I AM not sure if there is a sort of invisible miasma that hovers around the months of July and August, but they always seem to be the months in which nothing happens, especially, in our case, payments of outstanding fees. 

We get on the phone and threaten and plead and finally somebody gets it together and pays us and we go on.
Recently, the contractor on a very large hospital contract wasn't paid by the client for two months. The contractor just stopped work for a few weeks until the whole amount due was paid and then they started work again. This was a very radical step but a very necessary one - if the contractor had allowed things to slide then... well the problem would have not gone away.

We were once owed R210 000. We called and emailed and finally.... The payment would have come via the architect but they said they hadn't paid and therefore they couldn't pay us. Since they were not out of pocket, they really didn't care but they did encourage us to approach the client directly, which we did, but we got no results.

Consequently, we stopped giving the architect any quotes for new work and we would not answer any queries on the project at all. Finally, the slow but slight pressure worked and the payment was made - two years late. We now ask that architect for a 50% payment up front, which naturally they can't give, so we ask for a payment bond, which they won't give and hence we do not work together.

Is this foolish? I don't think so.

By way of example, I will not ride a horse that kicks out - once it develops a kicking habit it never changes. Some people (and the architect in question is one of them) develop a habit of not paying until you scream. I don't need the hassle of dealing with them.

Neither do electrical contractors.

If you don't get paid then you can't pay your own accounts. If the people you deal with accept this, you can easily fall into the habit of just, uh, forgetting to pay or paying late. It's too easy to say, well, I would pay but I've not been paid. Rather pay all the accounts you can, even if you haven't been paid. Then you can keep in reserve the good reputation you will develop for paying you bills on time and, trust me, the time will come when you just don't have the cash and you can phone your creditors and say, "Look, help me out this once..."

The good thing about cutting ties with people who are bad payers is that you can spread the word about them without fear.
"Oh," you can say, "Number One Architects? Yes, they didn't pay us once..." This is not spiteful or vengeful, it's true. And in a way, it's just.

There are other dogs out there that delight in slicing and dicing your original contract offer in order to pay less. For example, you quote them for earthing and bonding, supplying a new outdoor light, fixing the DB, putting in a new socket outlet and so on.... Then they say, "Oh, forget about the earthing and bonding but give me a quote for a power supply to the swimming pool pump."

So you do, calculating that the earthing and bonding would have cost x rand, the pump supply will be y rand so the additional will be the markup on y rand. But, you find that the client will, at the end of the day, deduct lots for the omit of one item and expect no increase for the pump power supply. And refuse to pay the difference... and boast to friends about it.

What to do: Do not accept any extra work until the original contract (with items omitted if necessary) is complete. Then quote for additional work. Oh, I can hear you say, we do that all the time! No, no, no you don't! So many contractors don't.

Finally... If you get ripped off, just walk away... just leave it. It's all the same in 100 years...

machoy@iafrica.com