When you need to write a demand letter template to use to secure payment for something, you might opt to look at demand letter samples to see what needs to be included in your demand letter. You will find that a strong demand letter for payment is almost always more effective than a letter of demand format that is more general in nature. You want people to care that they pay you, so creating the right demand letter example is important in order to secure a good outcome for your situation.

Writing a demand for payment letter can be really simple if you know about the various things that need to be included in it. You will also get much better results from this letter if it is enforceable in court and legally formulated. The better your demand for payment letters, the more likely it will be to be effective.

Exclusive
Demand Letter Template
Demand Letter Template Download for Word

Demand Letter Templates

What is a Demand For Payment Letter?

A demand for payment letter is a document that informs someone that they owe a debt to a person or a business. The letter will need to state the reasons for there being a debt as well as the methods of debt recovery and what will happen if the debt is not paid or the person does not respond to the demand before a particular deadline.

This is often the first step that is used to collect this kind of money from someone before taking the time and money to take the case to small claims court. Many people have good success with the use of a demand letter template, so there is no reason to have to move on to court proceedings. This can be a big relief if you are dreading a long conflict over money owed.

There are some other names that this letter can go by as well. All of these names are legally correct and do not impact the effect of the letter in question:

  • Final Demand for Payment
  • Demand Letter for Payment
  • Demand letter
  • Letter of Demand

You can call your template for this kind of letter any of these things without risking the letter holding up in court or being useful to you when trying to collect a debt.

Can I write my own demand letter?

You can write your own demand letter, but you do need to be sure that it includes all the right information for it to be valid to use. Without being correctly stated, this demand for payment will likely not hold up in a court of law and might not be useful to you for the purposes of collecting a debt of some kind. You will need to remember as well that demand letters are intended for use in the following circumstances:

  1. You were paid in the time stated in an agreement that is legally binding.
  2. You were charged for a service that was not provided or a product that was not given to you. In this case, the demand will be for a refund rather than a payment.
  3. You have contacted the company and explained the situation and they have said that they would fix it, but there has been a long lapse without a response.
  4. The company involved refuses to credit your account even though they are supposed to offer this service.

Demand Letter Samples

How do you write an official demand letter?

There are some common sections that you need to include in your demand letter, and you must not leave these items out if you want your demand letter to be effective. The information in a demand letter is necessary to make it enforceable and to communicate your goals related to the conflict that has occurred. Demand letters need to be carefully constructed for so many reasons since this is the primary document that will be used to enforce a payment demand.

  1. Payor and Payee Information: The person who owes the debt as well as the person who is due the money, needs to be listed at the top of your demand letter template. You will need to make sure that the people involved are named using their full legal names and that contact information is collected, like addresses and phone numbers as well. When you write legal documents and do not ensure that the full legal name of the person is included in the document, you cannot enforce the document in a court of law.
    You will want to be sure that there is also information in this document that allows for someone to reach out if they have questions about the demand letter template they have received. This might be an individual related to the person who is owed the debt, someone who works at the company who is owed a debt, or even a lawyer who might work for this party.
  2. Fill in Payment Information: Payment information is critical to this document. You will need to be sure that you are going to be able to collect the debt in a way that will be reasonable for both parties that are involved in the agreement. You will need to state the payment due amount and the reason for the payment, such as rent, purchase, refund, or, etc.
    The original payment due date needs to be included, and the number of days that the payment is past due. If there are late charges, this information needs to be disclosed here as well. This can be a percentage or a flat charge, and you need to specify which of the two applies here. The last thing that might need to be included here is the number of days the payor has upon receiving the letter to make the payment before action is taken to demand that it be made.
  3. Details About Attempts to Collect the Debt: You have likely tried to collect the debt in some fashion if you are sending a demand for payment template to the party who owes you money. You might have called, emailed, showed up at the property of the person in question, and more. You need to list the dates and the times that you tried to give notice as well as what kind of outreach you used to try to get the debt from the other party. Dates and numbers of invoices can also be used to prove this part of the paper trail.
  4. Expectations About Payment: The expectations about how payment was to be delivered need to be included in this section, and you need to be clear about how the payment was supposed to be made. You will want to say how the payment was to be made and by what date in this section. The expectations section is critical to proving the point that the payment needed to be made using specific guidelines. Expectations about payment are the central argument for payment agreements of every kind, so this information needs to be restated in this section of the document.
  5. Consequences: There needs to be clear information in the demand letter template that states what the consequences of nonpayment will be. This is something that was likely laid out in the original payment agreement as well, so the other party should have been familiar with this information before they began missing payments. This is simply reiterating the information that the party who owes you money should already be aware of.
  6. Date: The date of the letter needs to be clear so that the party receiving it knows when the demand was made. This is usually the starting point for the countdown to when payment is due, so this information needs to be listed on the document for the sake of enforcing it correctly.  The date is pivotal to the enforcement of the contract as well.
  7. Signature: The person who is demanding the money needs to sign the document and date it next to the signature. You will want to be sure that you do not skip this step, or the document will not be legal or enforceable. Even though the other party will not be signing this document, legal documents need to be signed to be enforceable.

Demand Letters For Money Owed

What should you not put in a demand letter?

There are some things that you cannot include in a demand letter. You will want to be sure that you are being professional and that you are using the right kind of language and terms in your demand letter for a host of reasons. Professionalism is necessary even when you are writing someone a demand to enforce a non-business payment agreement.

  • Threats

You cannot put threats into your letter. This will just make the other party mad at you or unwilling to work with you. It might also give them cause to bring legal action against you. You cannot threaten anyone that you are trying to collect money from just because they owe you money. Make sure that you are professional when you are writing this letter to protect your interests.

  • Personal information

You cannot add personal information about your feelings or your opinions in this document. You should refrain from inserting your personal demands or desires into the letter. You are trying to enforce a payment contract with this demand letter. Stick to the legal information that was in the original agreement.

  • New rules or demands

You cannot put new demands or rules into the demand letter that you send to collect payment. Just because you might wish that these items would apply to your agreement now that you are having trouble with payment being collected does not mean that you can make new demands that were not in the first contract. You will need to honor the way that the original payment contract was made when you are demanding payment for it. You must stick to the original demands and not make new ones that were not in the original contract.

Make sure that you make copies of the letter so that you are not caught without a copy of the agreement. You will need to be able to point to the document if you are asked about what was in it, and if you head to court, you need to be able to point at the document there as well. You cannot lose track of the document and have the only copy be in the hands of the person that you are trying to get money from. They could easily state that they never got the document or that it does not exist, and then you would have to start the process all over again.

Demand for Payment Letters

Demand for Payment Letters Are Important to Have on Hand

If you have a payment agreement with anyone, you need to have a payment demand template on hand to use in the instance that the person does not pay. Payment disputes can always happen when a payment agreement has been put in place, and you need to be sure that you are able to enforce the payment that is demanded in the original contract. You cannot personally attack the person that owes you money or badger them about the money that they owe you. You need to use legal channels to enforce the original payment demand, not personal attacks.

Creating a legally-enforceable demand for payment is important as well. You cannot hope to use this document for your purposes if you do not write it properly. Being sure that you are creating a valid document that you can use for this purpose is critical as well. You can write as many demands for payment letters as you want and send them out, but if they are not valid or legally correct, you cannot use this document to enforce your demands.  This guide will help you to write a demand for payment letter that you can actually use to collect the money you are due.

 

Click to rate this post!
[Total: 2 Average: 4]
Tagged:BusinessDebtDemandLegalLetterPayment
TemplateLab March 11th, 2023
Ryan Duffy
Ryan Duffy