Ask HN: How to deal with overseas clients who do not clear payments?

[tirthbodawala]

I worked for someone from New York, helped him with web app development, he confirmed he was happy and promised to clear payments in 15 days, but he never cleared it. For 2 months he was polite enough and replied to me that he would pay as soon as he would receive money, but later on he stopped replying to my messages and never responded to me. There was no way he would receive my call, I added a negative review about him on his google business and then he finally responded me on skype and threatened me that he would ruin my business by negative reviews. From there on I am receiving negative reviews on my Google Buisness, How can I handle this situation?

[PixelPaul]

I hate it when people leave bad reviews in return for getting a bad review themselves. If they deserve the bad review they should accept it and take it as feedback. It has almost become a blackmail service, google reviews.

[codegeek]

Did you have a contract ? Do you have the agreement at least in writing somewhere (email etc?). How much are we talking about in terms of the amount ? You can find a litigation lawyer in NY state who can send them a "Threaten to sue" letter. The lawyer may charge you a few hundred bucks just to do this but depending on the amount, it may be worth a try.

[joelx]

Require full payment or at least half payment upfront, and don't turn over any work until you get the final payment.

[xupybd]

If he's American sue him.

[tirthbodawala]

What is the procedure? He lives at "Spring Valley, New York".

[xupybd]

codegeek has a more useful answer than mine. If you're willing to pay for it, find a lawyer and they'll be able to walk you through it. As codegeek says a threatening letter may be enough to solve this.

If you want to file without a lawyer, I'm not sure. If it was New Zealand we have a small claims court for this sort of thing but in America I think you may have to know a lot about the legal system to sue there.