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Invoicing after 1 year not payable?
Thread poster: Laurens Landkroon
Laurens Landkroon
Laurens Landkroon  Identity Verified
Local time: 14:16
English to Dutch
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Thanks again Thomas and Sheila Feb 21, 2017

I take I am bound by legal regulations in the country of the client? (if so, I'm sure there is a way to find out what specific rules there are in this topic in UK law).

If not, that would be awesome. (as FYI, in the Netherlands, payment for services rendered, even the ones that are not invoiced, have to be paid, it's important to send the invoice within 5 years ; if you send an invoice after 5 years, the client doesn't have to pay the invoice anymore it seems.)

I'm al
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I take I am bound by legal regulations in the country of the client? (if so, I'm sure there is a way to find out what specific rules there are in this topic in UK law).

If not, that would be awesome. (as FYI, in the Netherlands, payment for services rendered, even the ones that are not invoiced, have to be paid, it's important to send the invoice within 5 years ; if you send an invoice after 5 years, the client doesn't have to pay the invoice anymore it seems.)

I'm also now wondering if there is governing European law about this. (and whether or not the rules/regulations apply to all countries or that there are exceptions, although I highly doubt that there are such exceptions).

I will update this thread if I know more.

Best,

Laurens.
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Thomas T. Frost
Thomas T. Frost  Identity Verified
Portugal
Local time: 13:16
Danish to English
+ ...
Jurisdiction and more Feb 22, 2017

My hunch would be to follow the law and legal procedures in the constituent country of the UK concerned. You should be aware that it is not "UK law" you need but the law for the constituent country of the UK concerned, for example England/Wales or Scotland. They do not have the same legal systems. You need to consider England/Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland different countries when you're talking law.

It would be easier to enforce a Scottish judgement against a client in Scotl
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My hunch would be to follow the law and legal procedures in the constituent country of the UK concerned. You should be aware that it is not "UK law" you need but the law for the constituent country of the UK concerned, for example England/Wales or Scotland. They do not have the same legal systems. You need to consider England/Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland different countries when you're talking law.

It would be easier to enforce a Scottish judgement against a client in Scotland than a Dutch judgement against a client in Scotland, I think. You'd save money on translations.

To find the time limits, just google "statute of limitation Scotland" if your client is in Scotland, for example.

I'm pretty sure EU law has nothing to do with this. You find the statutes of limitation in national law, and they are different from country to country.
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Laurens Landkroon
Laurens Landkroon  Identity Verified
Local time: 14:16
English to Dutch
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Thanks Thomas. Feb 22, 2017

As far as I can see from a short Google search, there is a law about this from 1980 that only applies to England and Wales it seems...

Pretty much all dates mentioned for such cases are between 3 and 6 years, there are only some exceptions when fraudulent or other malicious practices are involved.

I searched a bit more and I only see 6 years mentioned as statue of limitation in the UK.

Did you mean that in England, different counties have different laws
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As far as I can see from a short Google search, there is a law about this from 1980 that only applies to England and Wales it seems...

Pretty much all dates mentioned for such cases are between 3 and 6 years, there are only some exceptions when fraudulent or other malicious practices are involved.

I searched a bit more and I only see 6 years mentioned as statue of limitation in the UK.

Did you mean that in England, different counties have different laws about this topic?? Confusing....

I mean, if the rule is 6 years in England, than any county can just overrule this and list their own limitation period??.....)

I'll read through the links you sent tomorrow. Just noticed it's almost 1.30 am over here....

Regards,

Laurens.


Thomas T. Frost wrote:

If nothing else is agreed, the relevant statute of limitation in the competent jurisdiction determines such questions.

So which jurisdiction is competent if nothing has been agreed? I found this document:

http://www.emarketservices.com/clubs/ems/prod/E-Business%20Issue%20-Applicable%20law%202.pdf

Once you know which jurisdiction or jurisdictions are competent, you need to look up their statutes of limitation.


[Edited at 2017-02-22 00:38 GMT]
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Thomas T. Frost
Thomas T. Frost  Identity Verified
Portugal
Local time: 13:16
Danish to English
+ ...
The UK Feb 22, 2017

Laurens Landkroon wrote:

As far as I can see from a short Google search, there is a law about this from 1980 that only applies to England and Wales it seems...

[…]

I searched a bit more and I only see 6 years mentioned as statue of limitation in the UK.

Did you mean that in England, different counties have different laws about this topic?? Confusing....

I mean, if the rule is 6 years in England, than any county can just overrule this and list their own limitation period??.....)



I think you need to read up on geography. The UK comprises four countries: England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, as this article describes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Countries_of_the_United_Kingdom .

The US comprises 50 states. Germany comprises 16 states.

In all of these cases, the individual states or countries are competent for certain legislation, not the nation.

This has nothing to do with counties.

