that a min of 35mm boxes would be required. Also it is perfectly acceptable to have horizontal chases between accessories. Read the electricans guide to the building regs.

 

[wade88]

Mark is right mate,

I have just finished my court proceedings with a non payer. He owed me £2500, and that took 12 months of court papers, statements, backward and forward to each other, not to mention the court fees that quickly added up, time, effort, stress etc.

For £400 i would have to agree with Mark and just put this one down as a loss fella. It wont be the last time you come across these people, but for now, consider yourself fortunate it wasn't a larger sum of cash. In my experience which is limited in such matters, but if your case takes as long as mine to get processed, time off work to go to court and all the other things you have to do, that £400 will take its sweet time to get to you.

My whole affair cost about £300 anyway in fees. You may end up in the same boat. Problem is, people know this, and those who know the law fairly intimately, will know full well how easy it is to get away with non-payment.

My recommendations to you would be, mug this one off, put this geezer down as one of lifes little accidents and hope he has a hard time crossing the road tomorrow. But for future work, no matter how big or small, or just say for jobs over £400, get them to sign a contract of works. The ones who wont want to sign it, are the ones who you will instantly recognise as being the ones most unlikely to pay, if a client doesnt hesitate and gets a mark on that paper, they are legally bound to fulfill your terms of work, should it ever need to go to court, they have not a single leg to stand on (provided you also meet terms and dont breach your own contract)

Anything more than a few hundred quid is well worth taking 10 seconds to go over the paper work for. Will save you a world of hurt in the future mate. Just keep 50 copies in the van or glove box and routinely take one in to every job before you start work.

But thats just my opinion. Others may say go for the throat, its about time us hard working lads stopped getting our pants pulled down by scabby scoungers who just wana play the system.

Hope thats a little help from one persepctive
Ben

 

[Tim M]

There's an important business lesson to learn here. Always put your quotes in writing detailing what is included in your price. Variations are the biggest cause of disputes over payment, I learnt this myself the hard way many years ago so always agree a price for any variations and again put it in writing. If it's a case of keeping the job moving on site this only needs to be a handwritten note outlining the changes to the job and price and get the customer to sign. This way if there are any problems with payment at the end of the job it is very difficult for the customer to dispute and you have evidence to take to court if it comes to that.

In this case you have nothing in writing so you're going to find it difficult to prove in court so you may be best to put this one down to experience and write it off.

What was the problem with the horizontal cable run btw?

 

[Geordie Spark]

What you should do with non-payers ........ :59: or ...:death: maybe ...:hanged: how about..:behead: ?????

 

[markc123]

What kind of car does he have? Does it have nice working tyres?

Im not suggesting anything by this post, and it should NOT be interperated in anyway shape or form to resemble damaging someones property :smilewinkgrin:. Breaking the law is wrong.

 

[PEG]

Sorry to hear of your non-payer but if you advertise,you will get the "general public",and they are a strange band.Expect to have a couple of issues like this every year and as suggested,weigh up the amount owed versus trouble chasing. Having had a little bit of experience of the debt collection job in another field,i can tell you the old blood/stone theory is correct.I saw a LOT more cash stumpted up using charm and myther than i ever saw with,er,OTHER methods.The people who live by shafting others accept legal action and possible violence as an occupational hazard,so it has little effect.The advice re;contracts is sound but be aware if someone decides to try it on,it will be "interpreted" to suit their end. Good luck and although this will sound mad in a recession,try to advertise as little as possible!

 

[GLENNSPARK]

Sorry to hear of your non-payer but if you advertise,you will get the "general public",and they are a strange band.Expect to have a couple of issues like this every year and as suggested,weigh up the amount owed versus trouble chasing. Having had a little bit of experience of the debt collection job in another field,i can tell you the old blood/stone theory is correct.I saw a LOT more cash stumpted up using charm and myther than i ever saw with,er,OTHER methods.The people who live by shafting others accept legal action and possible violence as an occupational hazard,so it has little effect.The advice re;contracts is sound but be aware if someone decides to try it on,it will be "interpreted" to suit their end. Good luck and although this will sound mad in a recession,try to advertise as little as possible!

you could always `PEG` em to the wall....:lol:

 

[pjcomp]

Look online for Thomas Higgins, a Liverpool-based legal outfit which offers a chase-'em-and-get-'em service. First thing they do is send a Letter Before Action which only costs you two or three quid (at last time of looking). Very often this is enough for the customer to reach for his cheque book, as the LBA comes from a solicitor and is worded accordingly (unlike if you send your own "pay up or else" type letter). If they don't pay up you can go on to the next stage, which is legal action, Small Claims Court etc. If the customer is an habitual non-payer he may call your bluff, at which point you either carry on or, as suggested, put it down to experience. Point is you stand a good chance of getting your money for a very small outlay. Because Higgins (other litigatious solicitors are available) specialises in this it's almost certainly cheaper than your local high street ambulance-chaser would be for the same thing.

pj

 

[markc123]

Sorry to hear of your non-payer but if you advertise,you will get the "general public",and they are a strange band.Expect to have a couple of issues like this every year and as suggested,weigh up the amount owed versus trouble chasing. Having had a little bit of experience of the debt collection job in another field,i can tell you the old blood/stone theory is correct.I saw a LOT more cash stumpted up using charm and myther than i ever saw with,er,OTHER methods.The people who live by shafting others accept legal action and possible violence as an occupational hazard,so it has little effect.The advice re;contracts is sound but be aware if someone decides to try it on,it will be "interpreted" to suit their end. Good luck and although this will sound mad in a recession,try to advertise as little as possible!

