Posted by
Grafters01
13 yrs ago
My husband threw a suprise party for me at HK restaurant and settled via cheque at the end of the night. I didn't check the account for a while as I didn't want to know what he was spending on my birthday. Now 15 months later the restaurant has been in touch to say they 'lost' the cheque all that time ago and can we issue another! Its a lot of money that we no longer have. Do they have a legal right to ask for it after this amount of time? especially given the fault lies entirely with them. Has anybody else had a similar thing happen and can advise me? Thanks
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If you have your own house and accounts in order, you should be able to check if the cheque was ever cashed. If not, then isn't there a certain time limit after the date the cheque was issued that it automatically becomes invalid if not cashed or deposited to the a/c? Not sure of this as I don't have a cheque book myself so double-check with your bank.
Secondly, how was the restaurant able to find and contact you over a year later? If paid by cheque, the most record the restaurant would have of you is the name and contact telephone number in their reservations book. How can they prove they are after the right person for the replacement cheque?
I would first double-check whether the cheque indeed is still uncashed / not cleared, then argue with the restaurant that it indeed their own fault if they have lost your cheque.
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"Its a lot of money that we no longer have. Do they have a legal right to ask for it after this amount of time"
here i see a clue to this situation,
you probably know that the cheque was never encashed and you enjoyed the free and expensive dinner and now you don't have any money to pay for it and trying to hide behind the legality of things.
Ethically asking you should pay for what you ate (and hopefully enjoyed)
they made a mistake and lost the cheque and it took 15 months (probably during account audits) that the payment was never recd and now trying to recover it from you, although a little late but still morally you are obliged to pay for it, given that at one point of time you were so rich that you didn't bother to check you accounts and notice that the resto payment was never deducted from your accounts.
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A cheque is only valid for 6 months so therefore if this hasn't been cashed during this time another one needs to be issued. The fact that you no longer don't have this money to pay your bill isn't the restaurants problem ... it's yours so deal with it. Get a bank loan to pay for it if you have too.
You should know right from WRONG !!
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If i were you, I will sette the account, why make a good birthday memory turned sour, I am not sure if the restaurant can file a case at the Small Claims Tribunal against you, since they are after you for the payment now... should there be a case against you, your defense " I didn't check the account for a while (15 months??) as I didn't want to know what he was spending on my birthday." seems like a stretch... and " Its a lot of money that we no longer have.", i don't think the judge will appreciate this line of reasoning...
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Just do the right thing and settle the account. Mistakes happen, but the truth is you DID have a party there and DO owe the money, regardless of how much time has past. Beware - Karma (or whatever you like to call it) has a way of coming back to bite you.... Or perhaps because this is the type of person you are, the fact that you 'no longer have the money' is Karma in action already!
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