Is is worth going to court over?

[Inspired by Reggio]

I personally would walk away ~ because A) if it was me who initiated the termination of service I would not feel comfortable forcing them to stay on even if there was no 'reason' for their concern in your mind IME the minute you terminate because something is not working (even just the hours of care) the mama bears sensitive protection mode goes up and worry sets in for them founded or not it is still 'real' for them and B) if I remember correctly it is 'one week' difference in pay that they owe you because you had the one week security deposit but require 'two weeks notice' for terminating the contract on your part which is what you gave and they've now bolted owing you the 'one week' so to speak ... IMO it will cost you more in disrupting your current clients who will have to find alternative care for court dates and even if you get awarded the 'lost income' of the week plus any court costs or lost income and so forth .... your clients are still inconvenienced

With the collection agency ... it has been a while since I have used one but do they not charge something like 30% of what they hope to collect for you and there is no guarantee they WILL collect so you will be out even more money having paid them the 30% and than if they are not able to get the person to pay you are out that money too ...seems a large risk for a weeks income specially since you did not provide the actual 'service' to them ... if I had actually WORKED and got stiffed I might be more inclined to do it just on the principle but for the 'notice period' not so much.

A contract is there to protect both the provider and the client by setting clear expectations for service and payment but it is not totally FAIL SAFE that just because you have something in the contract that the court will 'uphold' that for you if things go sour .... cause from all the court shows I have watched over the years regardless of what your contract says IMO you are going to have a hard time finding a judge who will award you $$ for service not actually rendered to the client for whatever reason.

IMO the same goes with saying in a contract 'all court costs will be paid by the client' sadly you cannot 'enforce' that unless the court orders it so if the client did take you to court and you 'lost' the client is not voluntarily going to pay you the court costs you would have to get 'awarded' that by the courts ... heck even if you WON unless the settlement awarded you 'court costs and lost income' in the total no one is going to 'volunteer' to pay those just cause it says so in the contract .... so what that policy is basically doing is informing clients that you would indeed consider taking a client to court if they messed with your financial end of the deal ~ which might work to scare anyone from messing with ya but it does not 'guarantee' that you would get your court costs covered

Best way to avoid situations like this is that if you want X weeks notice than make sure to get the $$ = to X weeks upfront when care starts because chasing them after the fact for said notice will be hard ... keeping the deposit on hand until the END of care notice period still gives you the option if you just want a client GONE to waive your non refundable policy and refund it in lieu of notice on your part or meet them in the middle and refund a portion or what not to make them just go away peacefully ... it keeps the control in the providers hands to do what feels right and ethical in each scenario.

As well as a deposit always get paid 'in advance of care' so that you are never in the position of having offered a service you do not get paid for and have to choose to either 'sue or suck it up' ... it is sad that for the very small % of asshats in the world everyone has to suffer with strict financial policies!

Basically IMO a contract will not stop you from getting sued and it will not guarantee that you get everything you feel you are entitled to under the contract in the court of law should you actually get sued ... going in front of a Judge is often a 50-50 crap shoot of who will 'win' the judgement depending on which judge and their thinking being pro customer is always right thinking or pro business has a right to protect itself thinking!