gettingstiffed

I actually included it to show how I'm pretty positive they're going under and have no assets remaining. Added an EDIT to my original post.

Not much help for this time around, but if you're working with fly-by-night outfits, it's a must.

Yeah, I guess in our community we don't think of funded startups as "fly-by-night" outfits, even though any bank or mainstream institution would absolutely think of them as such. I guess I had a little more confidence in the kind of person that has convinced well-known investors to give them money.

FWIW I've had other founders treat me very well in going-under situations, so I know it's not everybody.

That's a great lesson - thanks. I've never heard of or considered such a thing, but that's a great way to assure payment without raising prices.

EDIT: I think people aren't giving you enough credit here. Every contract is a negotiation - this clause is just another weapon I can include in my starting offer on a new contract. If people say hey, we won't agree to this provision, I can now say "OK, no problem, my rates just went up 10%."

I've thought about that a lot - what do I take away from this?

I'm not sure there's anything I really could have done. I was working on 30 day terms (quite common), and I'd worked for them with quite prompt payment for over a year. I probably had ~12-15 paid invoices from them for similar amounts that were paid within 7-14 days of issue.

I stopped working for them upon the issuance of the second invoice in question - so I had two invoices outstanding at that point, 1 that was 15 days past issue (but not contractually due) and 1 just issued.

Do people in multi-invoice contracts really stop work until they have proof of remittance? I've never heard of such a thing - that sounds crazy to me.