Extortion - how to deal with?

[Anonymous]

I worked with someone off Facebook for a nanny service and am being told that this person wants back payments over the past twelve months out of the blue for work claimed was done beyond scope, but payment was already paid in full with no issue until now. There is no record of these bills or requests prior. Can I take them to court for extortion? How can I protect myself if I'm taken to court over these fraudulent charges?

[Anonymous]

What are they threatening if you don't pay?

[Anonymous]

What does your contract say?

[Anonymous]

Were you on the books?

[Anonymous]

Just... ignore?

[Anonymous]

I mean, in what way are they extorting you? Sounds like your basic contract dispute.

[Anonymous]

Post their extortion attempts publicly so everyone can see them.

[Anonymous]

What do you mean "take them to court for extortion"? You don't sue someone for extortion, it's a crime. Are they threatening you? Forcing you somehow? Or just trying to collect money they feel you owe?

Like others have said, sounds more like a contract dispute.

[Anonymous]

Yes a contract dispute but over something that isn’t remotely real. They say some third party person was involved that needs to be paid that we’ve never heard of or dealt with. The person we hired was a local friend of a friend. The agreement was verbal based on daily care and has been going on for a long time with no issue only documenting monthly payments which were accepted without issue. At the time of termination was when all of these accusations for more money came to surface saying more hours and more people needed to be paid to settle up but there is no actual documentation stating any of this.

[Anonymous]

They are just asking for money that they say we owe but are harassing about it. What to do next? There is no proof and it’s not real so what are the next steps we should take?

[Anonymous]

Well...it's not extortion when you had an employee that you didn't pay as such or pay taxes on. Find out the penalty for wage misclassification and see if the money requested is less than your illegal activities.

Next time, payroll.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They are just asking for money that they say we owe but are harassing about it. What to do next? There is no proof and it’s not real so what are the next steps we should take?

Save all records of the harassment and then block them across all platforms.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Well...it's not extortion when you had an employee that you didn't pay as such or pay taxes on. Find out the penalty for wage misclassification and see if the money requested is less than your illegal activities.

Next time, payroll.

I don’t think any of the money was claimed on taxes for either person. I’ll check on that though

[Anonymous]

Sounds like you made a dumb decision to pay someone under the table and now you are suffering consequences. It does sound kind of like extortion, actually. Do you know who you are dealing with? Are they scary people?

[Anonymous]

Also even if I paid whatever sum is being asked couldn’t that still be a wage misclassification? In other words could I just be charged twice? How about them if they didn’t claim income? It was care for children which is typically actually a deduction on your taxes which wasn’t claimed.