[Ian101]

http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/threads/company-who-owe-us-money-has-gone-into-administration-but-is-still-trading-how-do-i-get-my-money.336890/

     and I moan when Im taken for a tenner !

Guess that's the beauty of window cleaning you cant loose too much to non payers.

Had to smile at the part "they still want us to continue working for them" ...... Im sure they do 

[jonboywalton75]

My mate wrote off £2500 on one job!!!

[Walter Mitty]

My biggest hit was just under £500.  It was for subcontract work that I did - never got the final month out of them.  I did regular work for a number of yewars for them - always paid after 30 days.  They decided to go in-house and ended up bumping me for my money.

[Window Lickers]

Lost £1K on a builders clean about 3 years ago, they went down the pan. The highest owed to the builders was 30K.

[Bay View WCS]

Looks like they were a bit too trusting tbh in maintaining the relationship whilst the debts were piling up. However, I think this is one area where directors should be held criminally liable for continuing to incur debt when they are fully aware that they will not be in a position to settle those debts.

As said above we are quite lucky in that most of our domestic work is quite small value and all it has cost is our time. The most I've been stung for is £60.00 but my brother is still waiting for payment of a £20,000 invoice 8 months down the line and has just commenced court proceedings. A butcher friend of mine has just wrote off £8,000 from a kebab shop that went bust.

I'd have no sleep or very bad nightmares if I was in the position of the guy in the link.

[Ian101]

My mate wrote off £2500 on one job!!!

painful !

[Sean Dyer]

the lesson here

customer is someone who pays on time , not someone who promises to !

ive been had for £240  , never worked for them again

[AuRavelling79]

the lesson here

customer is someone who pays on time , not someone who promises to !

ive been had for £240  , never worked for them again

Quite right - I think the most I've "been had" for in this job is about £30 and that would have been two jobs unpaid.

I probably write off about £20/£30 in a year - nearly always people who move without paying; die without paying (!) or the very rare "I told Dan I only wanted a one off not regular" (Dan never got that one wrong) liars.

[TomCrowther]

One if my customers was taken for £160k by a firm of solicitors. Found it almost impossible to get anyone to fight his corner because of the customer. Finally got it to court and they offered thirty pence on the pound which he was advised to take. Now that is a big one to take!

[tonyoliver]

over the years I have been done many many times mostly for small amounts the largest was  £500 for a school.
subbed out work seems to be the worst for this as the person  higher up the food chain seems to want to make an extra buck by not paying you.
tenants moving out the day after you clean the windows is a regular which in my opinion is theft just to protect their deposit.
next, is the want it done but don't   want to pay or knockers as they are called in London. again theft , some make very good livings out of getting people to work and never ever have the intention to pay.
its not just builders who suffer from this.
some races seem to enjoy the thrill of getting you to waste time and effort  trying to get small amounts of cash out of them  come tomorrow or getting the non English speaking granny to deal with you until you just give up  they just wait for the next mug and so on.....
some move some die.....
once the son rang and said the mum had died and no we wont  be paying your bill .............a week later I saw the mum in Sainsbury's resurrection personified  I said what a miracle praise the lord your back from the dead with no embarrassment they just didn't want to pay .
 
and taunted me cant pay wont pay  makes you mad but you just get on with it

[Johnny B]

I've been had by more people here in the emerald isle in three and a half years than in the fourteen plus years I was cleaning windows in Blighty.

I don't chase the debts though (too stressful for me). I don't write them off either. If (as has happened) I get approached by some of these wanting me to clean for them again, I remind them of their debt and for the requirement for paying up front before further work commences. Funny how their interest seems to evaporate at that point, as does my stress levels!

John

[duncan h]

Someone owes me £10 from last month. That's a crate of Carling 

[Ian101]

Someone owes me £10 from last month. That's a crate of Carling 

good way to look at it.

I went collecting yesterday and went to 2 houses who pay once every 6 months due to working abroad (sub mariner and a bomb disposal engineer) ... feels like a nice bonus 

[hotsteam]

why don't you guys take action against these thefts because that's what they are ?

I have trouble was one customer he owed £220 for one job it wasn't the money that peed me off but the way  he kept making promises, like my wife will drop a cheque in, or pay by bac's .

So I sent a letter stating all the bulls**t and legal action would follow if not settled within 7 days,
next day at 10.30 am I get a phone call from him saying he would pay by bac's which he did.

Go for it, it is your money 

[Johnny B]

why don't you guys take action against these thefts because that's what they are ?

I have trouble was one customer he owed £220 for one job it wasn't the money that peed me off but the way  he kept making promises, like my wife will drop a cheque in, or pay by bac's .

So I sent a letter stating all the bulls**t and legal action would follow if not settled within 7 days,
next day at 10.30 am I get a phone call from him saying he would pay by bac's which he did.

Go for it, it is your money 

I know, but I really don't cope well with people making false promises. I would seriously lose my rag if I didn't walk away, and probably some of my decent customers too if they saw that side of me, so I'd rather use my time cleaning proper customers' windows and seeing the filth who stiff me watch their windows match them!

John