frenchtoast
Junior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Maine. I worked for an online magazine for 5 months starting in March of 2008. I wrote a total of 7 articles. Each article was assigned to me by the owner of the magazine which he personally emailed to me stating he wanted these particular articles to be written by me. He also personally edited them and sent me the changes by email.
Each article had a price tag assigned to it before I was hired. He would send out mass emailings to all of his writers and people would request various jobs from him.
I never received payment for any of these articles. I knew that this was a start up company and I assumed -foolishly, that I would be payed when the articles were published as promised. At one point during my correspondence with him he let slip in his email that each person receives a check at the end of each month during the month that an article ran in the magazine. To date he now owes me approximately $300.00. I am now living outside the USA but I have retained my father as my legal proxy in the US so that he can sign any checks coming to me. Our bank has agreed to this legally so that is not a problem. Before I left the USA I sent my publisher/the owner a CCSR with a print out of every article I ever sent him and the price listing that he personally sent out. It was returned to my address stating that the owner refused to sign for the letter.
I will be coming back periodically to the USA and I have skype so I can make calls to people internationally if necessary to work this out.
My question now is: What do I do now to recover my money? Who can I complain to for help? What can I do to scare him into paying me what he owes me? I am young and I have never been in this situation before.
P.S. I HAVE KEPT ALL CORRESPONDENCES TO AND FROM THIS MAN AND HIS SECRETARY. Most correspondences were directly from him. The others perhaps 2 were trivial matters from his secretary. -As in please use a different form of attachment for your article as my computer can't read such and such. The rest is directly from him. He has stopped correspondence with me. I have never sworn at nor made illegal threats to anyone. I have done my very best to treat this in a professional manner. I think that the business went south and now he won't pay. He has businesses in several states.
Each article had a price tag assigned to it before I was hired. He would send out mass emailings to all of his writers and people would request various jobs from him.
I never received payment for any of these articles. I knew that this was a start up company and I assumed -foolishly, that I would be payed when the articles were published as promised. At one point during my correspondence with him he let slip in his email that each person receives a check at the end of each month during the month that an article ran in the magazine. To date he now owes me approximately $300.00. I am now living outside the USA but I have retained my father as my legal proxy in the US so that he can sign any checks coming to me. Our bank has agreed to this legally so that is not a problem. Before I left the USA I sent my publisher/the owner a CCSR with a print out of every article I ever sent him and the price listing that he personally sent out. It was returned to my address stating that the owner refused to sign for the letter.
I will be coming back periodically to the USA and I have skype so I can make calls to people internationally if necessary to work this out.
My question now is: What do I do now to recover my money? Who can I complain to for help? What can I do to scare him into paying me what he owes me? I am young and I have never been in this situation before.
P.S. I HAVE KEPT ALL CORRESPONDENCES TO AND FROM THIS MAN AND HIS SECRETARY. Most correspondences were directly from him. The others perhaps 2 were trivial matters from his secretary. -As in please use a different form of attachment for your article as my computer can't read such and such. The rest is directly from him. He has stopped correspondence with me. I have never sworn at nor made illegal threats to anyone. I have done my very best to treat this in a professional manner. I think that the business went south and now he won't pay. He has businesses in several states.