Re: *** ADMIN: Consultants forum? -- MIDRANGE-L

It is quite possible that you could place a "mechanics" lien on their computer
under the "mechanics law" in your state. It is a unique way of handling the
problem, but a lawyer could advise.

I would send a registered letter to the manager explaining that the rate is not
negotiable, and that payment in full was expected within a reasonable (14 days)
time. If there was no response, i would send a demand payment letter requesting
payment in full, with additional verbiage explaining that any expenditure for
collections would be added to the tab.  This letter would go registered with
copies to the Managers direct report, the legal department, and an executive,
preferably the president.

In my case, I have a law firm as a client, as well as several acquantinces that
are lawyers. Although I have used legal advice when drawing up contracts, I have
not been really "stiffed" yet.
I had one client that claimed that a simple report program was crashing his
printers. After about 8 hours of attempting to duplicate the problem, I asked
that the next time it happened, they save the spool file before they restarted
the printer. They wouldn't do it. This printer printed a lot of "graphical" data
from Xpoint forms program, and the failure was in an IBM module. A clearly
APARable situation, but they would not even talk to IBM, even though they had
support.  I simply quit spending time on  the problem, and didn't bill for the
time.
Bob.

boothm@earth.goddard.edu wrote:

> I agree that there is need for a forum for discussions.
>
> I just had a situation where I found a COBOL guy to help an organization
> that was in trouble and had given up entirely on ever finishing the
> project, let alone finishing it on deadline.  We finished the project with
> nearly a half day to spare and sent an invoice and heard nothing.  One
> phone call to follow up was all that was needed to realize that we weren't
> supposed to be successful with the project; we'd been hired to fail and
> prove the need for big-budget changes in the affected department. (That is
> a conclusion I drew, not provable anywhere).  As a result the department
> manager discounted our invoice by 2/3rds.
>
> So, has anyone had this sort of thing happen?  What do you do?  Are
> lawyers worth the trouble?
>
> I wish there was a forum where a discussion of this topic would be
> on-topic.
>
> _______________________
> Booth Martin
> boothm@earth.goddard.edu
> http://www.spy.net/~booth
> _______________________
>
> Mark Lazarus <mlazarus@ttec.com>
> Sent by: owner-midrange-l@midrange.com
> 11/20/1999 05:12 PM
> Please respond to MIDRANGE-L
>
>
>         To:     MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com
>         cc:
>         Subject:        Re: *** ADMIN: Consultants forum?
>
> Larry, James, et al,
>
> At 12:00 AM 11/14/99 -0500, you wrote:
> >I too am one of us and find myself agreeing with James.  We certainly
> wouldn't be
> >looking for clients there because, well, their wouldn't be any!  I just
> can't
> >imagine what we would 'talk' about that can't be covered here on
> Midrange-L.
>
> >> IMHO, as a consultant, I'm hard pressed to find value in such a list.
>
> >> Now I could be very wrong, but I imagine the first round of postings
> >> would be a series of chest pounding to gain position by bragging
> >> rights.  After that, no one would divulge their perceived competitive
> >> edge.
>
>  Here's my opinion on this.  I think that it can be a useful forum.  This
> would be especially true for the little guy (i.e. a 1 man consulting
> shop.)
>
>  Some possible topics:
>
> - Subcontracting
> - Rates for a service for a particular area
> - Contract samples
>
>  IMHO, it should be allowed to post opportunities and consultants seeking
> work.
>
>  -mark
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