Unpaid Invoices - But Rather Complicated

[DirtyDog]

Never had PCG+ at the time

Presumably you are now, so why not ring their legal helpline and ask them for free?

[d000hg]

If your client didn't pay the agency, maybe that's WHY they went bust.

[tarbera]

I understand now

Agency was declared dissolved in Aug 2008 so in theory the liquidators are done & dusted. The cleint owes somebody 11 weeks of invoices......

So you have no contract with client, I have equal claim on the money, can you send me the timesheets and I can try my luck also?

[dack]

It's unlikely that invoices you didn't raise have been paid. For those that you did not submit, there is no-one that you can submit them to, since the contract for the work was with the now defunct agency.

For the invoices you submitted to the agency which weren't paid, you would have been a creditor of the agency. The liquidator should have chased the client for the money, and should have been paid. Any money that was due to the creditors would have already been paid out as part of the liquidation process.

You don't actually need a contract in place to submit invoices, I've done it many times on new contract or renewals, as I’m sure many others have. The fact that you’re actually doing the work is a contract in itself that has been accepted by the contractor and the client.

The liquidators were applying pressure to us to submit our timesheets so they could submit invoices, they even took one of the lads to court – and lost. So that implies they couldn’t submit invoices without our timesheets.

Besides, the client from day one, has never claimed that my invoices have been settled.

[dack]

Presumably you are now, so why not ring their legal helpline and ask them for free?

Yes I am DD and that's somthing I'll be doing over the weekend.

[dack]

So you have no contract with client, I have equal claim on the money, can you send me the timesheets and I can try my luck also?

... as long as you can prove you done the work....

[dack]

If your client didn't pay the agency, maybe that's WHY they went bust.

They only didn't pay what we hadn't submitted and so the agency was only down on their commission.

[BlasterBates]

You have a contract with the agency and the client owes the agency. When a company is liquidated it still exists as a legal entity and will chase the client for outstanding debt. The fact that you haven't submitted an invoice has no bearing on whether the agency is owed money by the client.

Effectively you have to lodge your claim and get money out of the agency, or submit an invoice. You have no legal leverage over the client, other than good will.

Bad situation. When a company is going into liquidation the best is to withdraw your services and perhaps sign a new contract with the client. This is complicated legally.

[dack]

You have a contract with the agency and the client owes the agency. When a company is liquidated it still exists as a legal entity and will chase the client for outstanding debt. The fact that you haven't submitted an invoice has no bearing on whether the agency is owed money by the client.

Effectively you have to lodge your claim and get money out of the agency, or submit an invoice. You have no legal leverage over the client, other than good will.

Bad situation. When a company is going into liquidation the best is to withdraw your services and perhaps sign a new contract with the client. This is complicated legally.

The agency went into liquidation in 2009 and was declared dissolved in Sep 2013 and I left the client end of 2010. The client is public sector otherwise I proably wouldn't have bothered trying at all.

Got an appointment on Tue with a solicitor (£174 +VAT/hour!!!).

[DirtyDog]

You don't actually need a contract in place to submit invoices, I've done it many times on new contract or renewals, as I’m sure many others have. The fact that you’re actually doing the work is a contract in itself that has been accepted by the contractor and the client.

You do have to have an agreement, though. In your case, you had an agreement with the agency, and the agency had an agreement with the client.

You did not have an agreement with the client, therefore the client does not have to pay you directly for work that you did when engaged through a third party.