Consumer Law, Warranties Consigned to Limbo?

[civil_engineer]

Greetings,

The question concerns items which have been sold to a state university - all items were received by the university librarian and found satisfactory as of November 30 2010 with word that a payment process which will take less than 30 days was underway ("The institution then sends the check to us within 30 days, we deposit the check and typically 2 days later, the cash will be in our account.")

Today's date is January 20.

There has been no receipt of payment by me, but rather continued emails between me and the dealer who located the university-buyer that seem to make excuses for the university's payment delay ("The end result is it is a State Institution and the payment comes from the State and we had to be set-up, also the holidays made for vacations"; " I do quite a bit of business with institutions and they all vary even with net 30 day terms").

The identity of the university is unknown to me - as otherwise I would contact the university president.

Bottom line is that I was not prepared to wait more than 30 days for payment and have become interested to pursue legal action which may create options to resolve this issue - the simplest initial step being considered is the professional legal service of a letter to the dealer.

Do the law professionals, students and hobbyists here feel this is a good track to pursue due to default on the 30-day commitment? Or that first perhaps there is effective content to include in an email to the dealer that may be necessary as a preliminary to professional legal services?

The monetary amount owed by the university is $2000 ($400 to the dealer, $1600 to me).

Many thanks for any comments.


M.S.

 

[army judge]

Greetings,

The question concerns items which have been sold to a state university - all items were received by the university librarian and found satisfactory as of November 30 2010 with word that a payment process which will take less than 30 days was underway ("The institution then sends the check to us within 30 days, we deposit the check and typically 2 days later, the cash will be in our account.")

Today's date is January 21.

There has been no receipt of payment by me, but rather continued emails between me and the dealer who located the university-buyer that seem to make excuses for the university's payment delay ("The end result is it is a State Institution and the payment comes from the State and we had to be set-up, also the holidays made for vacations"; " I do quite a bit of business with institutions and they all vary even with net 30 day terms").

The identity of the university is unknown to me - as otherwise I would contact the university president.

Bottom line is that I was not prepared to wait more than 30 days for payment and have become interested to pursue legal action which may create options to resolve this issue - the simplest initial step being considered is the professional legal service of a letter to the dealer.

Do the law professionals, students and hobbyists here feel this is a good track to pursue due to default on the 30-day commitment? Or that first perhaps there is effective content to include in an email to the dealer that may be necessary as a preliminary to professional legal services?

Many thanks for any comments.


M.S.

There is an old legal precedent, that in order to sue the sovereign, one has to gain the sovereign's permission.
You can't just sue the goivernment like you can sue Susie Sixpack.

But, lawsuits aren't your problem.
Your problem is the dire financial position of most state governments and the federal government.
Financial problems have trickled down to New York State Univerisities.

State governments have become notoriously slow to pay.
Heck, Ca;ifornia was paying in useless vocuhers a few weeks ago.
The creditor had to hold the voucher and cross their fingers, hoping they might one day redeem the vouchers.
The vouchers were in effect, IOU'S!

So, go ahead and try to sue the university.
I doubt that you'll get very far, or if you do, it won't be very quickly.
Or, you can hope and wait that you will one day get paid.
Yeah, it isn't very encouraging news, is it?
So, don't sell to the state unless they pay you in cash or by credit card.
Haven't you ever been in store that proclaimed, "No checks accepted"?