Pay Your Bills!
For some reason my dyslexia is never more apparent than when I'm paying bills and writing checks. Despite this fact, I still manage to "check out" and let my mind twirl happily around whatever subject was previously flittering in the background, back when I focused as you and I had a conversation. That's right - while we were discussing The Glass Menagerie, I was thinking about vivisection.
Earlier today as I was playing in my checkbook, I was thinking of this post and it was reminding me of when I had to make similar phone calls.
At my first legal secretary job, I worked for a sole practitioner. The great thing about working for a small firm is that you get to do a little bit of everything. The worst thing about working for a small firm is that you have to do a little bit of everything. Including calling people regarding their unpaid bills. I was 20 years old. I lived with my parents. Once a month I gave my dad a rent check. Once a month I paid my Visa bill. That was it. I was young and couldn't imagine ever NOT paying a bill on time. Ehh, youth.
The fact that these clients - some of whom were supposed to be upstanding citizens- sometimes weren't paying a bill that I PUT EFFORT INTO, absolutely disgusted me. Not only did I spend lots of time saying, "M, did you bill for that phone call?", but I entered all the time each day. I formatted all the bills. I was the one who suggested the idea of including a SASE with each bill in the hopes it would encourage clients to pay us promptly. All this work I was doing, and to think these punk clients were just tossing my bills aside. Geez, you'd think they were embroiled in some sort of nasty divorce, complete with custody battle or something. Oh yeah. They were.
One of the worst things I had to do at that firm was to call clients and get them to pay. My boss was usually really good about prepping me to do new things. She would write out scripts for when she wanted me to call various people in the Court system. Opposing attorneys. But with this collections thing all she gave me was "Use your imagination. Say whatever you want." I wanted to cry. These were ADULTS I had to call. This was worse than the first time my boss had entrusted me to put together an entire divorce to be submitted for Court (I cried then).
Ultimately, I fell back on what had always served me best: lying served with a side of playing dumb. I'd also throw in a little status of the case, to make it seem like I was calling to HELP them. My calls went something like this:
Hello?
GY: Hi, Julie?
Julie: Yes?
GY: Hi Julie, this is Green from M's office, how are you?
Julie: Hi Green, not so well. Simon refused to pick up the girls because my boyfriend walked them down to the car instead of me. Plus he hasn't given us back Gregory's clarinet from when it was left at his house. All due to the fact that I brought Steve to Greg's recital. Is that fair? Can M call his scumbag lawyer about that?
GY: Okay, I'll definitely mention all this to M for you.
Julie: Is she there? Could I speak with her please?
GY: Oh, I'm sorry, she's in Court right now. (M was *never* available to clients, unless they were being beaten while they were calling, were calling from jail or threatening to fire her because they could never talk with her. I was a pretty good liar, but I really became the Queen of Lying working for M. The lies just flowed out of my mouth. I should win awards.) But I'll make sure to let her know about this as soon as she comes back. I was just calling to let you know that we got a date in Family Court for you. It's July 18th at 9:30 a.m. Also, our billing person mentioned our office hadn't gotten a check from you. Do you know if one was sent out yet? (I always tried to mildly disassociate us from the money, and the client from having been responsible for sending it in.)
Julie: Oh, July 18th? I'll put that on my calendar. (NY Courts are outrageously backed up. I'm blown away by how swiftly things move through the courts in both FL and CA.)
GY: Great, and I'll make sure to let M know about what you mentioned. Could you check on the bill and let me know if we need to send you out another one? The post office can be so unreliable.
Julie: Yeah you know, I don't know that it ever came. Maybe you should send out another one.
GY: Absolutely. I'll have that done today.
Sure Julie. We both know I was giving you an out, and you were taking it. I'm so glad I don't do collections on any regular basis.
Earlier today as I was playing in my checkbook, I was thinking of this post and it was reminding me of when I had to make similar phone calls.
At my first legal secretary job, I worked for a sole practitioner. The great thing about working for a small firm is that you get to do a little bit of everything. The worst thing about working for a small firm is that you have to do a little bit of everything. Including calling people regarding their unpaid bills. I was 20 years old. I lived with my parents. Once a month I gave my dad a rent check. Once a month I paid my Visa bill. That was it. I was young and couldn't imagine ever NOT paying a bill on time. Ehh, youth.
The fact that these clients - some of whom were supposed to be upstanding citizens- sometimes weren't paying a bill that I PUT EFFORT INTO, absolutely disgusted me. Not only did I spend lots of time saying, "M, did you bill for that phone call?", but I entered all the time each day. I formatted all the bills. I was the one who suggested the idea of including a SASE with each bill in the hopes it would encourage clients to pay us promptly. All this work I was doing, and to think these punk clients were just tossing my bills aside. Geez, you'd think they were embroiled in some sort of nasty divorce, complete with custody battle or something. Oh yeah. They were.
One of the worst things I had to do at that firm was to call clients and get them to pay. My boss was usually really good about prepping me to do new things. She would write out scripts for when she wanted me to call various people in the Court system. Opposing attorneys. But with this collections thing all she gave me was "Use your imagination. Say whatever you want." I wanted to cry. These were ADULTS I had to call. This was worse than the first time my boss had entrusted me to put together an entire divorce to be submitted for Court (I cried then).
Ultimately, I fell back on what had always served me best: lying served with a side of playing dumb. I'd also throw in a little status of the case, to make it seem like I was calling to HELP them. My calls went something like this:
Hello?
GY: Hi, Julie?
Julie: Yes?
GY: Hi Julie, this is Green from M's office, how are you?
Julie: Hi Green, not so well. Simon refused to pick up the girls because my boyfriend walked them down to the car instead of me. Plus he hasn't given us back Gregory's clarinet from when it was left at his house. All due to the fact that I brought Steve to Greg's recital. Is that fair? Can M call his scumbag lawyer about that?
GY: Okay, I'll definitely mention all this to M for you.
Julie: Is she there? Could I speak with her please?
GY: Oh, I'm sorry, she's in Court right now. (M was *never* available to clients, unless they were being beaten while they were calling, were calling from jail or threatening to fire her because they could never talk with her. I was a pretty good liar, but I really became the Queen of Lying working for M. The lies just flowed out of my mouth. I should win awards.) But I'll make sure to let her know about this as soon as she comes back. I was just calling to let you know that we got a date in Family Court for you. It's July 18th at 9:30 a.m. Also, our billing person mentioned our office hadn't gotten a check from you. Do you know if one was sent out yet? (I always tried to mildly disassociate us from the money, and the client from having been responsible for sending it in.)
Julie: Oh, July 18th? I'll put that on my calendar. (NY Courts are outrageously backed up. I'm blown away by how swiftly things move through the courts in both FL and CA.)
GY: Great, and I'll make sure to let M know about what you mentioned. Could you check on the bill and let me know if we need to send you out another one? The post office can be so unreliable.
Julie: Yeah you know, I don't know that it ever came. Maybe you should send out another one.
GY: Absolutely. I'll have that done today.
Sure Julie. We both know I was giving you an out, and you were taking it. I'm so glad I don't do collections on any regular basis.
posted by Green at 5/06/2006 10:16:00 PM
2 Comments:
It's nice to see that other legal secretaries have the exact same job as I do! A little recognition is always good! Thanks
(Scrambling to see if we did indeed pay the CPA's bill for the 2005 tax preparation.)
Yes. But you had me worried there for a minute.
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