Telephone: 3207 1234
e-mail: frankcop@optusnet.com.au
If someone owes you money (and you can’t get paid), I can help you. I specialize in Court work and the collection of money from delinquent debtors. My clients are generally small- to medium-sized businesses. I am committed to providing quality legal advice and a service which is second-to-none.
2. A “soft” letter of demand is basically a friendly “reminder” to pay. It is normally reserved for your valuable (repeat) customers who are outside your trading terms.
3. A “medium” letter of demand notes that the debt is outstanding and asks for payment within 7 days.
4. A “strong” letter of demand is reserved for customers you no longer wish to service or who have refused to pay for whatever reason and further discussion has not resulted in you being paid. The letter basically threatens severe Court action if payment is not made within an allocated time.
5. All of my letters of demand are sent to the debtor BY E-MAIL AND FAX as I have found that debtors generally ignore ordinary mail or put it in the “in-tray” or “too hard basket”. However, everybody immediately reads an e-mail (usually going to their mobile phone) or a fax that comes off the fax machine and they treat it with much greater urgency. There is no additional cost for the faxing and e-mailing of letters of demand. For this reason, if at all possible, please provide me with all e-mail addresses and fax numbers.
7. If there is no response to the letter of demand, if you are able to provide me with a telephone number, I will contact the debtor by phone to give them “one last chance before Court action starts”.
8. Letters of Demand sent on your behalf are sent on a “NO PAYMENT NO FEE” basis (this means if the debtor doesn’t pay some money on the Letter of Demand, I don’t charge you). Remember: you can recover any debts which were owing in the LAST 6 YEARS (even if you have written the debt off in the past) so make a list of all customers who owe you money!
10. The cost of the searches depends on the searches you want done. Generally, the cost of a search is about $20.00 per search and spending about $99.00 will generally tell you all about the debtor’s asset position. This is a small investment if you are considering spending hundreds or thousands of dollars on a Court action.
11. Even if the debtor has no assets, you may still decide to sue. For example, the debtor may be a builder (with a licence) and bankruptcy may mean he loses that licence, giving the builder great incentive to pay you.
12. When I start a Court action for you, this means the preparation of the “CLAIM” (which is a legal document), filing it in the Court and personally serving it on the debtor.
13. As you can imagine, it is quite a shock for the debtor to receive a Claim (which indicates someone is suing them in Court) handed into them personally by a document server. Sometimes this is enough to get payment from the debtor.
14. The debtor has 28 days from being served with the Claim to either pay you or file a “DEFENCE” (a legal document which gives reasons why the debtor thinks they shouldn’t pay you). If there is no Defence filed, you can get “JUDGMENT” against the debtor which means you have automatically won the Court case (you don’t even have to attend Court). Once you have Judgment, you can do certain things to “execute” your “Judgment” like having the Court Bailiff seizing the debtor’s assets to sell to pay you, etc. I will raise these options with you once you have the Judgment but I will carefully examine and assess which method of execution is likely to get your money for you quickly and without incurring a lot of further costs.
15. If a Defence is filed, a Settlement Conference is called by the Court and all parties must attend the Settlement Conference. About 98% of debts owing are usually resolved by the end of the Settlement Conference, without the need for going to Court (and incurring further costs).
All you need to do is click on my Debt Collection Sheet HERE which you just fill in and send back to me. You can use it as often as you like if you have more than one person owing you money. By completing the Debt Collection Sheet and sending it back to me by e-mail, I am able to assure you of very quick service, without the need for unnecessary time-wasting and collection of information. Once I receive the completed Debt Collection Sheet from you, I can take immediate action which will get your money back to you faster. Make sure you tick on the sheet what you would like me to do.