I'm tired of listening to people preach personal responsibility while they owe me money and can't be bothered to make regular payments.
I'm so tired of sob stories and empty promises, in fact, that I'm putting together a flier to include in each of the welcome packets at Porcfest this year to list accusations of bad debt. I hate doing this - I'd rather get paid, and I'd rather not embarrass people - but there aren't any alternatives that make more sense to me.
Please forward this to anyone you think might be interested in putting someone's name on this list – or getting their own name off of it.The format is simple - anyone who knows me can submit an accusation for the flier that looks something like one of these:
- Alec Muller claims that ABC DEFGHI owes him $2,255, has not made any payments since April 2009 (~14 months), and seems to perpetually have just had something bad happen when asked to make payments.
- Alec Muller claims that JKL MNOPQR owes him $440, has only paid $30 since February 2009 (~16 months), and always promises to make payments "real soon" that don't materialize.
Restrictions on what
I'm willing to print:
(If you disagree with these restrictions you're welcome to print your own flier)
- Absolutely no threats of violence.
- The accusation must be received or retracted by 6/16/2010 at 11:59pm EST to allow for printing and envelope-stuffing time.
- Can't exceed 200 characters including spaces. No curse words.
- For clarity's sake, use the format “Accuser Name claims that Deadbeat Name . . .”, and include actual names for both people.
- The person making the claim must contact me directly. Email the text of the accusation, give me a phone number and a good time to call you, and I'll verbally confirm that want me to print it. I won't print things from someone I don't know unless someone introduces me to them, and I won't print an accusation from anyone who doesn't personally stand behind it.
Guidelines- The goal here is to use the threat of humiliation to encourage people to keep their promises. Put another way, “Kept promises” = Goal; “Threat of humiliation” = Tool, and don't confuse them.
- Don't surprise the person you're going to accuse; – tell them you're planning on doing it and give them time to start paying you (and retract it if they're making satisfactory progress).
- A secondary goal is to warn other potential lenders so they don't unknowingly subsidize people who don't keep promises.
- Be honest (i.e. do warn others to expect a sob story or “the check's in the mail” if you know 1st-hand to expect it with this person), but don't be vindictive – that just makes you look like a jerk.
- This is for “bad” debt, not “any” debt. If you've agreed to a payment plan with them and they've stuck to it, that's not “bad” debt. If you've kept bugging them and they refuse a payment plan or keep promising to pay soon and never do, then it's “bad” debt.
- Remember that you're taking a risk when you make a claim like this; if you claim something and don't have any evidence to back it up, someone can easily accuse you of lying.
- I'm putting a disclaimer on the flier that says: “I have checked to ensure that the accuser is the person they claim to be, but I don't guarantee the veracity of their claims.”
The Free Talk Live BBS
Author
Topic: Publishing Bad Debts At Porcfest 2010 (Read 3065 times)