Customer Owes $14K and Has Gone Silent

“my condolences - that's just not right Good tidings are coming your way [re: When did credit card companies become judge and jury? Small businesses are getting crushed by chargebacks.]”

Oh that’s good.

“They are tied at the hip. If you can't stand up and be accountable and instead hide behind curtains, you aren't a legit business. More likely a fly by night, always ready to run out the back door after taking someones money.”

“I had to do this after I saw my employees so upset and the abuse went on far too long. Weirdly enough, we did it amicably and two years later when my business was struggling we work together on better terms (we keep careful constraints on the relationship and the stakeholders are all good stakeholders). Oddly I’ve at times regretted leaving the relationship when my business ends up with issues, but net-net it’s worked out. No matter what you’ll learn some things from it. Move forward!!!”

“I’m just asking no need for the hostility and now that you mention it, I’m starting to see why”

““those who give you that "money" will get rid of you so they don't have pay anymore” but are they dependent on me? Let’s say i’m a mechanic and they het rid of me who will fix there car?”

“On one hand, we have a rule “we don’t work with dicks”. On the other hand if your business is losing tons of money, you could probably use some tough love.”

“You need a lawyer and not Reddit. And id sue the shit out of any “partner” that did this to me.”

“As far as I am concerned, that is irresponsible behavior. But i guess as long as you feel good about it...”

“We are not talking about 1100$ being nothing. We are worried for you… because this amount of money shouldn’t put businesses at risk. That’s all. The guy gave you good advice.”

“The answer is always whatever she didn't take, both lawyers took the rest. The glass can not be half full or half empty after double lawyer fees!”

Yup. This.

“Overriding the owner is not your responsibility. Advising the owner of the risk of writ\ing this off if they don't have a receipt is your job. That's it. Just that.”

“Same here! Had a clock timer to bankruptcy. First it was weeks, then months, then years. Do not give up!”

“Same situation. It's just weird. What more can be said? So much for rewarding good behavior and customers.”

“It’s not too bad. Just the 80/20 rule. Once you learn the ways you get screwed over you can learn to adapt. Like now we collect credit cards to reserve appointments, require acknowledging our cancellation policy, and can even block bad customers from booking again. You learn to focus on the 20% of the best customers that will bring you the 80% of your income and how to celebrate them. Weed out the rest.”

“It's really about the nature of the transaction. Business owners can just pay themselves a salary or monthly allocation to prevent this debacle.”

“yeah I understand that part...especially in current economies. It's like yeah still kinda creates problems in itself, because of mixed motivations, BUT it's also manageable and morally grounded in my opinion, or at least a different bear of a subject to discuss...long story short, like you said: People gotta eat and if someone insists, they're spending the money. My main gripe is just with people defaulting to it as a first resort or expected market desires. Like it feels like embody”

Exactly why I'm making such a fuss.

“I think a lot of people commenting in this thread have no experience working in/with small businesses. If they did they would understand how common things like this are”

Exactly. Where do these people get this idea that this is okay?

“Appreciate this, genuinely. You're right that the money side of it probably isn't "worth it" in a pure cost-benefit sense — I've done that math myself on sleepless nights. But this isn't just about the $25k for me anymore. These guys are millionaires, and’s $25k for them is nothing and I have a strong feeling I'm not the only person they've done this to. That's the part I can't let go of — not just the loss, but knowing they'll keep doing it if nobod”

“Hey everyone I don't usually post things like this, but I could really use your help. I'm still fairly new to the business world, and I recently got burned in a business deal that fell apart — I'm out $25k. That amount isn't something I can just brush off. It's money I worked hard for, and losing it has honestly weighed on me more than I expected. Since the amount is more than Georgia's small claims limit, I have to go through State or Superior Court, which means I need a”

Repo man

“it's mostly just out of principal. i shouldn't be penalized because someone didn't do their job correctly”

It's time to say, "Either pay up or get out."

“Just had the same story play out with me in a different field, business was failing couldnt find an exit and chased the thing right down the drain, Sell what you can for what you can get now. Completely pivot to a different line of work immediately the longer you wait the more you will lose, i am probably going to lose my house for waiting too long this is the 3rd time I have had to reinvent my income stream and i am only forty 2008-2012, 2020, and end of 2025 the last time was due to two custom”

“Nah, I'm not going into detail, but the claim was a bit more complicated than anticipated. Contract yes, money owed yes. Something unexpected happened to the client at the time of settlement which caused an unforeseen disruption to the existing payment arrangement. Their fuck up and not mine, but it meant that proceedings had to be urgently commenced to secure the funds. Urgent proceedings in a higher court obviously isn't something that my lawyer has a lot of experience with”

“You don’t need sympathy support. The customers paying your bills is the support you need”

how alone you’ll feel

“Never resolved and I don't work there anymore. Client had nearly $300k in UF. Could only account for $20k in cash customer payments. Client also refused to track petty cash. ETA: basically, I think the reason my boss refused to allow me to correct is it would have shown he was negative and didn't want to. (Later on, I found out my boss was illegally reporting employees of one state (at a physical location) as remote employees of another state where worker benefits and rights are signific”

“Haha thanks. Idk it's hurting my head sometimes. The problem is that we are getting so many vendor refunds from years ago due to unclaimed property audits on the vendors side or whatever random reason. It would be ideal if we would get the vendor refunds in the same year. We were also cleaning up our outstanding checks that AP sent out. It's just hard because it's kind of a grey area in my opinion. Unless you adjust Retained Earnings.”

