| Pages in topic: [1 2] > | Off topic: Craziest excuse from a client for non-payment? Thread poster: Fiona Grace Peterson
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Today I was told by an Italian client that he still hadn't paid me the fifty Euros he owes me (due at the end of July) because he's in Mumbai.
I vividly remember the first translation job I did, when the client told me she couldn't pay because she "had no more cheques in her chequebook".
What are the craziest excuses your clients have given you for not paying?
(And yes, I know non-payment is a serious issue. This thread is just to blow off a little steam).
| | | | Michael Newton 
United States
Local time: 08:59
Japanese to English
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| Craziest excuses for non-payment | Nov 13, 2019 |
Excuses I frequently get from Indian agencies is "The Government changed the currency" (so rupees to what?). "The Government has placed a temporary ban on out-of-country remittances". "The Government has changed the banking system" (indeed!).
Other possible excuses
"Our accountant is on vacation in Antarctica".
"Our accountant has been abducted by aliens".
"Our accountant is on maternity leave" (the accountant is a dude!)
Our accountant has been arre... See more Excuses I frequently get from Indian agencies is "The Government changed the currency" (so rupees to what?). "The Government has placed a temporary ban on out-of-country remittances". "The Government has changed the banking system" (indeed!).
Other possible excuses
"Our accountant is on vacation in Antarctica".
"Our accountant has been abducted by aliens".
"Our accountant is on maternity leave" (the accountant is a dude!)
Our accountant has been arrested on money-laundering charges." ▲ Collapse
| | | | | Not me, but my mother | Nov 13, 2019 |
My mother runs a small business and occasionally (actually, quite frequently) runs into non-payers. Most of them are the standard illness and business failure claims, but one couple won the prize for shamelessness:
"We can't pay you now because we're spending all our money on building a house. We'll think about diverting some funds your way once we're done."
She was so flabbergasted that she let them go without a word.
| | | | Sheila Wilson
Spain
Local time: 13:59
Member (2007)
English
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| Quality complaint: 1 missing character in 25,000 words | Nov 13, 2019 |
I edited a book (monolingual English, written by a non-native speaker) in July-August. It was delivered on 8 August and self-published days later. Payment of the invoice for work done in August was due 30 September but I heard nothing then and got no response to two reminders. Finally, the reply to the third reminder said that I'd charged too much and, anyway, there was a typo. The client was right -- although the spend was monitored and informed at every stage, there was indeed a typo: the auth... See more I edited a book (monolingual English, written by a non-native speaker) in July-August. It was delivered on 8 August and self-published days later. Payment of the invoice for work done in August was due 30 September but I heard nothing then and got no response to two reminders. Finally, the reply to the third reminder said that I'd charged too much and, anyway, there was a typo. The client was right -- although the spend was monitored and informed at every stage, there was indeed a typo: the author had omitted one letter from one word, and I hadn't noticed their error. For that one missing character in about 25,000 words, the client finally got round to demanding a discount when payment was already well overdue and the error had been discovered well before the payment due date.
The client would actually have got their discount if they'd reported it as soon as they found it, because I don't want anyone to feel unhappy about my services. But not at this late stage! I sent the final demand this week. Hopefully they'll end up realising how inappropriate their claim is as I really don't want to have to sue for the second time in 20 years. It leaves a nasty taste in the mouth, even if I am totally confident of winning any legal battle. ▲ Collapse
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John Fossey
Canada
Local time: 08:59
Member (2008)
French to English
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| An Indian client in Singapore this time | Nov 13, 2019 |
Fiona Grace Peterson wrote:
Today I was told by an Italian client that he still hadn't paid me the fifty Euros he owes me (due at the end of July) because he's in Mumbai.
I vividly remember the first translation job I did, when the client told me she couldn't pay because she "had no more cheques in her chequebook".
What are the craziest excuses your clients have given you for not paying?
(And yes, I know non-payment is a serious issue. This thread is just to blow off a little steam).
In my case, it was an Indian client who said, six months after delivery, that he had been in Singapore for six months so couldn't pay a bill of a few hundred dollars. I pointed out that with online banking one can pay one's bills from anywhere in the world, which made him quite angry and he said he was not going to pay. So I just sent him an automated reminder email every month of the overdue payment. After 2-1/2 years he paid - he said he wanted to "clean up" his books!
| | | | | I am so sorry guys | Nov 13, 2019 |
That we do not get paid so often. We must do something about it, don't you agree? Any ideas?
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Dear vendor,
we have simplified our payment processes. At the end of the month, we put all invoices we received into a hat. We then draw three invoices from the hat and pay them.
If you continue to harass us with payment demands, you will be excluded from the next drawing.
Best regards
| | | | Kay Denney
France
Local time: 14:59
French to English
Sheila Wilson wrote:
I edited a book (monolingual English, written by a non-native speaker) in July-August. It was delivered on 8 August and self-published days later. Payment of the invoice for work done in August was due 30 September but I heard nothing then and got no response to two reminders. Finally, the reply to the third reminder said that I'd charged too much and, anyway, there was a typo. The client was right -- although the spend was monitored and informed at every stage, there was indeed a typo: the author had omitted one letter from one word, and I hadn't noticed their error. For that one missing character in about 25,000 words, the client finally got round to demanding a discount when payment was already well overdue and the error had been discovered well before the payment due date.
