Contract terminated help

[theroyale]

TheRoyal - did you send your agency a letter from a solicitor? or is there some sort of online legal/debt collection system that can send a threatening letter for a fixed fee? Or if i give them 30days notice can i use small claim court?

Didn't have to send solicitor letter although I was preparing to - all I did was send an official sounding email that said "xxx invoices are outstanding on payment. Please let us know the status of these invoices".

Seemed to do the trick. As someone else has mentioned here they don't want to get involved in any proceedings, especially when the b******* in your case clearly don't have a leg to stand on.

As for email v recorded delivery I was advised that email was just as tenable legally - although other people here need to confirm that. (I did follow up the actual email with "For our records could you please confirm you are in receipt of this email")

[Wanderer]

The problem with this agent this agent they work on self billing with client and ignore all invoices.

Hmm. How do you deal with that situation then. With self billing, the client or agent raises the invoices for you and then pays them, my LTD doesn't raise invoices (it's not allowed if you operate self billing). If the agent/client doesn't raise an invoice and (potentially) you don't have a timesheet either, how can you demand payment?

[Wanderer]

Follow it up with a final 7 day "Letter before action" after the time limit to pay up has passed.

I have found that sending a copy of this type of final warning letter to the Company Director and sending it "signed for" (costs a quid or so from the post office) works wonders too. The problem was sorted out the day they got the letter.

[Old Greg]

Interesting so far. Client/agency posted me a letter stating contract terminated on basis of "emergency" which is part of a termination clause as in my earlier post. They (client) refuse to date to provide further detail what is the emergency, which led to my contract being terminated. Funily i heard of similar story with another chap being terminated before i joined this client!

Well took some contract legal advice...and they suggested i write letter back for further information on the basis of "emergency" and threaten them with small claims court. Adviser suggested that unless my company is insolvent or bankrupt (which is not case) or i have done nothing of serious misconduct at client office, they have no reason for emergency termination. Even if I did something not correct they should have made me aware formally or a formal meeting/notice before temrinating contract - which never happended. This legal chap recommend i use moneyclaim.gov.uk for a small claims court claim, which he thinks should be straight forward and any district Judge will ask client/agency what is the "emergency" and what steps were taken to notify contractor before termination i.e. is there an audit trail or traceable communication? (erm no)

I welcome your views on this, as i notice some forum members say well its part of contracting risk; others saying there can be nothing done. Any suggestions/help/advice welcome.

Lesson to learn: Always check your termination agreement and double check you are happy with the wording. if not change it or walk away or work with an "gun" to your head week to week

Emergency? Is there a force majeure clause e.g. Force majeure - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (might be US based and IANAL etc. but gives you the general idea)? If this is what they are claiming, as OPs have said, they must justify it.

[Ignis Fatuus]

Thanks for replies so far. Just to clarify i am LTD co. I have contract with agency and agency have their own with end client.

This is the terms for termination in the contract:
TERMINATION
x.1 An assignment may be terminated by the Company or the Subcontractor giving the other party the period of notice of 5 working days, except in cases of emergency and the Company’s decision as to what constitutes an emergency shall be conclusive.
x.2 Failure by the subcontractor to give notice of termination as required in S.17.1 shall constitute a breach of
contract and shall entitle the Company to claim damages from the Subcontractor for any consequent loss suffered by the company.

x.3 The Subcontractor acknowledges that the continuation of an Assignment is subject to and conditioned by
the continuation of the contract entered into between the Company and the Client. In the event that the contract between the Company and the Client is terminated for any reason the Assignment shall cease with immediate effect.

Surely the highlighted part of the contract blows the OP out of hte water?

[diesel]

Surely the highlighted part of the contract blows the OP out of hte water?

some interesting discussion here.
All my past and current contracts only cover immediate termination in the event my LTD co goes insolvent or bankrup - none of which neither apply.

But they have not provide any explanation of "emergency" and no explanation of "reason". But even by applying the 3rd clause one can interpret the same as i said before...."we expect contractor to give us notice but we (client) can do what we want"


Old greg - thanks for the defintion link..could be a good one to produce if this ever gets to court.

surely there must be others who have had experience of being treated this way unfairly and breach of contract???

[diesel]

received a recorded delivery letter today from agent - fast response!
Basically they have said client was "unhappy with my work and quality hence the reason for immediate termination". Also they have said client has a right to refuse payment for last invoice and also seek damages from me and right of seeking correction of work at no cost to them. They have not taken up this right at this time.
Basically sounds like they are ready to counter sue me for the work. In fact if they told me what they were not happy i would have easily said yeah i will do an extra few hours from home at no cost to correct. But they did not.

Also the agency and client have said "reserve the right to what constitues an emergency is at discretion of agent".

any views welcome.

[Muttley08]

As I understand it, they have to be clear if they're terminating the contract on those grounds when they terminate it. If they haven't then their case is a bit thin.

My advice would be if to get some professional to point you at the legal bits to do with this, case history etc...

That said, you're down to a lot of work pushing this through and proving it for 5 days....

[Wanderer]

client was "unhappy with my work and quality hence the reason for immediate termination". Also they have said client has a right to refuse payment for last invoice and also seek damages from me and right of seeking correction of work at no cost to them. They have not taken up this right at this time.

Oooh, a veiled threat to up the ante. Quite a clever comeback by the agency, I must say. Now, you have to ask (and be honest with yourself), do you think there was any thing that could be construed as poor workmanship? I'm not suggesting there is, but you have to have a hard think about if you could argue your case in front of a judge.

Was the contract to deliver a specific piece of work (price work) or to give X days of consultancy on a daily rate? Price work, you have a tough one to prove and if the work could be proved to be defective then you would legally have to fix it (though you have to consider if there was scope creep or an inadequately scoped project). X days consultancy is a bit easier, you turn up and do the work the question is was the quality of the work delivered of merchantable quality, so to speak.

Correcting any defects for free is only really viable for a fixed price deliverable, otherwise, anything that you touched that has deficiencies could potentially come back to you to be fixed.

Also the agency and client have said "reserve the right to what constitues an emergency is at discretion of agent".

No it isn't, it will be decided by a judge in a court after consideration of contract law.

I would be inclined to demand a detailed explanation of what was deficient and how the propose that it be rectified. If they can't provide that (they may just want to get on with their business) then they have to pay up.

You could also consider taking it to court and forcing them to file a defence/counter claim and see what happens. They may back down or they may fight it. If they fight they would have to file a detailed defence and they may not be willing to invest this much time. There is a risk that they could counter claim, do you have PI insurance? However, you can (quietly and not in writing) point out to them that your company has no assets so even if they got a judgement against your LTD, they couldn't enforce it anyway.

Personally, I'd take it to court just for the experience. Win or lose, I'd take it as a lesson on how to deal with this situation in future though there is possibly something to be said for walking away and avoiding all the stress. I've learned to pick my fights carefully, don't start it unless you are determined to win it.

Anyone here ever actually had one go to court?

[DS23]

aside from the last one - are your invoices paid up?