Company not paying an invoice £2500

[Banker2020]

Hi

 

I work in the oil industry as a contractor.

on Monday 10th February i was contacted by a large oil services company for a short job offshore, it was to get to Norwich the following day.

Just as i was getting in my car to drive down, i got a call saying its delayed until Friday but if i wait on standby they will pay me for the 11th at full day rate.

 

on the Thursday afternoon i got an email saying the job has been delayed again but i will be getting paid for the job which would have been 4 days Mon-Fri. (see email 2)

 

 i put my invoice in for the 11th and the 4 day weekend for £2500.

1 month later its still not paid, but im promised that i will get paid.

This keeps on going on for another 3 months with lots of promises of payment but no cash in the bank.

 

i put my application into the small claims court and to my surprise they are contesting it.

(they put in an application to set it aside on final day, almost the month from judgement in my favour)

 

here are some of the emails sent between us;

 to me it seems like they've no case as they've admitted they owe the money and just give reasons not to pay ..

. but other opinions are appreciated.

 

The excuses were constant as to why they were delaying paying and were contradictory

 

 in 25 years of contracting i've never known a billion dollar oil company behave in such a way.

It could be they are going bust as they're riddled with debt.

 

Email chain 1

Quote

 

 

 

 

Email chain 2, sent Thursday afternoon.

Email chain 3

Email chain 4

 

Email 5

 

 

[dx100uk]

you already had judgement

on the day you had it ...

you should have ordered the court to send in the bailiffs.

 

from the court you should have a copy of their N244

what are their reasons for the set aside?

 

 

 

[Banker2020]

Ive not got a N244

 

And Ive called to ask what are their reasons for setting aside and they weren't on file.

 

Does the above case look strong ... to me its water tight, but anything can happen in the courts.

 

Once i got the judgement, they have 28 days to pay to avoid getting a CCJ.

 

Seems they can also set aside during this time according to the woman i spoke to.

 

 

[dx100uk]

did they defend the claim?

 

dx

 

[Banker2020]

No

[dx100uk]

sorry hit reply by accident

did they even do AOS and acknowledge the claim?

 

[Banker2020]

No 

 

But even without all that would you see my claim as strong?

 

I suspect they may claim their offices were closed due to CV19 and didnt get court papers.

[dx100uk]

just type no need to hit quote..

 

so on day 20 (they had 19 days to AOS) you got a default judgement

you should have enforced the judgement and ask the court to send bailiffs in 

and if this is over £600 ...for £60 you could have crossed courts and sent sent in High court enforcement officers...

 

how do you know they have raised an N244 if the court has not written to you?

 

[Banker2020]

I got this today

 

ON the 6th August i got a "Judgement for claimant" letter.

 

At which point i believe i did enforce it, but was told they had 30 days to pay to avoid a CCJ.

 

Hence i waited until this time was over.

[dx100uk]

how did you enforce it..send in bailiffs??

 

the 28 days is solely a period whereby the CCJ won't appear on credit files if paid

that doesn't mean they have 28 days to pay it..nor that you can't enforce it !

 

AFAIK ..you should have received a copy from the court of their N244 application as soon as CTSC got it.

 

somethings not right here or you've dropped the ball by not investigating your rights properly..

its all very good raising a court claim and winning, but if you don't do anything about it, you leave the door open to exploitation of the court system..

 

you appear to be playing a big multinational via a third party too in your contract?

so no wonder this happened if you don't know you onions.

 

however your claim to me looks good..you just gave them rope when you shouldn't have done.

 

 

 

[BankFodder]

I suggest that you contact the court immediately on the telephone and asked them for a copy of the set-aside application. They should be able to email this to you. Ask them to email it to you and tell them that it is urgent.

It's absolutely correct, that somehow or other you have become confused or you have been misled. You had an opportunity to enforce the judgement immediately that it was granted and you could have transferred up to the High Court for a very rigourous enforcement.

Please will you tell us which companies you are dealing with. Don't be shy about it.

Also please can you post up the claim form in PDF format – redacted

[Banker2020]

Uploaded the pdf of application

 

Yes seems like ive made a schoolboy error, i called in and they said this is the procedure.

 

Spending most my time dealing with NW.

 

 

 

 

claim-form-claimant-use.pdf

Edited September 9, 2020 by Banker2020

[BankFodder]

So I see that the crux of this claim is that you entered into an agreement to carry out certain work for £2500. They breached the contract by not providing the work but promised to pay you in any event.

Is that correct?

[Banker2020]

Yes, they called on Monday it got delayed until Friday ... they asked me to stay on standby until then and would pay for the Tuesday ... then on Thursday it got delayed but i was told i'd get paid for the 4 days.

