Small claims court for late payer who has paid but totally ignored late charges?

bris

As already said you can charge for your actual losses. A bank for instance employs a member of staff to send out the letters so the late penalty charge is justified for the employees time.


Remember when the charges were anything from £25 t0 £50? Well the regulator cut that to £12 because they knew it wasn't costing the bank those high prices and valued the employees time at £12 so the extra was a penalty.

steampowered

Hello,

The advice given by other posters only holds true in the case of consumer debts.

In the case of B2B contracts, the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 legislation allows you to claim compensation for late payment at fixed rates, as set out here: http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/20/section/5A.

You don't have to prove any actual loss to claim the compensation, because the amount is fixed by statute.

If you wish, you could certainly issue a 'letter before action' asking for the amount due and issue a small claim if it isn't paid. I can't really see how you could lose, the legislation is very clear and has been successfully invoked in many previous cases. Whether it is worth the bother of going to court is another question.

gettingtheresometime

Could it also be argued that unless the customer agreed to these charges when (s)he signed the contract, the op left it a bit late to inform them of the payment terms?

arcon5

This is why I suppose business' shouldn't seek advice on here as despite op saying its a business to business contract and referring to relevant legislation people are still giving incorrect, consumer based advice.

arcon5

Op
You seem to already know what rights you have better than those around here.
Whether it's worth pursuing is the question.
Maybe a letter demanding the outstanding balance and threat of court action. If no response move on

steampowered

gettingtheresometime wrote: »

Could it also be argued that unless the customer agreed to these charges when (s)he signed the contract, the op left it a bit late to inform them of the payment terms?

Hello,

The legislation sets a default time for payment of 30 days (unless a different time period was agreed). Interest would start running and late payment compensation available after 30 days (unless a different time period was agreed).