🚀 go-pugleaf

Note:  This article may be of no interest to people who are not residents
of Ontario, and particularly of Ottawa.

In a previous article about OCS, I reported that I was mislead into purchasing
a refurbished laptop, believing that I was buying a new unit.  I concluded by
quoting the court's judgment, which awarded me damages.  In this, the second
article, I will outline a few points concerning the small claims court of our
province.  If you ever intend to resort to the small claims court, you may be
able to benefit from knowing about my experience.

At the back of our mind, we, the people of Ontario, have the notion that our
provincial government created the system of small claims courts so that
disputes over small sums could be resolved expeditiously, without lawyers and
in a relatively informal way.  This notion assumes that both sides play by the
same rules, using a level playing field.  Before you rush to fill out a claim,
consider this.

At first, I contacted Ms McConkey, president of "1150033 Ontario Inc.,
carrying on business as Ottawa Computer Services" to settle out of court. 
Rather than respond, Ms McConkey hired legal counsel, whose contribution was
to send me the standard threats, but no offer to speak of.  At that point I
filed a claim with the court On November 7, 1996.  According to the court's
staff, OCS should have filed a defence by November 28, a pre-trial hearing
could have been heard by mid December, and the trial itself could have been
heard in the first week of January.

In reality, Ms McConkey hired another lawyer, whose first contribution was to
file a "motion", asking the court to dismiss my claim even before the "matters
of issue" are heard.  I consulted a lawyer who advised me that the motion has
no chance of succeeding and who encouraged me to save my money and represent
myself.  I followed this advice and the "motion" was defeated: the pretrial
was on.  But OCS succeeded in delaying the proceedings, increasing my
expenses, and wasting my time and the court's time.  And why not?  For OCS
this was just one more business expense, which is probably tax deductible; I,
on the other hand, would have to pay for my own expenses with after-tax
dollars.  If you go to small claims court, this may happen to you too.

Then came a series of delays, when OCS started missing deadlines, a series too
long to report here.  But the most egregious delay occurred after both sides
had agreed to a trial on March 26.  Two weeks before the trial date, the
lawyer for OCS advised that "the defendant will not be available for trial". 
This meant that my witness and myself had to re-organize our schedules and
start negotiating a new date. (Incidentally, on the morning of March 26, I
spoke with Ms McConkey at her store to find out why she was not "available for
trial", but she refused to give me a reason). 

The end result was that OCS and their lawyer caused the claim to came before a
judge in mid-April rather than in the first week of January.  If you apply to
small claims court, you too may be subject to this type of delay tactics.

Once you have won your case, how do you get your money?  Well, here starts
another procedure, or, rather, a new array of procedures.  More about this
side, in the next chapter.  Suffice it to say, that to date OCS has not paid a
penny...

I hope you find this info useful: forewarned is forearmed.  Tune in for
Chapter 3.

Cheers.