[lilymom]

Originally Posted by virtualstaffing

Good morning,

With regards to our contract and the one clause that someone pulled out of context. As a virtual staffing company we match clients with our contractors.When a client does not pay their bill with Team Double-Click we immediately notify the VA to stopperforming any tasks for that client because their pay is no good. The clause is in the contract as a safe guard for us in case that VA decides to ignore that stop order and continue working. It's happened before and wecan't be held liable when someone continues working for a clientwhose money is no good. We need to protect ourselves too!

Actually it was taken out of context in that it was incomplete. The entire text of the terms is available at https://secure.teamdoubleclick.com/Registration/ (scroll down), but the paragraph discussed above that was only partially posted is here:

"Moreover, the parties agree that any bill to a client of Team Double-Click® that remains unpaid after sixty (60) days from the invoice date will be turned over to collections and that the Independent Contractor shall forfeit his or her payment on said work. In the event Company is unable to collect the bill, Company reserves the right to deduct the entire amount of the bill from Independent Contractor’s future compensation. Independent Contractor’s responsibility to repay the amount of any uncollected bills shall survive the termination of this Agreement."

The above clearly states that the contractor will not receive payment at all on outstanding invoice after 60 days and that if the company is unable to collect on the bill, the Contractor will be billed for noncollectable amounts from their future compensation. There is no provision that contractor will be paid if monies are ever collected after the 60 days, so if they collect the contractor simply does not get paid?? This says absolutely nothing about stopping work because the client said to - it simply says that if the client doesn't pay, the contractor pays the bill for them.

Why on earth would ANYONE agree to such terms? Why would the contractor be responsible for payment of a bill incurred by a client that was supposedly VETTED by the Company?

When I subcontract for businesses or vice versa, which is what this essentially is, my subs (or myself) are paid directly whether or not the person contracting ever gets paid. Period. If TDC pays for the service to the contractor, the contractor is subbing and does not work directly for the client.

Very interesting discussion and surprising that people are willing to do it, but some will and that is their choice. If it works for them, then so be it, but I am a business person that wants to run my own business, not be at the mercy of another person dictating my time and the terms. That's why I own my own business. I set the time, the terms and the fees. Not negotiable and it works and has worked very successfully for many years now.