“Closed a deal this morning. Small potatoes for all the biglaw Chads on here, but it was a referral from a buddy. Guy’s business was sideways and he was unable to make payroll on the first of the month and needed out immediately. He got me the operating agreement yesterday and I had been operating under the assumption that he was selling units, but oh no, he hired some clown in a strip mall to do the operating agreement and he called all of the membership interests “Shares” instead of ”Units.” I”

“fair, once you'd told them the rules and they went ahead anyway, ignorance stops being available as an excuse. that's the same pattern a few people described here, the response to being told is the real signal.”

“I’m gonna answer this with two things in mind, one is to answer the direct questions, and two is a more detailed answer as to how I got to that point and how to get out of it, because I get a lot of follow up DM’s asking about clarity so just hoping to help somebody that could use it. So no, expenses were not missing, and yes, contractor bills hadn’t hit yet. I find that you can make your business as complicated with tracking very intricate details or you can try to simplify it as best as possib”

“You can actually say that without hiring a lawyer. I’m not saying not to hire a lawyer, but you can still use the excuse even if you don’t.”

“The model needs an immediate reset: stop accepting new deposits, separate all client funds from personal spending, and calculate exactly what is owed before the refund hole grows larger. Pause live-in placements—clearly the supply does not support that niche—and offer only roles for which qualified workers are already available, while charging the hiring family rather than taking fees from cash-strapped workers. Contact every affected client honestly to arrange written refund or replacement plan”

“Put it out of your head. You tried. He failed. There's nothing more to think about.”

“I'm really sorry you're dealing with all of this. It sounds incredibly overwhelming. The fact that you are still looking for a way forward says a lot. Give yourself some grace while you figure things out.”

“Before taking on any more searches, have you totaled how much cash you would need right now to cover every outstanding refund or replacement obligation?”

They’re already hurting, if you’re not struggling I’d say just let it go.

“Yep! This is the one for me too. That cringe you get when you see their name on text/email or phone. Time to let go.”

“I was once a bookkeeper and then controller who cared about small business owners doing everything “wrong”. 30 years in and my best is advice is you cannot care more than they do. It won’t come back to bite you lol. They have a CPA, why would it come back to bite you?? As long as your checks are clearing the bank, stop worrying about it so much. They are not losing sleep over it, why should you?”

Anxiety/stress spike everytime I saw their name on text or email

“About to fire them. The wife is the owner of record and her horrid husband wants to use the business as his personal luxury spending ground and to find his other business. He gave us a bunch of shit for telling him he can't run his personal vehicle expenses through his SCorp and we wouldn't be putting it on the books as an expense without documentation. Literally lost his shit, and went downstairs and screamed at his wife and kids. We're trying to help her plan to leave his sorry ass”

“$200K is way too much to handle casually. I’d get a CPA or attorney involved before agreeing to a settlement or writing anything off, and document everything in writing. This really needs to be brought to the owner’s attention too.”

“"none of this is illegal" is such a tell. nobody says that about something that's actually fine. the fact that he felt the need to say it out loud means he'd already had the thought. and the disappearing bonus payroll is the one I'd have lost sleep over. the expensive dinners are just someone treating the org like a personal account, but a payroll run that leaves the ledger means somebody went in and removed it. that's a decision, not sloppiness.”

“He repeated the phrase, "none of this is illegal" to try to convince me. And then he praised God for their good financial state. I remained cordial on the call, but yanked my contract soon after the call ended. There were other shady red flags-using debit cards instead of credit cards, very expensive dinners all charged to general operating, a disappearing bonus payroll from the ledger.”

“When the client was 50% of my income, was financially irresponsible and also a jerk.”

“It is truly aggravating. In our business we regularly need to adjust invoices and bills, since they are high dollar items and negotiations can occur after the sale is booked, particularly with our consignors.”

“Idk why keeping a customer is so important if they’re not paying for the goods, especially for that long. If that company is using your company’s goods to make a profit, that company should be able to pay for it. Either force them to consistently back pay, or cut your losses and stop business with them, bc your in-laws’ company is losing money either way. Being put in a position to make financial decisions, then being told not to make those decisions, means you’re not really in charge of making”

“I'm just wondering why someone who doesn't understand why they would use liability rather than equity is taking on clients of any sort let alone these ones.”

“the part people underestimate is that documenting your disengagement matters as much as the disengagement itself. write down what you found, what you told them, and when. if this ever gets looked at by anyone, "the bookkeeper flagged it and left" needs to be on paper somewhere, not just in your memory. also worth being blunt with yourself about why you stayed a year and a half. disorganised client who can't focus on finances is usually a good client. disorganised client whose last”

$200K is way too much

“What is the guarantee the money will come to you over the 10 years? Is there any risk of it being cut off over the other side becoming insolvent/bankrupt?”

Good luck! This sounds like a bear

“Yeah not enough people use promissory estoppel which is why the bad actors can get away with it.”

“Yep. If a business fails "the owner didn't know what they were doing". If a business succeeds they were "lucky".”

“No need for an attorney. Just do small claims court. If you get an attorney involved, you'll probably spend nearly the same amount as the debt. That's just digging a deeper hole.”