Your customer will not respond to you, is not paying you and it seems they have fallen off the face of the earth. What can you do?
Using small claims court can be slow, but if you obtain a judgement you can garnish wages or assets.
Every state is different and in NH the maximum amount you can sue for in Small Claims Court is $3500.00. You pay all the filing fees up front but the court will award those back to you along with interest with your judgement. My experience has been that most debtors do not show up to the court date and you win a judgement by default.
When you win a judgement, that DOES NOT mean you will now be paid. Once you receive a judgment, you need to try to collect on the judgement. You may have to file with your courthouse for periodic payments if the customer still does not pay. When you do this, the court will mail you and your customer a notification telling you when the hearing is to be held. The debtor will have to provide documentation to the court as to why they have not and cannot pay this bill. This can include pay stubs, unemployment payment stubs, welfare check stubs or income tax returns. The judge will make a decision on how much the debtor will pay each month and on what date the payments will be due. You will receive a copy of this court order once the judge makes their decision.
Once yo uhave this court order, if it is not complied with, the customer or debtor is in violation of a court order which is contempt of court. You must let the court know if this happens and tell them you have a court order and this customer is in contempt of court and you want them to be arrested.
I have had to do this, and they put the handcuffs on a debtor who was in contempt and he had a secretary of the court call his girlfriend who came down with the money to pay me so he could have the cuffs taken off and go home.
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