The 6-year time limit I found applies in England and Wales, not the UK as a whole. It could be different in Scotland and Northern Ireland, but as you still haven't told us which country of the UK you are talking about, we can only guess that perhaps you mean England.


 
Michael Wetzel
Michael Wetzel  Identity Verified
Germany
Local time: 14:16
German to English
Who cares about the specific law if you more or less know the situation is clear? Feb 22, 2017

It seems highly unlikely that their assertion is valid anywhere in the UK or in the Netherlands (if that is deemed to be the relevant legal system here).

Just send them an invoice for the price you agreed upon and sincerely apologize for creating a headache for their accounting department. Depending on where you are in your discussions with them, tell them you've gotten legal advice and have been informed that your invoice is still fully valid. If they believe they are exempt from
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It seems highly unlikely that their assertion is valid anywhere in the UK or in the Netherlands (if that is deemed to be the relevant legal system here).

Just send them an invoice for the price you agreed upon and sincerely apologize for creating a headache for their accounting department. Depending on where you are in your discussions with them, tell them you've gotten legal advice and have been informed that your invoice is still fully valid. If they believe they are exempt from paying for services invoiced in an untimely manner, then let them look up the relevant regulations and send them to you. If they want to argue that the price agreed to in the original agreement should not apply to later work that you did for them, then let them find some argument for why that is a plausible assumption. None of that is your problem.

If they don't pay, then follow Thomas's and Sheila's good advice. And if you can find a plausible(!) reason to divide the invoice up into two more invoices, that might be a good idea. The limit for the EU small-claims procedure seems to be €2000.
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Christopher Schröder
Christopher Schröder
United Kingdom
Member (2011)
Swedish to English
+ ...
+1 Feb 22, 2017

They have to pay. There is no one-year limit in any part of the UK. If necessary, threaten small claims and they will cave.

Nosy, I know, but I do wonder how you managed to forget to bill 4,000 euros for a year...


 
Laurens Landkroon
Laurens Landkroon  Identity Verified
Local time: 14:16
English to Dutch
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Thanks Michael, Thomas and Chris. Feb 22, 2017

Good to hear that my thoughts about this are not wrong.

Thomas, my apologies for not mentioning it, I read that I wrote a Limited company in the UK. (only in my last post I mentioned England a couple of times, not specifically tieing it to my client).
In short, it is a company based in England.

But still, I totally agree with Michael, I think the best course of action now is to have them explain to me (with legal proof obviously) why they shouldn't pay.the full
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Good to hear that my thoughts about this are not wrong.

Thomas, my apologies for not mentioning it, I read that I wrote a Limited company in the UK. (only in my last post I mentioned England a couple of times, not specifically tieing it to my client).
In short, it is a company based in England.

But still, I totally agree with Michael, I think the best course of action now is to have them explain to me (with legal proof obviously) why they shouldn't pay.the full amount due. I read numerous documents (all stating more or less the same thing, that there is no such thing as a 1 year statue of limitation), spoke to a few lawyers and several business owners in England and colleagues based in the Netherlands and I did not come across any valid reasons why a company should not pay for services rendered (only in matters that I mentioned before, when invoiced 5 or 6 years after the work (only applies to services, not to goods) and when fraude or malicious intent is involved).

I will also create 2 separate invoices (each below 2000) just for the worst case scenario (having to go to court).

Lets see how they respond to receiving 2 invoices for almost 4000 euro in total, whereas they could have just paid me that one invoice for 3300 euros instead...). (in my initial post I explained why I hadn't invoiced the additional work I did for them, partly because I felt responsible for this issue and somehow wanted to show that this 700 euro gap was a way of sort of compensating for that, I know, I know, another big mistake....)

I also read that the maximum amount you can take to such a small claims court, or whatever the name was for these somewhat small claims, is 2000 (euros or pounds?).
This route is far from ideal obviously, so hopefully it won't come to that.

Again, thank you all for the help and support, much appreciated!! (^_-)


Laurens.

PS :
Chris, not nosy at all.
Where shall I begin? Imagine your daily life being suddenly turned around over a period of about 6 months, a family member becoming terminally ill, losing both your parents, a few close friends involved in a terrible car accident and (some) even dying, you yourself out of order for about 4 months, being there for your kids who were having their own difficulties and struggling to get ahead, and I hope you can understand a bit that business matters were not on my list with priorities..

ok, I could list a few more of these, but I guess you get an idea....


[Edited at 2017-02-22 12:40 GMT]
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Christopher Schröder
Christopher Schröder
United Kingdom
Member (2011)
Swedish to English
+ ...
- Feb 22, 2017

Small claims limit is £10,000 in the UK.

Sounds like you've had a horrendous time. I can't believe they listened to that and didn't cough up. Let me know if I need to get my baseball bat out.


 
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Invoicing after 1 year not payable?







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