The client would actually have got their discount if they'd reported it as soon as they found it, because I don't want anyone to feel unhappy about my services. But not at this late stage! I sent the final demand this week. Hopefully they'll end up realising how inappropriate their claim is as I really don't want to have to sue for the second time in 20 years. It leaves a nasty taste in the mouth, even if I am totally confident of winning any legal battle.
Sheila I feel for you!!! I bet the typo was one of those darnedest things that the spell check doesn't pick up on.
It might be too late to sound credible, but could you argue that this was the "copyright typo"? I learned a while back that publishers always leave one typo in every book, on purpose. Then if someone tries to just lift the text and publish it for their own profit, you can prove that it was your editing work, because they will lift the typo too.
A friend of mine sells maps, and some other people copied her map and pretended to have produced it themselves. She won the court case on the strength of them having copied the deliberate mistake.
(I now find myself trying to spot the copyright typo in every book I read... which plays havoc with my peace of mind!)
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| "Our customer hasn't paid yet" | Nov 14, 2019 |
I wrote a very angry mail, that this wasn't a problem of mine and that they couldn't use such an excuse with me, a seasoned translator, taking the trouble to explain the reasons, too (which they were anyway perfectly aware of, I suppose).
Two days later I was sent the money.
I don't remember any other remarkable or crazy excuses.
| | | | | "We're in the Maldives for a couple of weeks" and more... | Nov 14, 2019 |
An e-mail "from my iPhone X" sufficiently technologically advanced to inform me that they could not pay for a couple of weeks, but not sufficiently advanced to access their online banking facilities?
That said, it meant I was on holiday for two weeks also, at home, working on files other than theirs.
When they returned, the funds did come through, but I admit to having been a little reticent to progress beyond the value of the deposit. Why? They would not pay the rest ... See more An e-mail "from my iPhone X" sufficiently technologically advanced to inform me that they could not pay for a couple of weeks, but not sufficiently advanced to access their online banking facilities?
That said, it meant I was on holiday for two weeks also, at home, working on files other than theirs.
When they returned, the funds did come through, but I admit to having been a little reticent to progress beyond the value of the deposit. Why? They would not pay the rest until the "end of the month". I'm pleased they earn more than 10 times what I do, (I have translated revenue-related documents for them), but it is a fairly hefty insult to make me wait, particularly as everything is done to a mutually agreed schedule.
Could I hurry the last batch through? Well, I'll do my best but as you sent the final batch through
- 6 weeks after I'd asked for it
- added extra documents (sneaky, sneaky)
- modified / augmented other documents
- you sent it more than one week later than announced....
Another thing clients seem to find difficult to understand is why if they send something through one week late, that does not translate by my being one week late in turn. Well, other clients don't have to bear the brunt of your not keeping to the plan, you do. So it may actually mean being way more than one week late, even if I do fit you in as soon as possible.
Client education!
[Edited at 2019-11-14 14:12 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | | "We always pay 90 days after invoicing EOM" | Nov 14, 2019 |
Agreed was explicitly 30 days after invoicing, the job was super urgent, of course, and "long term collaboration" promised.
| | | | Sheila Wilson
Spain
Local time: 13:59
Member (2007)
English
+ ...
| An intentional error? I like it! | Nov 14, 2019 |
Kay Denney wrote:
Sheila I feel for you!!! I bet the typo was one of those darnedest things that the spell check doesn't pick up on.
Thanks, Kay  . It was a missing lower-case "I" -- the tiniest character there is. MS-Word was always going to put a squiggly line under it -- whether the spelling was right or wrong -- but this particular text was so chock-full of them that the warning wasn't enough.
It might be too late to sound credible, but could you argue that this was the "copyright typo"? I learned a while back that publishers always leave one typo in every book, on purpose. Then if someone tries to just lift the text and publish it for their own profit, you can prove that it was your editing work, because they will lift the typo too.
A friend of mine sells maps, and some other people copied her map and pretended to have produced it themselves. She won the court case on the strength of them having copied the deliberate mistake.
I had heard about that but never really believed it. You've convinced me! I'll be looking out for them in future too.
By the way, I've remembered a rather sad case of non-payment from way back when I was running a training course for the French Job Centre. My client was an intermediary, a not-for-profit association. The president literally stole the petty-cash box along with all the funds in the association's bank account and did a runner with her 4-year-old son. The police caught up with her a few days later, minus the cash. She ended up in prison and her kid was put into care. That little boy clearly lost a lot more than I did  .
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| The other way around | Nov 14, 2019 |
One client of mine sent me a 9300 euro job. I received the money on my bank account before I even had translated one word (because I had to finish a previous job first)!
Wonders do happen occasionally.
Needless to say he is my favourite client. 😊
| | | | Vi Pukite
United States
Local time: 05:59
Latvian to English
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| "You didn't have the country in your invoice address so we didn't know where to send the check." | Nov 16, 2019 |
This one came from a US company, of course. I live in the US.
| | | | | Suicide attempt | Nov 18, 2019 |
For one of my first jobs I only received the full amount about a year later (!). I was told the owner of the small translation agency had tried to commit suicide and her friend was trying to sort things out for her business. I wasn't sure whether this was the truth, but it sounded too extreme to be a lie. In the end, after a lot of hassle, I did receive my money. Years later I googled her and found out she'd closed her translation business and had become a wedding planner...
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