Expert: Charles W. Field - 3/21/2005

Question
First, my business is a solid surface countertop business in Georgia. I made a lease purchase of a large machine to be able to carry out contracts I already had. I was assured that they could hsve me up and operating properly within the month. Most of my avialable capital was consumed by the down payment. The company is the largest tool maker in the world. They were new to this market. They normally sell CNC equipment for cutting steel. This is a CNC gantry for cutting granite. I was their first customer in the Southeast. The machine sent was and is incapable of cutting any pieces close to tolerences, as well as the machine never has been equiped correctly for this application. It has broken many peices. I have now lost in excess of 3 million dollars in orders and over 1 million in profit. I did not have the money to purchase a different machine. I lost every contract I had because of machine inaccuracy or by multiple guarantees of when I could produce not being true. I have always been promised total resolution of the problems within three weeks of contact with the company and have had none. They have been aware of the problem for at least ten months without any change. Today, I am writting every executive and department head am extremely verbose letter demanding both resolution and compensation. This is my first request fot any compensation, I waited until now because I had not lost my largest contract and if the machine was fixed, I could complete the job. I think this lost cost me my business. I live in a community where everyone knows me, but it is rapidly growing. I think my industry name has been ruined by their lack of action and multiple empty promises. I also feel that my kindness in this matter has been mistaken for stupidity, and that angers me. I live by a rule of, be very nice, until it is time to not be, and then make sure they never want to see you again. My questions for you in this matter are:

1) I want to ask for compensation for future loss of revenue, how would I determine the worth of my business before it crashed?

2) As I mentioned above, the letter is quite verbose (i.e. When a company is selling product, especially as expensive as a CNC gantry, and the salesman has made several mistakes with the product and or parts of the product do not function as intended, and the cost is being remunerated by the customer in the form of real money or lost business, a company can not appear parsimonious or languid in managing the mistakes.)   . I did this for two reasons. First, I wanted to grab their attention while being a pain in the ass. And, I felt this was more discriptive and emotional. Is this a good Idea? Why?

Answer
1) You will need a business analyst. I would start with a CPA who can review your business history.
2) In the letter, you don't want to say anything that will come back and bite you. I would review your situation with a local attorney. It sounds like a lot of money might be at stake.