Spiteful Payments (Made In Troublesome Ways)

[ramonmercado]

Back pay row over crate of coins

Fred Raine says he is taking legal advice

A man involved in an employment dispute has had his £1,300 severance pay delivered to him in a crate full of small change weighing 11 stone.

Mr Raine, from Burnhope in County Durham, was expecting a cheque for the balance of his cash award, following an industrial tribunal win.

But the acrimonious split from his bus firm boss, Malcolm Lee, ended with a crate of coins dumped at his door.

Mr Raine, 61, said he intended to seek legal advice to resolve the matter.

The delivery came after a protracted wrangle between Mr Raine and his former employer Malcolm Lee, who runs Lee's Coaches in nearby Langley Moor.

Mr Raine said he quit his job in 2005 on medical advice and spent his last days at work on sick leave.

He claimed he had been under-paid and was awarded £2,300 at a subsequent industrial tribunal.

Legal wrangle

He received a cheque for £1,000 and the remaining amount in coins from 1p to 20p.

Mr Raine, who lives with his partner Linda Walker, said he had to call on neighbours to get the crate into his house after it was delivered and left on his doorstep.

Ms Walker said: "A gentleman just knocked on the door and said he had a delivery.

"Now we have a legal wrangle, because we are not accepting this and as far as we are concerned Mr Lee has not honoured his agreement."

Mr Raine said he had contacted his solicitor to try to resolve the matter.

According to the Royal Mint the following amounts of coins are legal tender in Britain for single transactions: 20p for any amount not exceeding £10; 10p for any amount not exceeding £5; 5p for any amount not exceeding £5; 2p for any amount not exceeding 20p; and 1p for any amount not exceeding 20p.

Mr Lee has made no comment on the matter.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/engl ... 293679.stm

 

[EnolaGaia]

Here's another tale of spiteful payment ... A man who resigned from his job and was still owed $915 had to resort to legal action to get paid. He finally received payment - apparently in the dark of night - in the form of oil-soaked pennies.

Last paycheck from ex-employer shows up as oil-covered pennies

A Georgia man who was expecting his final paycheck from a former employer said the money instead arrived in the form of 500 pounds of oil-covered pennies dumped in his driveway in the middle of the night.

Andreas Flaten said he submitted his two-weeks notice in writing in November, and Miles Walker, the owner of Walker Luxury Autoworks in Peachtree City, had a noticeable negative reaction. ...

Flaten, who said he left the job due to a toxic work environment, said he was still owed $915, which the owner told him would be delivered in January.

He said the owner accused him of damages when he called to inquire about the check not arriving at his home, so he contacted Georgia's Department of Labor.

Flaten said the money then showed up -- as 500 pounds of oil-covered pennies that were dumped in his driveway in the middle of the night. ...

Walker said he couldn't recall if he dumped the pennies at Flaten's house. ...

FULL STORY: https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2021/0...alker-Luxury-Autoworks-Georgia/2071616005218/

 

[IbisNibs]

Hmm . . . 145 copper pennies per pound, multiplied by 500, divided by 100 = $725.00—

How much would you have to pay to transport 500 pounds of anything?
That's a vindictive guy!

 

[Analogue Boy]

Hmm . . . 145 copper pennies per pound, multiplied by 500, divided by 100 = $725.00—

How much would you have to pay to transport 500 pounds of anything?
That's a vindictive guy!

In the first story, the guy ran a coach firm. In the second, the guy ran an autoworks. Both places with transport that could easily accommodate bulky and heavy items so postie not needed.

 

[EnolaGaia]

Another legendary means for making a nuisance payment is to execute a bank check / cheque in some bothersome form. This Weird Universe webpage displays a 1967 newspaper article describing an exhibition by Chase Manhattan Bank on unusual but negotiable checks.

Strange Personal Checks
http://www.weirduniverse.net/blog/comments/strange_personal_checks

 

[EnolaGaia]

This undated Notes and Queries item at The Guardian website poses the question:

I have heard various stories about cheques being written on unusual objects. Is this legal and, if so, what is the minimum information required on such a cheque? Would any reputable bank honour such a cheque?

... To which multiple readers have responded with comments and descriptions of actual incidents.

https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,5753,-20434,00.html

 

[EnolaGaia]

This 1986 piece by Cecil Adams (The Straight Dope) addresses the general validity of such bizarre checks and cites some of the same cases mentioned in the articles cited above.

Can you write a check on any old piece of paper?

It’s true you can write a “negotiable instrument,” bank talk for a valid check, on just about anything. According to the Uniform Commercial Code, the body of law that governs these things, all you have to include are the name of the payee, the dollar amount, the name of your bank, your signature, the date, and some suitable words of conveyance, such as “pay to the order of.” You don’t need the account number or the bank ID number you find on preprinted checks. ...

Charlie Rice, a columnist for the old This Week Sunday newspaper supplement, once wrote about various goofy checks that he claimed had been successfully cashed over the years:

Eben Grumpy of Iowa was a little slow in paying John Sputter $30 he owed him. Sputter threatened to sue, so Grumpy painted a check on a door and dropped it on him from a third-story window next time he came over. A court ruled the door was legal payment. ...

