Small Claims Court

[getnbusy]

I've never been sued in small claims, but in NC that is magistrate court. Meaning it is in front of a magistrate, not a judge, and attorneys are not allowed. I am a landlord and I have tenants in there all the time for evictions. The magistrate always rules in our favor and awards us possession of the property plus a " judgement" for damages and money owed. In 20 years I have NEVER collected on a judgement. IMO it ain't worth the paper it's written on. That leads me to believe that you don't have to pay, even if you lose. I'm sure it's different everywhere, and I'm probly confused because that's the way it has always been in my town. At the end of the day, you gotta do what lets you sleep at night.

 

[Earl Weiss]

.............. That leads me to believe that you don't have to pay, even if you lose. I'm sure it's different everywhere, and I'm probly confused because that's the way it has always been in my town. At the end of the day, you gotta do what lets you sleep at night.

Check out your local regs about recording the judgement. Here we call it a memorandum of Judgement. That way it shows up on the credit report. Every once in a while, a few years later the debtor calls because they can't get a loan without clearing this.

 

[mjwalsh]

Check out your local regs about recording the judgement. Here we call it a memorandum of Judgement. That way it shows up on the credit report. Every once in a while, a few years later the debtor calls because they can't get a loan without clearing this.

For the sake of further understanding on what can ruin credit ... if there is no judgement whatsoever in a court of law for the person or company who feels they are owed because of their interpretation of a contract involved or whatever ... the credit report monitoring corporations ...will not allow the negative entry?

 

[MEP001]

I've never been sued in small claims, but in NC that is magistrate court. Meaning it is in front of a magistrate, not a judge, and attorneys are not allowed. I am a landlord and I have tenants in there all the time for evictions. The magistrate always rules in our favor and awards us possession of the property plus a " judgement" for damages and money owed. In 20 years I have NEVER collected on a judgement. IMO it ain't worth the paper it's written on. That leads me to believe that you don't have to pay, even if you lose. I'm sure it's different everywhere, and I'm probly confused because that's the way it has always been in my town. At the end of the day, you gotta do what lets you sleep at night.

It's the same way here - it's not like they have to pay right there or go to jail, and if they don't pay you have to take measures to garnish their wages or sue them again, so more money spent just to collect money. My former employer was killed by a drugged-up truck driver and was ordered to pay some $600,000 in punitive damages. His widow will never see a dime of that.

 

[Earl Weiss]

It's the same way here - it's not like they have to pay right there or go to jail, and if they don't pay you have to take measures to garnish their wages or sue them again, .

No debtors prisons in the USA. The only way they can go to jail is if they have the ability to pay, are ordered to pay and don't pay. Then the judge can hold them in contempt.

 

[JimmyJaffa]

We are dealing with automobiles, people have insurance, and we have collected from the insurance companies. I agree individuals are a waste of time. 32 cameras at each location has paid for themselves. The new HD cameras are great.

 

[JMMUSTANG]

We are dealing with automobiles, people have insurance, and we have collected from the insurance companies. I agree individuals are a waste of time. 32 cameras at each location has paid for themselves. The new HD cameras are great.

What 32 camera system do you have?
Cost?

 

[JimmyJaffa]

We buy individual components. DVR from one source, cameras from whom ever has a deal going, wire ebay etc. We have our service tech install it. I can watch whats going on on my cell phone.

 

[hkim310]

So I thought I would give everyone an update on what happened with my case. I ended up going to court on 2 different occasions. The first trial, his lawyer asked him questions, my lawyer asked him questions, and then we ran out of time because the judge had a prior appointment to attend. The main point that his lawyer was trying to make was that once the vehicle entered the car wash, the driver no longer had control of the vehicle. My lawyer did a good job explaining that control of the vehicle was not with the car wash but with the driver throughout the entire process. The judge definitely seemed to agree that unless the car wash employee was driving the vehicle through the car wash, the driver was ultimately still in control of the vehicle. The day before our 2nd court date, his lawyer contacted our lawyer and asked if we would accept paying half, which we denied. The day of our 2nd trial date, they gave up the case and I never went back to that 2nd day in court. I ended up paying a little more than what I was being sued for but am still happy that I did not pay for an incident I did not believe was caused by our wash.

 

[rph9168]

You definitely set up a positive precedent. It is good for any customer that wants to take advantage of you will not get be pushed around.

 

[Earl Weiss]

You definitely set up a positive precedent. It is good for any customer that wants to take advantage of you will not get be pushed around.

If only it were true. Just had a guy with a 1998 Pickup and mirror had scrapes on it. I declined liability. He says he will sue. Do you think he will check to see how many times its happened? Been sued 2 or three times by State Farm Subrogation lawyers. Fought each to verdict. Typicaly half what they claimed. That is a relatively small club. They may check. One State farm guy said he might like to call me as an expert witness on a future car wash damage claim. I said only if it's for the defense.

 

[rph9168]

I meant a precedent for him not the industry. Every wash is or chain of washes has a different situation to deal with. Frankly some that get sued probably deserve it for not maintaining their wash or operating in the safest manner possible. I was lucky in the fact that the wash chain I worked for was the busiest in town and had a very good reputation. I think there were times when a customer may have considered pursuing us in court that decided not to because of the way we operated.

 

[mjwalsh]

For what it is worth, I just saw a clip on this evening's TV show AFV. It shows car in an conveyor style car wash with brushes & was narrated with the driver opening his driver side door in a really fast way supposedly because he wanted to retrieve a pamphlet off his windshield that he had not noticed before. The narrator in one breath was saying how stupid the driver was & in another breath something about a $10K lawsuit.