5 ms·

What do you think about the approach taken? ("I summarized the entire timeline into three sentences. I provided no evidence. I didn’t want to give my hand away

What do you think about the approach taken? ("I summarized the entire timeline into three sentences. I provided no evidence. I didn’t want to give my hand away before arbitration.")

thathndude 4y ago
Personally, I would’ve taken the exact opposite approach. I once had an attorney, a very successful attorney, tell me that he’s a big fan of laying cards on the table right away. The rationale is that he either wants to know why he’s going to lose early or show the other party why they are going to lose early. In a case like this, where it seems like OP has all the information to prove that these guys are simply in the wrong, I come out guns blazing. I Layout the whole timeline with screenshots and copies of emails, very detailed. Then I make the ask with some snarky closing line like, “if you’d like to avoid the inevitable judgment that will be rendered against you, please contact my office to facilitate payment.”
- tiahura 4y ago
  I’ll disagree. My guess is that it wouldn’t have changed their initial offer, and then he wouldn’t have any ammo to negotiate with.
  - thathndude 4y ago
    But negotiation is not a game of gotcha. It’s not as though you get a number, and then pull a rabbit out of the hat to get a bigger number. “But see this.” You make a demand, and you justify it based on the facts and law, and then you stick to it or make minor concessions until you reach your end result.
    - sudden_dystopia 4y ago
      As someone that settles personal injury lawsuits, this is exactly how the process works. I receive medical records, review them, and make an offer. When we negotiate, very rarely do we talk about the actual case details, it’s just numbers back and forth. If they say it’s worth more than I have it evaluated, I simply ask for more records or indicate that I have reached my best offer. For what it is worth, it doesn’t affect me at all how much I pay out. It’s not part of my job objective to pay the least possible. If I can justify it, I can get it authorized.
      - hammock 4y ago
        What criteria do you use to evaluate, if not the case details?
        alisonkisk 4y ago
        icelancer 4y ago
        There basically aren't any. I've gone through arbitration three times and each time both parties propose a hilariously stupid number and work towards the middle over 12 hours. It's incredibly dumb. But it works.
  - 300bps 4y ago
- pmoriarty 4y ago
  "if you’d like to avoid the inevitable judgment that will be rendered against you, please contact my office to facilitate payment" The judgement may be inevitable, but a wealthy corporation may have the resources to keep the lawsuit in the courts long enough to bankrupt you or until you die of old age.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > a wealthy corporation may have the resources to keep the lawsuit in the courts long enough to bankrupt you or until you die of old age Which is the advantage of arbitration. Someone has run a terrific PR campaign to convince Americans it’s hopelessly corrupt. It’s not. It’s a venue that makes what you described impossible.
kevin_nisbet 4y ago
Adding an additional perspective. I'm on the board of directors of my condo corporation, and we have to deal with escalations from time to time for various claims, and threats of lawsuits, etc. From what I've seen, a perspective of I've collected a bunch of evidence that I'll refer to, but not actually provide, does seem to correlate with those with baseless claims, or those possibly trying to scam the corporation. This is anecdotal from my experience, but has happened more than once. In this case, it might be slightly irrelevant, because the insurer probably has easily verifiably facts on their side to know the calls happened, and the computers were a problem, etc. But something like the invoice that's being claimed, is an important piece of information. We may want to know what work was done, was it in scope of our responsibilities, call the plumber and verify their credentials, ask them for details not documented, etc. If we have any suspicion the individual is trying to defraud us, not knowing the evidence that supports the amount claimed makes it really difficult to agree to. And if this goes on for a long time, it may be difficult to follow up on those facts. I don't know about the rules around arbitration specifically, but if this hadn't settled, there may be deadlines involved just like the courts. And anything your doing to make the other side unprepared or to ambush them may be held against you. I don't know that it means you have to lay out everything on day 1, but I wouldn't want to leave anything to the last minute and allow even an argument that I prejudiced the other side by knowingly withholding relevant information.

What do you think about the approach taken? ("I summarized the entire timeline into three sentences. I provided no evidence. I didn’t want to give my hand away before arbitration.")

thathndude 4y ago

Personally, I would’ve taken the exact opposite approach. I once had an attorney, a very successful attorney, tell me that he’s a big fan of laying cards on the table right away. The rationale is that he either wants to know why he’s going to lose early or show the other party why they are going to lose early. In a case like this, where it seems like OP has all the information to prove that these guys are simply in the wrong, I come out guns blazing. I Layout the whole timeline with screenshots and copies of emails, very detailed. Then I make the ask with some snarky closing line like, “if you’d like to avoid the inevitable judgment that will be rendered against you, please contact my office to facilitate payment.”

tiahura 4y ago
I’ll disagree. My guess is that it wouldn’t have changed their initial offer, and then he wouldn’t have any ammo to negotiate with.
- thathndude 4y ago
  But negotiation is not a game of gotcha. It’s not as though you get a number, and then pull a rabbit out of the hat to get a bigger number. “But see this.” You make a demand, and you justify it based on the facts and law, and then you stick to it or make minor concessions until you reach your end result.
  - sudden_dystopia 4y ago
    As someone that settles personal injury lawsuits, this is exactly how the process works. I receive medical records, review them, and make an offer. When we negotiate, very rarely do we talk about the actual case details, it’s just numbers back and forth. If they say it’s worth more than I have it evaluated, I simply ask for more records or indicate that I have reached my best offer. For what it is worth, it doesn’t affect me at all how much I pay out. It’s not part of my job objective to pay the least possible. If I can justify it, I can get it authorized.
    - hammock 4y ago
      What criteria do you use to evaluate, if not the case details?
      - alisonkisk 4y ago
      - icelancer 4y ago
        There basically aren't any. I've gone through arbitration three times and each time both parties propose a hilariously stupid number and work towards the middle over 12 hours. It's incredibly dumb. But it works.
- 300bps 4y ago
pmoriarty 4y ago
"if you’d like to avoid the inevitable judgment that will be rendered against you, please contact my office to facilitate payment" The judgement may be inevitable, but a wealthy corporation may have the resources to keep the lawsuit in the courts long enough to bankrupt you or until you die of old age.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > a wealthy corporation may have the resources to keep the lawsuit in the courts long enough to bankrupt you or until you die of old age Which is the advantage of arbitration. Someone has run a terrific PR campaign to convince Americans it’s hopelessly corrupt. It’s not. It’s a venue that makes what you described impossible.

kevin_nisbet 4y ago

Adding an additional perspective. I'm on the board of directors of my condo corporation, and we have to deal with escalations from time to time for various claims, and threats of lawsuits, etc. From what I've seen, a perspective of I've collected a bunch of evidence that I'll refer to, but not actually provide, does seem to correlate with those with baseless claims, or those possibly trying to scam the corporation. This is anecdotal from my experience, but has happened more than once. In this case, it might be slightly irrelevant, because the insurer probably has easily verifiably facts on their side to know the calls happened, and the computers were a problem, etc. But something like the invoice that's being claimed, is an important piece of information. We may want to know what work was done, was it in scope of our responsibilities, call the plumber and verify their credentials, ask them for details not documented, etc. If we have any suspicion the individual is trying to defraud us, not knowing the evidence that supports the amount claimed makes it really difficult to agree to. And if this goes on for a long time, it may be difficult to follow up on those facts. I don't know about the rules around arbitration specifically, but if this hadn't settled, there may be deadlines involved just like the courts. And anything your doing to make the other side unprepared or to ambush them may be held against you. I don't know that it means you have to lay out everything on day 1, but I wouldn't want to leave anything to the last minute and allow even an argument that I prejudiced the other side by knowingly withholding relevant information.