I'm sure it varies wildly from state-to-state and country-to-country but I believe where they are required to send a representative that's an employee they can

I'm sure it varies wildly from state-to-state and country-to-country but I believe where they are required to send a representative that's an employee they can send a lawyer that that they have on staff since they meet the requirement. That said I'm not sure what advantage they'd have since small claims is a very different beast. Not to mention the costs to do so would almost certainly exceed the judgement. Might even be cheaper to simply default than deal with the back-and-forth of settling the matter outside of court.