A client has refused to pay two invoices for consulting work. In CA,
does anyone have an idea about the following two questions:
[1] County of jurisdiction. I did most of the work in one county, but
the client is in another county, where the "product" is in use by them.
Would the claim be valid to file in either county?

[2] The two invoices are worth about $4000 each. The max allowed in
small claims in both counties is $5000. Can I go to small claims court
one time for each invoice that is due? I would like to know if this is
even an option, if they refuse arbitration, and I then may have to
consider getting an attorney involved.

Thanks for both replies.
I talked to a small claims advisor in the county I live in and he said
he thought the case would fly in my county (not the client county). He
reiterated the two last aspects that you quoted: where the contract was
to be performed, the contract was breached, which could easily be
construed as my county. The other two aspects he didn't talk about. I
wonder if qualifying for just those two makes it ok or not?
The contract was for a smaller amount which they paid, the non-payment
is about additional work that I did. They paid most of the additional
work, even several invoices that were billed after the two they are now
deciding to not pay. So that also seems to fall neatly between the
criteria you listed.

I left out the word "or". Sorry. Venue can be proper in more than one
place. All you have to do is file in one of the proper venues. You don't
have to meet all of the criteria, just any one.
McGyver


"wheel" <wheel@idontthinkso.zom> wrote in message
news:MPG.1a8d64ba81661999896a8@netnews.comcast.net...