# Poll: Have you ever skipped out of paying a significant sum? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 7, 2011, 8:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159 "2011-07-07T08:32:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![alice\_in\_wonderland](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alice_in_wonderland/32/176_2.png) [@alice\_in\_wonderland](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alice_in_wonderland)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2011, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/21 "2011-07-07T23:38:05Z")
> [@Asimovian](#): > > My wife and I were divorcing and knew it would be enormously burdensome for one of us to stay in a gigantic house that we’d just bought months earlier, Sorry to be nosy and i don’t mean to hijack or derail the thread, but how do you go from ‘Lets buy a huge-ass house together!’ to ‘We need a divorce!’ in a couple of months? Were there problems and it was thought the house purchase would help them or something? Feel free not to answer as it’s really none of my business, but i was just curious. ---
**Author:** ![Asimovian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asimovian/32/172_2.png) [@Asimovian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asimovian)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2011, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/22 "2011-07-07T23:43:06Z")
> [@alice\_in\_wonderland](#): > > Sorry to be nosy and i don’t mean to hijack or derail the thread, but how do you go from ‘Lets buy a huge-ass house together!’ to ‘We need a divorce!’ in a couple of months? Were there problems and it was thought the house purchase would help them or something? > > Feel free not to answer as it’s really none of my business, but i was just curious. I don’t mind discussing it at all, but that’s way too much of a hijack for this thread. Feel free to search for all threads I started between August and October of 2009 if you want to watch my marriage dissolve in text form, and/or PM me with any questions. 🙂 ETA: (The short answer, though, is that the house purchase had nothing to do with problems in the marriage, but it did accelerate certain issues.) ---
**Author:** ![appleciders](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@appleciders](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/appleciders)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2011, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/23 "2011-07-08T00:30:41Z")
Last spring I took a trip through France with a couple of friends, and we rented a car to do so. The rental company had our credit card information and charged us for the rental, but not the under-25 fee or the drop-it-off-in-a-different-location fee. We made a couple of phone calls to try to sort the matter out, but never managed to do so. At some point, we figured that the ball was in their court and dropped the matter. ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2011, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/24 "2011-07-08T03:06:18Z")
Never. . ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2011, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/25 "2011-07-08T04:13:48Z")
> [@alice\_in\_wonderland](#): > > I have a pan that was shipped to me in error and the company made it basically impossible for me to return it, I believe you’re legally entitled to keep any unsolicited merchandise that’s shipped to you (i.e., without your requesting it). ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2011, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/26 "2011-07-08T14:06:28Z")
I’ve never done this. ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2011, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/27 "2011-07-08T14:18:18Z")
I can’t think of anything off the top of my head, but if a company repeatedly made it difficult for me to pay what I owe them, I wouldn’t have any problem leaving the ball in their court. ---
**Author:** ![alice\_in\_wonderland](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alice_in_wonderland/32/176_2.png) [@alice\_in\_wonderland](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alice_in_wonderland)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2011, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/28 "2011-07-08T14:21:15Z")
> [@Koxinga](#): > > I believe you’re legally entitled to keep any unsolicited merchandise that’s shipped to you (i.e., without your requesting it). Well, it was somewhat more complicated that that - I had purchased a knife from the company a couple of years previously that came with its own sharpener - the knife was fine but the sharpener had broken. I asked for a replacement sharpener (it had a life time warranty). A new sharpener came (with a new knife as well - apparently they can’t ship them separately) and it was also broken. I followed up to say I got the new set, sharpener also broken, maybe HQ needs to improve the durability, don’t bother sending another I’ll just use my steel to sharpen the (now 2) knives. No, no, no, says the rep, we WILL be replacing it. Ok, UPS arrives with another package - this one contains the ceramic baking pan but no sharpener. So I contact the rep again, she says she’ll have a new sharpener/knife shipped out (I say don’t bother but she insists), they will send me a thank you gift along with a postage label and could I please drop the pan off at the post office. Fine, says I. A couple of days later the new sharpener (and a third knife) arrive and the sharpener is intact. Yay! A couple of days after that a small flipper type gizmo arrives (the thank you gift) but there is no postage label. So, I wait about 2 more weeks for the label to arrive and contact the rep again. Oops, she says, it was supposed to be with the flipper - I’ll have them send it out. This whole time the friggin’ pan has been sitting in its box on my dining room table waiting to go back to the post office. 