Maybe just walk away and start your own business, don’t buy him out. He’s a business partner, not your child. Tell him not to run off any more customers and to stay away from work, or else you’re gonna walk.
He’s sad…well, we all are. We all have losses. That’s life. But, if he can’t make the grade, and keeps giving paying customers sorrow, he’s got to be the one who takes the hit. That’s business.
Read **astro’s **post again.
ooops, just read your update.
Good luck.
Well that phone call was the last I have heard from him. Closing down and reopening with new DBA as a sole prop.
Well that phone call was the last I have heard from him. Sent a few text messages and phone calls, mailed him a letter basically offering him the business and telling him to contact me if he intends to take it over if not I am shutting it down and reopening with new DBA as a sole prop. I also told him I understand that life has pretty much been a disaster for him this year and that I would make a place for him in the new biz should he wish to be involved, just in a more limited capacity appropriate to his medical limitations. Sometime in the last few days he came in after hours and cleared out all of his personal items from his desk.
Guess thats a no…
That sounds like the tidiest solution for this kind of conflict that I’ve ever seen.
I really, really wish that partners would set up an operating agreement that addressed things like this. I guess you have to be a CPA to have an issue like this be one that gets you angry, but I’ve seen too many people let a personal misfortune destroy everyone around them as well. It’s just irresponsible to start up a partnership on the assumption that life will be rainbows and unicorns forever. People move, divorce, die, etc. all the time. Businesses fail and someone has to cover the debts.
The problem is that nobody realizes all the downsides until they experience them. Even people who’ve gone to an attorney or who went through business school rarely appreciate how important the operating agreement is.
Anyway, good luck on continuing things successfully.
I hope you’ll spare some time towards setting up a succession plan. Even if it’s nothing more than making sure your spouse/heirs have all the client info, passwords, account numbers and some documented operations that they can use to sell the business or find a replacement for you if you’re not able to work there.
Best of luck in your new solo venture.
Some of that I already have “The envelope” passwords for online banking, PINs. passwords, etc. It is in my moms safe deposit box for the moment, I will rehome it when/if something happens to mom. I also do have a small emergency operating reserve fund that if need be can keep the business alive for a month even with zero revenues.