 

They will have been paid by the client, as it involve hiring expensive equipment that'd need paying for.

 

Jobs getting delayed like this is the norm in the oil industry.

 

It would seem that in April if he had the timesheets i'd have been paid.

The in May if he could have got me on the computer system i'd be paid.

 

If i put in a small claims application then they are not going to pay.

Edited September 9, 2020 by Banker2020

[BankFodder]

I think you have a very weak case. Although it's not your fault, you have done nothing to earn the money. They are in breach of contract because I would say that there would be an implied agreement that you would be provided with the work and you would be allowed to earn the contract price. However you have been prevented from doing this and I think that you would only be entitled to sue for any losses which you have incurred as a result of their breach.

It will be extremely unlikely that you would be entitled to recover the entire contract price.

What losses have you suffered as a result of their breach?

[Banker2020]

I turned down other work, for £3500

 

Would a SAR at their clients company be of use.

 

Could then see the situation with timesheets and what they got paid for me.

[BankFodder]

I'm not sure that that would be a recoverable loss – but you may as well use that as an argument when replying to the application for a set-aside. Have you done anything about getting the set-aside application?
Can you prove beyond any doubt that you suffered this loss?
Courts are very suspicious about claims for lost opportunities. First of all, courts are worried that the claimant is simply making a money-grab. Also, although you may have lost the opportunity to earn £3500, you still didn't do anything for those few days so you can't actually show that you were "out of pocket" in terms of having put a certain number of hours in and not been paid, or paid for transportation which then became unnecessary or paid for equipment et cetera which then became expenses thrown away.

You said that within the industry, the client will have already paid money because there would have been expenses incurred in respect of the purchase or the rental of expensive equipment. These are exactly the kinds of expenses which would be reimbursed for breach of contract. You haven't told us that you have had any of this kind of loss.

[BankFodder]

5 minutes ago, Banker2020 said:

 

 

Could then see the situation with timesheets and what they got paid for me.

I don't understand what you mean

[Banker2020]

No i dont hire equipment.

 

Ive just lost Labour.

 

If i do a SAR to this company and to the client it may come up with something and will put them in poor light with their client.

 

6 minutes ago, BankFodder said:

I don't understand what you mean

They will have charged for the contact not going ahead.

 

Theyd have a Purchase Order which they would get paid for.

 

|Theyd have charged for me and the equipment. They will be getting paid.

 

[BankFodder]

By all means send them an SAR. There is no downside. However, an SAR will only disclose data relating to you and not to the client.

I think we need to see the set-aside application and decide what to do about it. However if they have been properly advised, then I would expect that the set-aside application would make it clear that no work was done and therefore the value of the claim was excessive.

Whether or not the client has been paid, has nothing to do with you. Of course I'm sure that it rankles and that it feels extremely unfair – but that is not something that the courts will get involved in.

It seems clear to me that you should have had this matter enforced by a High Court process as soon as you had judgement – and you let it go. Even then, they could have been a set-aside – but you would have been in a stronger position.
I can imagine that you will be unlikely to succeed at a set-aside hearing and that if the judgement is set-aside then the best thing you could do would be to try and negotiate and get some kind of payment.

However, I think that there may be some collateral effects here. You decided to bring an action against a client in respect of an agreement in which no work was done. I don't know if this is a regular client of yours – but if it is then it may well be that the fact that you have decided to challenge in the courts will leave a bad taste in their mouth and you will find it more difficult getting work from them in the future.

I'm afraid that you may have shot yourself in the foot

[BankFodder]

You keep on referring to the things that they have said in terms of the delay et cetera – but I'm afraid that even a promise to pay you for delayed work which has never been carried out, amounts to a gratuitous promise.

You may feel that there is a morally binding obligation – and there's probably some force in that. However you have decided to go to court and am afraid that by doing that you have given up the moral high ground and you have decided to fall back on legal principles. A judge will apply legal principles and the basic principle is that although the other side is in breach, you may have suffered minimal losses and it is only those minimal losses that you will be entitled to recover.
Are these people regular clients of yours? Did you expect to get further work from them in the future?
 

[Banker2020]

I wouldn't work for a client who doesn't pay and messes contractors about, so i couldn't care less about that.

[BankFodder]

Get the set-aside application and then come back here

[Banker2020]

Just thinking when i request a SAR will they have to supply the companies whom my details have been forwarded to.

 

i.e the clients emails addresses?

 

Fckers cause a headache for me i can return the favour.

 

Edit - the item i was supposed to be inspecting need checking every 6 months for corrosion, it was past 6 months when this job got delayed.

 

Just to annoy them i can contact Lloyds register/DNV.

Edited September 9, 2020 by Banker2020

[BankFodder]

Note they don't have to provide email addresses.