Rogue customers

[Subby]

Hi all, my first post in the Arms! Glad to see the old plumbing tips thread was hiding here and not deleted as I feared!!
Anyways, I have encountered my first rogue customer

I did a job at fortnight ago for an agreed price, customer was happy he quote and very happy with the work done. I invoiced at the end of the job, the materials cost me more than I quoted so I reduced my labour charge so the invoice total was the same as the quote we agreed upon.

The customer is not paying or answering my calls. I am owed £600 I paid for materials and 340 labour. I a asking a solicitor in know to send a letter but am worried that they will leave a bad review on my main site is get work from .
. I did a very neat job (their words) at a very reasonable cost as agreed. I do not deserve any negative feedback I am concerned I will receive.

Have any of you.had a similar experience and what did you do / how did it pan out?

 

[Rickster123]

Send big Dave in to collect.

more importantly welcome to the arms! What you drinking?

 

[rpm]

Ah! The downside of FB, Twitter or whatever site it was.

 

[lame plumber]

way of the world, happens to us all.

 

[Subby]

Cheers mate mines a Guinness

 

[helpsy]

Hi all, my first post in the Arms! Glad to see the old plumbing tips thread was hiding here and not deleted as I feared!!
Anyways, I have encountered my first rogue customer

I did a job at fortnight ago for an agreed price, customer was happy he quote and very happy with the work done. I invoiced at the end of the job, the materials cost me more than I quoted so I reduced my labour charge so the invoice total was the same as the quote we agreed upon.
The customer is not paying or answering my calls. I am owed £600 I paid for materials and 340 labour. I a asking a solicitor in know to send a letter but am worried that they will leave a bad review on my main site is get work from .
. I did a very neat job (their words) at a very reasonable cost as agreed. I do not deserve any negative feedback I am concerned I will receive.

Have any of you.had a similar experience and what did you do / how did it pan out?

Hi Subby
small claims court. I recently did it and got most of my money. It is a pain though!

 

[brum]

big Davey all the way youll soon get yer dough..brum

 

[markfxy]

your first of many, don't let them get away with it you should have charged for the extra materials and itemised it in your invoice your not running a charity so why should you give them some of your profit, straight to small claims don't worry about negative feedback

 

[kris]

Welcome to the arms subby. Like the guys have said unfortunately we occasionally come accross bad eggs like this. Don't let the idiot away with it and maybe in the future as your starting up get material cost up front then labour when finished.

 

[Subby]

Good advice Kris will take that on board in future

 

[Best]

Strictly speaking, you are supposed to give the person proper opportunity to pay up, or at the very least, respond to you. Get a proper bill sent out to them & if they don't reply, send a statement (recorded delivery if you like). That way you have copies of your attempts to get your money for to hand to the court later. It is expected of you to have done everything you can first to keep it out of courts until as a last resort. No need at this stage to use a solicitor - just keep your bills & any letters friendly, professional & to the point. Two weeks is not long. The customer has probably spent your money on Christmas.

 

[helpsy]

Took me about 10 months to get some of the money. Make sure you record delivery ALL communication.

 

[SimonG]

Knee cap the feckers

Welcome to the real world.

What do you have in your terms and conditions for late payment?

 

[SimonG]

Seriously though, doesnt matter if its a penny. You want to be known as the hard arsed fecker that will chase the last penny. Last thing you want is to be known as a soft touch.

Chase them till it hurts.

 

[Subby]

I don't have terms and conditions, is it a good idea to write terms on the quote / invoice?

 

[plumben]

Be ruthless dosent matter if its a pound or a thousand
same with pricing if you let it happen once it'll happen again

 

[lambchop]

Google "late payment law" it's excellent mate, unfortunately had to use it a few times but never fails.

 

[LPC]

I might be some kind of trailblazing rebel here but when someone owes me money, I go and knock on the door. This has yielded a 100% success rate.

 

[tamz]

I set the wife on them. Phone calls then personal visits. She is better with the mouth than me and less threatening.
If that doesn't work they are paying one way or another.