Posted: 3/11/2005 9:38:05 PM EDT
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This is business related and I'll give a brief background of my problem. I run a tree care business and a local yellow pages company decided to publish an add with my name and number in it W/O my permisson or knowledge. I've never even spoke with a sales rep from this company that I'm aware of. That would be all fine and well but for a couple of problems. 1.The book they published covers and area that's probably 40 miles from my base of operation and over 70 miles at the furthest point. 2. My business is a small company and I don't have a person on staff to answer my phones. To save money I have a live answering service and they charge for all the calls they field. Then they text message all of my calls to my cell phone which also costs me money. I've been down the small claims court route in the past and it worked very well. The time was with an auto insurance company that refused to pay a claim when thier insured "T" boned my at a traffic light. The second time was when a home owner refused to pay for services rendered. He owed me several thousand dollars and I got a judgement on him but he file chapter 11 and I didn't collect squat. I was shocked when I saw his list of debtors. These were both very clear cases, but I don't know where to start on this one. How do I establish current and more important future damages? Some people will keep this book and it's possible that I'll be getting calls for the next 5-10 yrs from this listing. How should I attempt to resovle this situation or is it even worth the effort? TIA TD |
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Did they actually publish an ad,or is it just a listing of your name an phone number? Have they sent you a bill? Is the book distributed in your regular work area also? I'm not a lawyer,but if all they did was pick up you name and number from the Real Yellow Pages at no charge,I don't think you will be able to collect anything without a lawyer,and the time and expense may not be worth it. I get tons of calls from people who want me to work on their car.I assumed that one of these books had me listed under automotive repair instead of automotive machine shop services,(I was listed correctly,people were just calling the first thing they came to in the book!),so I know how you feel. Please keep me posted on how this shakes out,in case it happens to someone else. |
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IMHO I would divide this in two issues: 1) is the company charging you anything? If not and you do not want an ad in the next edition just send them a formal letter (registered mail) telling them to not repeat the ad anylonger. If yes then they should show proof of your consent. 2) are you obliged to work that area because of this ad? If not and it does not interest you anyways then simply call the potential customer back and explain the situation. When I relocated my wife and I called a couple yard working companies for our house in Atlanta that explained the distance issue and we understood. No grudges or issues. Also, the guy calling you from that area may have/know a business opportunity closer to you. However, a good opportunity that pays well might justify the distance. Moreover, I would use this "adverse" situation positively and do a "market research". That is, how many people from this area are calling you? Are they spread or concentrated? Can they be a recurring business opportunity or just occasional? Depending on the answers you may want to expand your business!  Some lawyers I know always advised me to stay away from courts unless absolutely necessary. And I agree with them. Just my 2c. BTW...I'm an engineer, not a lawyer. 
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| I think the problem is when someone calls his number, it cost him. Because of the way he has his phone service set up he gets charge when anyone calls it. Thats how I read it, anyhow. Looks like the least expensive thing for you to do is get your number changed....... Good luck TreeDawg. WarDawg |
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You are correct. I pay for all of my calls. I know that sounds strange, but all business' pay for thier calls in one way or another unless they have a simple answering machine. The number change would be quick and simple, but I've built my business around that number for 15 years. I shouldn't be forced to change my number due to a mistake this company made. They told me it was a mistake. I don't care to take this company or anybody to court. I like to make my living the old fashioned way and earn it, but they have left me little choice. When I called and informed them of thier mistake and my problem they more or less told me it was my problem. That's when I got fired up. In the end this my no more than my problem, but I'm going to explore all of my options before I throw in the towel. TD |
I'm not a lawyer, either, but my daughter is. I was just speaking with an Atlanta friend of mine yesterday about this very subject. He was sued and settled for a few thousand dollars, even though he knew that he was in the "right". He paid $7000, rather than "win" by spending $10k in legal fees. You'll just have to weigh your possible losses, relative to your possible gains.Generally, one can't profit from the innocent mistake of another. |
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Walter, here's the rest of the story. A VP for the company told me they were in the wrong and he was going to make it up to me if I would allow him. He asked me if I was interested in a free add in thier Gwinnett county book and I said sure. I was looking for a simple solution to this problem. He said he would have a manager from my area give me a call and set up an appointment. A few days later I recieved a phone call from a regualer sales rep. that wanted to set up an appt to meet with me reguarding the problem. At the time of the appt. I didn't know this was only a sales rep. A very good looking girl in her early 20's showed up and tried to sell me an add at a reduced rate and I told her that wasn't the deal I'd agreed on. She called her manager and he told me that was the best they could do. This company is slimy as they come. I want to make them pay if possible. I'm sure if it ever makes it to court the Judge will be very interested to hear how eaisly this little problem could have solved. I have a good friend that's in the same business and he told me it costs them little to nothing to run an add in an established book reguardless of size. I'm going to file a report with the BBB 1st thing Monday. TD |
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Treedawg, I'm a law student, so while this isn't exactly legal advice, it's better than nothing. First, you'd have to have some legal basis for a suit. There isn't anything criminal that they've done, so that won't justify a lawsuit. You could call what they've done a form of nuisance. I'm not familiar with Georgia state law, but you could go onto the internet and get a listing of the Georgia code (look at the civil, not criminal code) to find a civil provision that would qualify. If you're looking at a "layman's terms" webpage or something like it, what you want to look under is torts (the basis for a civil suit). The problem is that damages (as you pointed out) are going to be the difficult thing to prove. At first glance, all you've "suffered" is free advertising, so from a legal perspective a judge (and a defense attorney for the yellow pages company) is going to have a hard time believing you have a claim. Because you have this answering service set up, you actually do have a way to prove damages. Since you seem like a relatively saavy businessman, I imagine you've kept records of your costs over the past few years. If you have a record of how much you've spent on the answering service up to date X (the date when the ad was published) and since then, you could formulate a claim based on the added expenses since the ad was published. For instance, if you spent $200 annually on the answering service, and since the ad was published you've put out $300, you could try to argue that the extra $100 are the "damages" youv'e suffered. The additional problem would then become proving that the calls you've received since that time were due to the ad being published, which would be difficult. However, if the answering service keeps records of the incoming calls, you might be able to go through the records and prove which ones came from the coverage area of the ad (40 miles away, etc). Most phone numbers give some indication of the location from which they originate, and if you're really lucky that location has a diffierent area code (you'd have to check on that). Bottom line is this: a civil suit in this situation is likely not going to net you a lot of money, and as one of the posts said, your costs for the suit might be more than the amount of your damages. If you can piece togethe the records as I mentioend above, go through them and get a rough estimate of how much "extra" you've spent on answering service costs since the ad was published. Provided that you have not made any additional changes to your advertising since that time (haven't put a TV spot on, for instance) you can take that amount, call the company rep you spoke to and say, "Look, I've lost $X as a result of your add. I'm perfectly happy to file a claim against you for the damages, while also sending letters to the local newspapers, the Attorney General's Office, and the BBB informing them of your practices. Or, you could provide me with a free advertisement in the next edition of the yellow pages in my area, as well as a written guarantee that my ad will be removed in the next version of the problem edition." If this doesn't work, you're up the creek. But getting an estimate of your damages is the place to start. Hope this helps. Let me know if you have other questions. |