3 months later I threw out the box, put the pan in my cupboard and figured screw them - if they’re that incompetent I’m keeping the damn pan and they can call and pick it up if they want it that badly. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2011, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/29 "2011-07-08T15:04:30Z")
Yes, I skipped out on a bill for over $700,000. When the collectors would call, I would use a fake accent and pretend they had the wrong number. More details [here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=14000076&postcount=17). ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2011, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/30 "2011-07-08T15:13:50Z")
I don’t need to follow the link. You’ve already confessed to being a deadbeat, and I have you pegged for it. I’ll tell all your friends. ---
**Author:** ![Student\_Driver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3da27b/32.png) [@Student\_Driver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Student_Driver)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2011, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/31 "2011-07-08T15:20:30Z")
Can’t think of anything beyond forgetting to pay for a haircut I got when I was 10 or so. There have been a few times where I _should_ have owed someone something, but had no way to really pay it. Years ago, I had a couple of problematic wisdom teeth dealt with at a local dentist’s clinic. The clinic then went out of business right after filing the insurance paperwork. The insurance company notified me that I would owe a few hundred dollars after their payment, but I had no one to pay, and no follow-up company claiming to own the debt ever contacted me. More recently, I had a massive and expensive bout of eye problems that took a month to reverse (nice to bounce back from blindness to 20/20!), and another three months to research to make sure there were no underlying immune system problems. Insurance paperwork showed that I would owe around $5000 in co-pays after they paid their part, and I was prepared to pay it… thankfully, I had a big tax refund, bonuses from work, and some savings, and if things got worse, I could hit retirement accounts and contact the ex-fiancee to take her up on her offer to dip into one of her trust funds. Total costs actually billed by the hospital and specialists? $18 and some change. The detailed bills show that they wrote off everything not paid by the insurance company save for a couple of office-visit co-pays. This is despite my having told the doctors that I could afford everything out-of-pocket and receiving more expensive treatments than may have been necessary. I suppose I could contribute some money to the non-profit medical societies involved, but all of the specialists were private practitioners who, presumably, would be interested in making some money. ---
**Author:** ![Foxy40](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@Foxy40](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Foxy40)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2011, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/32 "2011-07-08T16:30:26Z")
Years ago I wrote a check to Target for around $150. It never cleared. I never called and reminded them. I assume it was misplaced. ---
**Author:** ![Cyberhwk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7993a0/32.png) [@Cyberhwk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cyberhwk)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/33 "2011-07-09T01:18:30Z")
Ask again in about a year. Guy quoted us $2500 to paint our house. He painted but screwed a few things up and said he’d be back out soon to fix the problems. Two weeks later we haven’t seen him and still haven’t paid him a dime. ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/34 "2011-07-09T05:12:03Z")
Back when we built our house, we had the landscapers put in a watering system for the flowerbed that wasn’t included with the system we’d paid for previously. They sent us a bill for $150, but I held off paying it because I wasn’t real happy with them, and wanted to talk to someone personally about it. The company closed up shop and disappeared shortly after that, so there wasn’t really anyone to pay. ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159/35 "2011-07-09T05:49:55Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Yes, I skipped out on a bill for over $700,000. When the collectors would call, I would use a fake accent and pretend they had the wrong number. More details [here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=14000076&postcount=17). What was the point of this? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poll-have-you-ever-skipped-out-of-paying-a-significant-sum/588159.md?page=1)