Getting Paid

Getting paid can be a frustrating endeavor sometimes. We’ve heard it all before, “the check’s in the mail!” Learning how to approach this diplomatically can be helpful if you want to work with the client again, but at the same time, you’ll need to know when to be firm. A lot of the timeline here will be at your discretion, but here are a few helpful steps you can take when you’re having trouble getting paid.

The first thing to figure out will be if the job was run through payroll or if they had you sign a W-9 and will be giving you a 1099 at the end of the year. We won’t get much into misclassification, but just know that in California you are supposed to get your paychecks bi-weekly. If you are working 1099, then they will most likely pay you Net 30.

Setting a Timeline

The main thing you want to do whenever you are reaching out to them is to set a timeline. You want them to say “You will receive the check by next Wednesday”. Once they fail to meet that goal you want to follow up, get them to set a new timeline, and figure out why it happened.

Payroll – After 2 Weeks

If the job is through payroll and the check hasn’t come after two weeks, try calling the payroll company who you filled out your start paperwork with. They have very little relation with the production company, so they have no incentive to lie to you. You can call them and just ask about the status of your check, they’ll be able to tell you if it was mailed or not or if the funds have even been released yet. 

After ~30 Days

If the job is payroll, after 30 days you should begin to get a little nervous. There isn’t much reason it should take this long. If it’s payroll, skip to the section “After 60 Days”

For the Net 30 jobs, it’s pretty rare to see someone pay exactly on time, I would wait about a week before you start to ask them where your check is. Once you get to that point, email your contact on the production team and just let them know that you have not received your check yet and ask them for a timeline on when it should come.

From there it’s about seeing how they respond to this. If you’re lucky they may give you a timeline and say you should see your check on a specific day. Wait until the date comes and then let them know you are still waiting on it, ask them what happened. Check the address it was sent to, make sure they have a record that it was sent, basically help them to make sure there are no mistakes on their end.

No Response

If after reaching out you don’t get a response it’s just about being persistent. Make it a part of your daily routine to reach out to them via text, email, phone calls, whatever communication method you have. Be polite, but each day ramp up your efforts a little bit. Start out with just an email, then the next day email and text. Maybe a few days after that if they still aren’t responding you call, email, and text them. This portion depends on how much you trust this person. If you feel like they are trying to skip out on paying you, using all forms of contact really lets them know you’re not going away. 

After 60 Days

Once you reach this point, it’s really about your relationship with the production and how they have responded thus far to determine what you’ll do going forward and in the future with them. Some companies might pay quickly for labor through payroll, but getting them to pay for equipment rentals could be very difficult. In these instances, you can always ask for a credit card upfront for equipment. Some people will ask for payment when the job begins for equipment rentals, others will bill their credit card once the job is over. It takes about 15 minutes to sign up for a credit card processor like Stripe, then you can add this into your regular things you ask for from this client. There are a few next steps you can take here.

Wait

Probably the least fun out of all of these. If they are responsive and truthful about what’s going on, it might be worth it to just continue this routine. Ask them when you can expect the check, tell them you didn’t receive it, etc. It really depends on how much you value the relationship with this client.

Charge Late Fees

Personally, I don’t love this option. In California, late fees are capped at around 10% per year. That means on a 1000 dollar invoice you are looking at .83% per month, or $8.30 per month and it must be stated clearly on your invoice beforehand. For some reason, people will still get unreasonably upset about late fees and it has not been the most helpful to keep the channel of communication open. I also think there are better ways to get more money for all of your time which we’ll come to shortly.

Collection Agency

I like to think this one is the most fun and can be really effective, although keep in mind it is unlikely you will work for them again after this. Sometimes that’s okay though! People need to be paid and you should never feel bad about trying to collect the money you have worked for. 

A good collection agency I’ve worked with before is Direct Recovery, you’ll just send them your invoice or any records of the amount owed and then they will take over the collections process. In my experience, people will get the collections call and then immediately call you to send a check. The collection agency will charge ~15% or so to collect, but it’s a small price to pay for money you wouldn’t be seeing otherwise.

Wage Claim

This is probably the most rewarding, albeit the most time-consuming. Basically this is just filing a wage claim with the state of California to say that your employer has not paid you. The silver lining to filing a wage claim is that you can also be paid waiting time penalties on top of your wages due. 

From the DSLE website: “The penalty is measured at the employee’s daily rate of pay and is calculated by multiplying the daily wage by the number of days that the employee was not paid, up to a maximum of 30 days. “

Now, this can be huge….say your daily wage was 600/day. 600*30 = 18,000. So you could get a judgment for 18k on top of your wages due. I have managed to turn a 300 dollar unpaid invoice for overtime into over 10k myself because of the waiting time penalty. Filing a wage claim though can be tricky. You need to know that the company actually has money to pay the judgment you’ll receive. The good thing is it’s the responsibility of the employer to prove your claims to be false, so bring your timecard written on a napkin, it’s fine!

The goal with the wage claim is just to threaten them with how bad it could be, then seek a settlement before your hearing even comes up. While it’s great to get money, it’s terrible to spend years of your life chasing after it, it can take up to 9 months to get your hearing, another 2-3 months for your judgment, and then you still need to collect on it. It’s much easier just to explain to them that based on the Waiting Time penalty laws, they could owe you 30x your rate, plus the overdue paycheck, and just wait until they come back to you with an offer of 3/4 or 1/2 the total due. If they don’t want to settle then you can go the judgment route and ultimately because you have a legal document showing you are owed money, you can do things like seize their assets.

Conclusion

Getting paid is hard! Find the people who pay on time and stick with them. Don’t ever feel bad for trying to get your money.