When running a small business, you need to make sure you are getting paid for your services on time and in full.

What would you do if you had a client who was always paying late and trying to demand a discount?

That is what happened to the laundry service provider in this story, so he finally held the restaurant’s tablecloths hostage until they paid in full.

Check it out.

You don’t want to pay? I’ll hold your laundry hostage

I, 44m at the time am a small business owner.

I have a pickup and delivery laundry service in a big city.

My bread and butter is commercial business – small salons, bars, restaurants.

People like us because we don’t require a lengthy contract.

It’s a sort of call-us-if-you-want-to situation, and if you don’t like us, don’t call.

It works both ways.

That would be a great client to have.

We were pretty new to the business at the time, and we were super excited to get a Michelin 2 star restaurant’s tablecloths and napkins.

We didn’t like the jerk finance guy M who always tried to negotiate us down, but we got along great with A.

She was the logistics/fixer/genius problem solver for the restaurant.

Any high end business should have someone like her on staff.

We jumped through hoops like we’d never jumped through hoops before.

Even rented more space to handle their business.

At $3000/month, they were our biggest customer.

Thing is, M already negotiated an AMAZING deal with us from the start, but he was in the nasty habit of trying to negotiate after the fact.

Every time they owed us money, he would try to get us to take less.

We told A this was not OK over and over again.

M was an owner, but he was just a money guy.

The head chef and other owners actually cared about the business.

Well – the back and forth went on for months.

They always insisted on a discount.

We never gave in, because we were already in deep discount territory with these people.

And, come on – at $400 / plate, you can afford $2 per tablecloth or whatever we charged them.

Is that even legal?

M eventually started really putting the screws to us and was withholding about $1700 – money we really needed – while he tried to squeeze us to accept less.

I think he thought we were probably living on the edge like most small business owners, but we were really just tired – sick and tired more than anything.

I came up with a plan and got my partner to agree.

We put the plan in motion.

We waited until the weekend came.

We had almost all of these people’s laundry.

I think you can see where this is going.

I called A, and I told her that M could stuff it.

We have all your laundry – it’s all pressed and ready, it’s Monday.

You’re planning to open again on Tuesday.

They won’t have much of a choice now.

When you pay us in full for this order and everything that you owe us for previous orders IN CASH, you’ll get your laundry back.

Not before.

I also let her know that once we got paid, our business relationship would be over.

This was disastrous for us financially, but we weren’t going to starve to death.

She understood, and she was actually on our side.

She LOVED our service.

She let all the owners know that we were not messing around.

She called us back and we agreed on a time.

I went to the restaurant, left my partner and the laundry in the van.

(I dealt with all sorts of criminals and scammers in the neighborhoods where we delivered. I knew how to treat deadbeats).

M wasn’t there.

The chef (other owner) was there, and only because it was him and not M, did I accept a business check instead of cash (it cashed / no problem).

I called my partner to bring in the laundry.

A called me later and proposed that we keep working with them and we would never have to speak to M again.

Wow, they really gave this contract up.

Honestly, it was such a weight off my shoulders to no longer deal with them, I said no way.

Don’t try to stiff a small business that stands between you and setting tables for $20,000 worth of seatings in your fancy restaurant when you have no plan B.

I have no regrets!

I bet they regret letting “M” ruin this great business relationship.

Read on to see what the people in the comments think about this story.

Here is someone in a similar business.

Hopefully, he got fired.

Yeah, best to cut ties.

Cash on delivery is the best option.

This guy has a great way to protect himself.

Great job standing up for themselves.

You have to be able to do that when you own your own business.

If you liked that post, check out this post about a woman who tracked down a contractor who tried to vanish without a trace.