It's just money...

[Woody]

Right now, there are two companies that owe GU enough money to pay our bills for three months. Being that they are both past due on payment, we are currently two months behind on bills ourselves. The difference? We've extended ourselves credit wise to cover our bills. But these companies seem to be uninterested in the fact they owe money at all. I wish I could be kind about the situation, but one of the companies is 80 days past due.

When I was young I watched as my mother juggled bills from month to month. It's a habit that I swore I'd never get myself into. But when the companies you work for, refuse to pay you... you begin considering your options. And with GU Jr. coming this is not the right time for me to be over extended because a couple of companies won't pay up.

It's a frustrating circumstance. And I have taken measures to make sure it doesn't happen again in the future. But, I can't discuss that just yet. The problem? I likely won't get paid until December for this new direction I've taken IF they pay me when they're supposed to.

I'm also working on the GU store to finally offer the posters, buttons, stickers, etc we bought for ConnectiCon. But, progress is slow. Guess it's time to start juggling.

[Gumblackwood]

I'm starting to think that everyone has to juggle finances from time to time. Right now my wife's employer has "forgotten" to send in payroll again, and we're closing in on needing to rely on our plan B. It sounds like you're doing the right thing finding other sources of income, even if they won't pay off until December.

[Dwiz]

I don't know what your legal options are in America, but surely there must be some kind of system in place to help make sure people get the money they earn?!
and 80 days is a LONG time...

anyway, thats obviously not what your post is centered about... I wish you good luck with it though, I know what its like, given my current situation, student...

meh, I don't know if this post really has a point beyond me empathising with your current situation...

[Woody]

There are really only leagal fall backs if you have a firm agreement in place. And even that doesn't garauntee speedy payment. It just outlines what artificial rights you can exercise once the payment is late (usually in regards to late fees, interest, etc).

Other than that, I can move the bill over to a collections agency. But finding one that's worth its salt is difficult unless you're a large company that could potentially move a lot of debt their way. In my case, given the amount of the debt, most companies that would help me would want 30-40%.

[Chiv]

The collection agencies in America take from the person hiring them?
I didn't know that, i thought it was like here in the netherlands: the collection agency gets your money + interest and their costs from
the person or company that's not paying. 2 reminders do have to be
sent before a collection agency can start on it though.

Anyhow woody I hope everything pans out and you get what you worked for.

[Breandan]

If it were my company, and I had as public a forum as you do, I would out them publicly after 90 days in default. But, then again, I can be a ruthless bastard when people bugger my company over.

[HyfighStereo]

It *can* work that way Chiv.

The collection agency does make most of their money based on interest if state laws allow for interest to accrue.

In most situations the original creditor is going to end up paying the collection costs. Those can only be collected from the consumer (the debtor) if there was an express agreement signed saying that they will cover the cost for collections if it comes to that.

Woody, I have worked in the collection industry for almost 10 years with 5 years of actual collection experience. I don't know if I could offer any advice you may not already know, but if you want some help I'm more than happy to lend what knowledge I can.

[Woody]

Thanks. I appreciate that. I'll keep it in mind certainly.

[aicrules]

The problem with going to collections is that you can take a small business relationship (which typically feels more like a PERSONAL relationship) from covertly offensive to overtly offensive. This would potentially threaten the relationship much more than it is now. People tend to take great offense at these sorts of things...similar to the brother or co-worker who perpetually owes you for lunch.

The difference, of course, is that this IS a business relationship which everyone always hopes will be handled professionally. I would assume that the steps you've taken to prevent this from happening again are the sorts of things that a normal accounts receivable dept would deal with a tardy accounts payable dept from another company.

Unlike payroll, there typically isn't any rush by a company to pay their bills to other companies. We have to pay our personal bills within a month or we incur a late fee of some sort. Yet, with businesses things can go months as "past due" and because everyone wants to keep the relationship happy, they won't do anything really bad until it is obvious that the delinquint party doesn't intend to follow through.

My wife was treated as an employee by her company until it got bought out by a large corp (NBC). They made it clear that the "contractors" were now considered outside companies and would be paid by B2B invoice process. This initially caused months of delays in getting paid. For a larger business with several years worth of cash on hand, this isn't a big deal. It's cases like my wife and GU that can't always bear that pain.

For us, the answer was to make sure we had a buffer to handle delays, and it paid off because it happened more than once. But even then it doesn't take much before the bank account closes in on zero.

Obviously I can't provide business advice without knowing more details...okay so even with details, I really am not qualified, but I can say "I FEEL YA"

[lionfire]

Pre-Pay for advertising. Not sure why you didn't do it that way to begin with. Back when I was attempting to advertise for my website all the other sites were pre-pay for X amount of Months for X amount dollars. Then after the time was up you could renew or your ad was dropped.

[Woody]

Lionfire, big companies do not work that way. Most companies work on a net-30 payout. And, most companies work through 3rd parties to secure advertising so they do not have to commit their own sales force to the task. In these cases the 3rd party has to be paid before they can submit payment to the vendor (me). So where a pay in advance model might work for a small site entertaining small advertisers, as soon as you start working with globally known companies that model isn't even a consideration.

[Aku]

Unfortuanately alot of buisnesses strech out their payables as long as possible, espcially when the power between the two companies are so uneven. You don't even want to hear some of the stories I have heard about Walmart.

I know it is aganst your style Woody, but companies react once their names are treated negitively on blogs and related media. Many companies have service people spcifically dedicated to finding bloggers with complaints.

An example of this is contained in the following links. Both are about the same incident.

http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/?p=936

http://blogcritics.org/archives/2006/12/23/161800.php

Really, you are under no obligation to honor the honorless.


I have a good friend that had a thriving small business before he went to get his MBA with me. Next time I see him I will check to see if he has any ideas.