Breach of Contract / Failure to pay for work rendered

I am hoping someone here may have Somme advice on a contract problem.

I have a client that I've been working with for about 4 1/2 months, the project is a SEO based project where I am expected to increase the position of their website in google.

The agreement was a base pay of $50,000 for 1 year.
Plus when goals where met a would be paid a bonus for the progress.

Laid out, it is $10,000 to be paid at position #10, $10,000 to be paid at position #5, and a final payment of $10,000 when the site reaches #1.

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I have been paid on time for everything so far, however this week we appeared on the first page on position #3.
by the terms of the agreement, the company is to pay me $20,000 as I have met the goal for 2 bonus payments.

When i brought this up today, I was told that there was a misunderstanding and he would not pay any bonuses.

The site does jump around some, and appears between #3 and #13 daily, it however it stays between #3 and #9 most of each day.
he is saying because of this I am not entitled to anything, and if i don't agree with these new terms of waiting, then we need to part ways now.

meaning i will not be paid what was promised.

I am curious what the law says about this, I feel like I did my job, and he should pay for that job, but now its like, i did my job, he still wants me to continue working, but he will not pay what was agreed, and this was not brought up until after the goals were met.

When comparing agreements like these with other seo companies, i see most all of them only promise the clients site to appear at the goal rank for 24 hours, and we sat #3 for 2 days straight, I'm not saying ok, i got there, so I'm walking away, because more work does need to be done, but i feel that because i did my part of the agreement, this company should do theirs and pay up and not make threats.

I've already contacted a lawyer, and have setup a time to discuss this tomorrow, but was hoping you guys could add a little do this, perhaps questions i need to bring up to the lawyer.

Thanks you for your time

 

They might easily win this case if its not defined as factual unarguable contractual terms... which most of the time it isn't... without being able to see the contract I wouldn't be able to give you much advice or even tell you what your chances are of winning in this type of case. I can tell you however, that unless it was expressed properly and accurately with little to no chance of a misunderstanding.. in these type of cases you'll most likely lose... since they have been paying you according to the contract terms... and yet, have failed to follow the bonus stipulation in your contract which you both disagree on by the terms this bonus clause becomes active.. send me a PM of the name of the site and the part of the contract in its exactness that confirms that you're entitled to the money judgement... I'd be able to tell you if your lawyer will actually win the case for you or they might just take your case to siphon some money from you b/c they themselves don't expect to win in court.. 0_o

 

Do you have a signed contract that states the terms and everything?

 

sadly no there is no written contract, I was promised he would sign one in a weeks time, this was months ago, he never did, and now refuses, I do have a letter from the CEO stating the terms, while this was never meant to be used as a contract, but rather lay out how i am to be paid, it clearly outlines that a agreement exists, and I've already been told my a lawyer that it can be used as a written contract to prove my case.

There is other issues, but i mainly wanted to touch on the fact that the service has been rendered, and payment has been refused.

 

i was also thinking bonus may be the wrong word here, it was mainly a agreement to split the payments up as results were shown, i know there are some odd issues surrounding bonuses, but its just you do this, you get paid this.

that is what has been broken.

 

Then you're pretty much screwed

A lawyer will tell you anything you want to hear to get your money. They're sales people, nothing more. An "email" is no proof at all of a contract.

What can you do at this point? Nothing at all. If you're still providing service to them, cease to do so, as they broke verbal agreements and refuse to pay.

This is why it is so critical to get at least 1/2 your money before you start performing services. Bonuses are your own responsibility, but you should have been on this before now.

 

It's a large amount of money so it is worth pursuing. Are you both in the same country, state or city? Is it a large corporation or a small business?

IANAL but believe that the President's letter & your email conversations would be enough evidence. It's too large a sum for small claims court, unless you are willing to settle for less, so you will likely need to pay for a lawyer.

You appear to have met certain milestones that should trigger payout - but did you have any discussions about how long the site must be at certain positions to trigger payout?

I suspect that being at position #10, #5 or #3 isn't providing the additional business that they expected and they are trying to stonewall you. I wish you well, don't give up.

 

We both are in the same city and state, i moved here from Knoxville, tn for this "contract"
shutdown a business with storefront, and moved my family to this town, to a house that they provided for $600.00 a month.

Yes it is a lot of money, The business is pretty good size, they rent cabins, some for $1000 a night.

Its not really a drop in the bucket for them to pay me what they promised, there was no discussion on how long it had to remain there, but it does appear there daily, you can see it there now.

I have documented every time it appears in google, by going to 15 different serp position checkers, and printing the results, i have over 100 printed pages showing results between #3 and #10 over the entire period.

I have also documented the domains rise from not being listed in google period, to being indexed, showing at page 6, and climbing all the way up to position #3.

This job was to be a performance based contract, due to them not being able to afford half up front, $100,000 is what i originally presented it to them. To make it easier for them to pay, we decided to split this up, and accept a little less than the total amount there, by paying $50,000 over a period of a year, then when the website reaches between #10 and #1, i would be paid based on what rank it was, i think part of this is the fact that It got there so early, however just last month we had a meeting where he felt i did not know what i was doing, because it was not on the first page yet, after 3 months, for a site that has a sandbox history in google.

i spent day and night working to reverse all problems, and i got results.

 

You did the right thing by setting up a meeting with a local attorney. I am an attorney myself, and I know that we can help clients best when they come to us as soon as a problem arises.

I strongly disagree with twhiting9275 that you are screwed. You don't have to have a written and signed contract to recover your money. It just makes the process easier because there is less ground to argue about what the parties actually agreed to.

It sounds like you did have a contract with this company, and the CEO's email should be strong evidence about what they agreed to pay you.

Good luck talking with your attorney. I'm sure we'd all like to hear how your case works out.

 

I understand if i go this route it will cost a lot of money, and a lot of people do think I'm screwed, I've talked to several lawyers in my area, and all say i have a case, but the big problem is shoving out a bunch of money to get it.

I'm a little pissed off that I even have to do this, as we had a agreement, and I'm being treated like the black sheep because I did my job.

Before I left the meeting I was told that if I demand even 1 bonus right now that I would receive nothing, and loose everything.

It sounds like a threat to me, demand your money and we pay you nothing..

 

Not necessarily:

http://www.law.com/jsp/legaltechnology/pubArticleLT.jsp?id=1202421724369#2

http://boston.bizjournals.com/boston/stories/2003/06/16/focus11.html

http://www.lasher.com/news_detail.asp?id=77

The bigger question for the OP, though, is can he demonstrate a contract had
formed between them.

 

It sounds like he had a contract to me...

 

Print all the emails and prepare a paper trail. Even if you don't have a contract, if you have the emails from the CEO, that's already enough ground for you to raise a complaint. Also, did you ever talk to them via online messengers? Check if the messages are still archived and print them out as well.

And yeah, how do they pay the house rent? Do you think you can get a copy of the receipts or lease?

 

to clarify some things, the CEO letter was not addressed to me, it was addressed to the finance department to settle a payment dispute, its purpose was to explain the payment schedule.
but also explains I'm to be paid bonuses if earned.

this was printed and handed to me, I'm sure she had no intentions on it being used as proof against them, but its pretty good proof stating i am to be paid as a contractor

yes i talked quite a bit on Google talk, and lots of email between us, tough things are vague.

The rent is automatically taken out of my check, i do have a lease, though it was formed for the simple need of getting the electric turned on, and has some really odd legal wording, but stats 1 year.
i have copies of every payment made from rent in the form of the payroll stub saying "rent for month of ???"