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Did I steal a job?

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Zelpmit

Junior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Wisconsin
I signed up with a LLC who does marketing for Self employed Painters who are looking for jobs. (for now, I'll name him Mish)
It was necessary to sign an agreement which said I would not contact any customers of Mish for a period of 2 years.
I did some jobs and thing went fairly smoothly and complaint free. Then I got a paint job from a couple who signed a contract. I will call them Mr and Mrs Homer. They waffled a bit about color selection and I helped them to pick and purchased samples.
Then Mrs. Homer had to go in the hospital for surgery and the Mr. Homer asked if the contract could be cancelled and I said yes. This made the contract null and void in my eyes as well as the homers.
Then when she got released, she still wanted the job done so she called up Mish again and said to have me come back.
I was busy for a few days but stayed in contact with homeowner while a timeframe could be worked out for the job.
Then Mish called me and asked what was taking so long for this job and I explained the delays. Mish said he knew the type and did not want his office fielding calls for 6 months and said he wants to call and cancel them.
I said, Just call and ask them if they are ready to go ahead, but Mish said no. He was calling to cancel.

The homers then called my cell phone and were upset about being canceled without a valid reason and asked if I was willing to do the job and I said yes.

While on the job one day, Mish came by and asked me why I was doing the job and I said, Well, because they called me and asked me to. Then Mish said he wanted half of the revenue for the job or will commence litigation.
I got a letter from his lawyer confirming this.

I looked up "customer" in the dictionary and it said one who pays for goods or services.
Therefore, since this potential customer was canceled by Mish himself, I was not obligated to the non-compete order.
Homer would have liked to be a customer of Mish but Mish refused to service their account.
Is there anyone out there who has any feelings why I should have turned the job down?
 


justalayman

Senior Member
what you can or can't do is determined by the very specific wording of your contract. If you have any questions about it, you should take it to a lawyer who can read it and render an opinion for you. Since we do not have the contract to review, any advice would be simply speculation.
 

Zigner

Senior Member, Non-Attorney
what you can or can't do is determined by the very specific wording of your contract. If you have any questions about it, you should take it to a lawyer who can read it and render an opinion for you. Since we do not have the contract to review, any advice would be simply speculation.
While I agree with this...my personal opinion is that the OP has violated his non-compete agreement.
 

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