I sort of agree with that, as word of mouth is the best advertising any electrician can get - and when you advertise you tend to get people with no good intentions whatsoever ringing up....

However the OP stated that he's had his "first non-payer" and correct me if im wrong Lefke Lad, but this too me sounds like he's new to the S/E game. If true, then its almost impossible not to advertise (unless you've built up a clientbase through previous jobs)

Lefke, the honest answer like has been said before is to take it on the chin and learn from your mistakes. Everyone wants to do a "gentlemens agreement" on jobs, as it saves hassel - but unfortunatley it doesn't always work like this, so as pointed out before you'll have to think about writing up contracts, unless you whole-heartly trust the person you're doing the work for.

Competition is fierce now-a-days, so you've got to take what you can get - however you can get it, and unfortunatley as in the OP's case, you sometimes get the riff-raff.

 

[telectrix]

what you need to do is find his, or a friend/relative's facebook page, then post on there how he is a slimy, miserable , non -payer.

 

[High Tower]

Lefke, if you go on line you can download the county court claim form, (form N1), it looks very very official, fill it out as you would do but dont submit it, but instead send the client a photocopy of the notice, "for their own information", its normally enough to scare them into paying. its worked for me 3 times now!!, and it costs nothing.

http://justclaim.co.uk/court-forms/N1-claim-form.html

 

[markc123]

Lefke, if you go on line you can download the county court claim form, (form N1), it looks very very official, fill it out as you would do but dont submit it, but instead send the client a photocopy of the notice, "for their own information", its normally enough to scare them into paying. its worked for me 3 times now!!, and it costs nothing.

Haha, if i could like this again and again and again - i would.

Love it.

 

[Guest55]

i use a more direct approach for non-payers..........

 

[imago]

There's no such thing as a "Non-payer", some people just take longer and need more encouragement than others. They all pay in the end though.

 

[SYKRAPS]

i use a more direct approach for non-payers..........


View attachment 16278

I think that to hire Dirty Harry would cost the OP more than the £150 that he stands to lose..........

Joking aside this is not a very nice situation that most of us in business encounter on occasion, in all honesty if you write off the £150 you will benefit against your accounts so you are not actually losing the full amount of £150 as some of this was tax to be paid on the job. You also may be acting a little prematurely if it was only a few days ago so send him some reminders with the outstanding amount listed.

Did you fit the flat plat gear? If not you should be able to gain a credit which once again will soften the blow to an extent.

I think your price was very low by the way, why should you do cheap jobs to promote yourself? Your qualities will soon gain you a good reputation which you should not give at low levels of cost. Being cheap can also have an adverse affect on some peoples decisions to hire your services, just my opinion if it counts for anything...............

 

[Lefke Lad]

Thanks for all the responses guys. To answer a couple of the queries - the £400 is in addition to the £250 paid, basically my labour costs. The horizontal run isn't that simple i.e run between two points equal distances from the floor. He wanted me to run it vertically down from an existing socket that is approx 30cm above the floor, then horizontally behind a skirting board for about 2.5m, then vertically up at least 1m to a fused spur. My concern was with whoever subsequently fitted the skirting board could nail the cable, including any future house owner who wouldn't expect a cable to be located there. Reg 522.6.101 says it's ok horizontally between two accessories and this wasn't so.

I know it's only 400 quid and is bound to be a hassle, but I don't like the idea of this scumbag getting away with it. So I think I will probably try pjcomp's Letter Before Action first and then possibly High Tower's excellent idea.

Failing that, some of the other ideas that are best not repeated might have to be employed to get satisfaction at least, even if I still remain out of pocket.

 

[Lefke Lad]

I think that to hire Dirty Harry would cost the OP more than the £150 that he stands to lose..........

Joking aside this is not a very nice situation that most of us in business encounter on occasion, in all honesty if you write off the £150 you will benefit against your accounts so you are not actually losing the full amount of £150 as some of this was tax to be paid on the job. You also may be acting a little prematurely if it was only a few days ago so send him some reminders with the outstanding amount listed.

Did you fit the flat plat gear? If not you should be able to gain a credit which once again will soften the blow to an extent.

I think your price was very low by the way, why should you do cheap jobs to promote yourself? Your qualities will soon gain you a good reputation which you should not give at low levels of cost. Being cheap can also have an adverse affect on some peoples decisions to hire your services, just my opinion if it counts for anything...............

Just to clarify, total job came to £650. He paid £250 after I did the 1st fix, but still owes the remaining £400. Really he should have paid me more, but he kept bleating about the cost, so I didn't charge for some of the mods.

On adammid's point about the flat plates, it's the first time I've had a customer who wanted them, so wasn't aware of the depth issue. I shan't make that mistake again.

Equally, I don't give verbal quotes anymore. I make sure the customer has it in writing, but that still doesn't stop non-payers.

 

[Gazmm]

the goverment offer a dedicated service for money disputes, google "moneyclaim.gov"
It costs a bit to register a claim but as far as i know your costs get passed on to the losing party. ive never had to use it but might be worth a read.