Lately, we’re seeing a lot of leasing defaults and our clients are hiring us to repossess vehicles and equipment from their customers who have stopped paying.
If you are one of the customers, it feels very personal to you. This is your business and losing the vehicle or equipment probably will impact your ability to generate more revenue, which is usually the reason you are not paying your lease to begin with.
When you first signed the lease with our client, you intended to pay the lease and you had the money to do it. Unfortunately, this economy has changed that for a lot of people, and often it isn’t because of anything they personally did.
If you receive an email or letter from our firm (or any firm) asking for equipment back, the person writing the email isn’t attacking you personally, nor are they implying that you are a terrible business person. They are simply saying, you are not paying the money you agreed to pay to use the equipment, and our client is entitled to have it back and wants it returned.
Writing angry emails attacking the writer’s personality, alleging fraud, criminal behaviour, or calling us names, is not a solution to the problem of not paying your lease and needing to return the equipment. It also doesn’t look good when we file those emails in materials before the Court.
The best way to handle a request to return equipment is to get legal advice. Yes, I know you’re thinking, “but lawyers cost money.” That’s true, but paying a lawyer to give you advice on the process will make sure you don’t make the bad situation worse.
Forcing us to bring Applications before the Court for the return of the equipment just increases the amount of money you end up owing our clients because the leases you signed all contain clauses saying you agree to pay the legal fees if they have to get the equipment back.
Don’t make a bad situation even worse. Get legal advice. Communicate professionally and know, that it’s not personal, it’s business.
Inga B. Andriessen, JD Principal Lawyer