Many nonstandard checks are publicity stunts, such as the 21-by-7-foot check cashed for a charity drive in Fort Worth. Most others are intended as nuisances. ...

SOURCE: https://www.straightdope.com/21341724/can-you-write-a-check-on-any-old-piece-of-paper

NOTE: According to a comment posted here the famous "cheque-on-a-cow" story involving a Mr. Haddock or Haddox was a known hoax.

 

[Analogue Boy]

I believe some over 75s had ‘trouble‘ filling in their cheques properly to settle their BBC Licence Fee.

 

[Kondoru]

Oh dear.

When I did food delivery one guy once tried to pay in 5ps.

A quick phone call to the boss...and he did not get any supper...

 

[EnolaGaia]

Here's another tale of spiteful payment ... A man who resigned from his job and was still owed $915 had to resort to legal action to get paid. He finally received payment - apparently in the dark of night - in the form of oil-soaked pennies.

Last paycheck from ex-employer shows up as oil-covered pennies
FULL STORY: https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2021/0...alker-Luxury-Autoworks-Georgia/2071616005218/

Update and closure on the Georgia / pennies story ... A coin processing company stepped in and took the pennies off his hands ...

Coin firm pays it forward after Georgia man paid in pennies

A global company has stepped in to solve quite a “coinundrum” for a Georgia man.

Andreas Flaten’s former employer dumped at least 90,000 pennies on his driveway last month as a form of final payment for his work at an auto shop, he said.

When Bellevue, Washington-based Coinstar heard about his predicament, they decided that change was needed.

They picked up Flaten’s coins on Thursday and rounded up the amount to give him a $1,000 check.

They also made donations to two charities of Flaten’s choosing: two animal shelters. ...

Flaten said his former employer — A OK Walker Autoworks in Peachtree City — owed him $915 after he left his job there in November.

He finally got his pay earlier this month in the form of thousands of oil- or grease-covered pennies dumped at the end of his driveway in Fayetteville, Georgia. Atop the pile: an envelope with Flaten’s final paystub and a goodbye note that featured an obscenity.

Flaten had been spending an hour or two every night trying to clean the pennies, which he stored in a wheelbarrow in his garage.

FULL STORY: https://apnews.com/article/marietta-georgia-us-news-0594655cc1276a8807e7bf0b1699a69e

 

[EnolaGaia]

A spiteful father paid his daughter's last child support payment in the form of 80,000 pennies. The daughter decided to take the high road on this otherwise humiliating incident and donated the money to a domestic abuse center.

Mother, daughter donate 80,000 'child support' pennies dumped outside home

One Richmond family got a shocking delivery last month when 80,000 pennies were dumped on their front lawn. Now, they're using the money to help those in need.

"I just turned 18. When I was in the middle of class, my dad came by. He had rented a trailer," Avery Sanford, a Deep Run High School senior, said. "He pulled up in front of the house and turned the trailer on so it dumped out all the pennies on the grass and my mom came out and was like, 'What are you dumping in my yard?' She didn't know who it was until he shouted, 'It's your final child support payment."

The act had an impact on the teenager. ...

"It's not just my mom he's trying to embarrass, it's also me and my sister and it's upsetting that he didn't consider that before he did that," Sanford said.

Once the pennies were picked up, Sanford and her mom decided to turn a bad situation into a positive one.

Every penny of Avery's last child support payment will be donated to Safe Harbor, a domestic abuse center. ...

FULL STORY: https://www.wtvr.com/news/local-new...ds-of-dumped-pennies-to-domestic-abuse-center

 

[EnolaGaia]

Update and closure on the Georgia / pennies story ... A coin processing company stepped in and took the pennies off his hands ...

Update on the update ...

It turns out the Georgia story didn't end with the spiteful payment of the ex-worker's wages in pennies. The incident sparked the US Department of Labor's curiosity about the employer's business practices, and he's now being sued by the feds for violating relevant employment and wage laws.

US government sues Georgia auto-repair shop that dumped more than 91,000 pennies in a former employee's driveway

When Andreas Flaten didn't receive his final paycheck from a former employer last January, he complained about it, calling up the US Department of Labor to lodge an accusation of wage theft. That employer responded by leaving more than 91,000 pennies on his driveway in Fayetteville, Georgia.

Now the US government is suing that company, arguing the act constituted illegal retaliation.

In a complaint filed with a federal court in Georgia, the Department of Labor accuses A OK Walker Autoworks and its owner, Miles Walker, of more than just pettiness.

The lawsuit claims the auto-repair shop bilked its workers out of money they were owed. The lawsuit accuses the company of "repeatedly and willfully" failing to pay time and a half for overtime, instead relying on a flat rate of pay regardless of whether someone worked more than 40 hours in a week. ...

The March 2021 penny stunt — along with the complaint that preceded it — appears to have prompted investigators to take a closer look at the shop's books. ...

FULL STORY: https://www.businessinsider.com/us-sues-company-dumped-91000-pennies-in-ex-employees-driveway-2022-1

For More Tidbits About The Employer's OTT Antics In This Case See Also:
https://jalopnik.com/feds-are-suing-an-auto-shop-for-paying-an-employees-fin-1848321704