I'm glad you asked this question the way you did because it will be useful to you and many people will learn from your question because it has some of the common myths in it that I love to address.
First, let me explain that every corporation has two lines of authority: the business unit and the legal unit. These two lines meet up near the top. The lawyers rarely talk to middle or lower management and customer service and vice versa, they rarely talk with the lawyers. (It does happen but not often).
That having been said, they also have different goals of operation: The business unit is trying to make the corporation money and the legal unit is trying to keep the corporation out of court. Hear this:
Any time a corporation goes to court with a customer they lose! Corporate lawyers hate, hate, hate small claims court because they have to defend against a suit there, and it is a court of no record so even if they win for $88 (in GA) the customer can appeal
de novo (new trial) to the next level up and they have to do it again. If you call a corporation and ask to speak to their legal unit they will not let you do so, you have to know the pass word: "Registered Agent" (I'll explain in a minute). Litigation costs money corporations don't make money with litigation; remember that.
Now lets get to your questions:
1) "If the business you are suing is a corporation, partnership or any other organization, you must identify the person who is authorized to receive this type of paperwork." Who do I put the CEO?
Corporations are legal persons that are created by filing articles of incorporation at the Secretary of State's office in the State. If a corporation is formed in one state and wants to do business in another state, they are required to register in that state with the Secretary of State (SOS) as a "foreign corporation" or they can't do business there. So a bank, (probably formed in Delaware) that wants to do business in Nebraska, has to file with the NE SOS as a foreign corporation. Part of that filing is to designate a "Registered Agent" who is their service receiver in that state. In other words, the Registered agent is the receptionist for the Legal Unit of the corporation. When something comes into the Registered Agent (they only take written communications) it IMMEDIATELY is passed onto the legal unit. If you sue this corporation, the RA is who you serve. Better, even if you just send them a letter THREATENING to sue, it goes to an attorney too and they set about busily to try to prevent you from suing.
So, answer number one is Registered Agent in the state. Look up the Corporation on the
Secretary of State's web site.
2) I spent hours and have all emails and many calls logged
Sorry, those hours are not recoverable,
directly anyway! (See below)
3) I heard that often corporations don't want to bother going to small claims court in another state so do I just make a sentence or two on the form so they are not too versed?
You only heard partially right:
CORPORATIONS HATE SMALL CLAIMS COURT IN ANY STATE LIKE VAMPIRES HATE GARLIC AND CROSSES. They operate in your state so they have attorneys in your state, they couldn't care less what state it is in. HOWEVER, refer back to my statement that corporations always lose in small claims court (I'll explain in a minute).
I have no idea what you mean by the last have of your statement, but don't worry about it, the first part of your statement and what I said about it is what is important.
4) If they bump it up to bigger court, can I go in myself or do I need a lawyer?
Refer back to: Litigation costs money corporations don't make money with litigation. Corporations don't even try to win in Small Claims Court. They
TRY NOT TO GO THERE. If there is anywhere they would hate going more than small claims court it would be:
REAL COURT. People operate under the assumption that corporations are going to fight you in court when the issue is under $10k. They are going to settle with you, PERIOD. I'll discuss the math that makes this a certainty in a moment. Attempting to "bump you up to big court" would just cost them more money. They wouldn't dream of doing that.
5) What to claim? Interest, Punitive, Hours spent(at what pay rate?) The gifts I bought for my cousin's husband to make the call as he did not bill but I bout him gift certificate.
People always get greedy when they head to court. Court is a place to recoup losses, not to make money. You don't get paid for your time fighting them. You get paid for your losses. That having been said, you can ask for whatever you want. I would get your uncle to write you out a paid bill that you can recover.
Figure out what you actually lost in interest which won't be much, add to it your "legal bill" and come up with between $5-7 thousand dollars. Did you see how I did that? I don't care what your losses are (they are less than that) but you can sue for that. You aren't going to get to court. When the attorney calls, you work something out with him/her that cuts your 5-7k down to 2-3k and get a check. Really!
Now, let me make this long post longer by showing you the math that makes this work.
You file a Small claims Court suit for under $100. Except for time, your expenses are OVER. If you lose you file a de novo appeal for $100. Your expenses are over.
On the corporation side, they are paying their attorney a MINIMUM of $250/hour. Forget suing, if you write the Registered Agent a LETTER and he/she reads it and responds to it, the corporation just spent $250. Get the picture? If the attorney calls you it's another $250. If you sue the attorney has to answer the claim $500 minimum. Then they have to go to small claims court to defend the claim 5-10 hours of work comes to $1250-2500 including travel time. If you appeal a de novo hearing will take a minimum of $2500 to defend. All of these numbers are true EVEN IF THEY WIN.
Most likely, you are going to win something. So, if they can get you down to anywhere near what you would likely win anyway, THEY WILL SETTLE. Quite frankly, if you will take double that, they will settle. Just pick a number under $7500 and stick to it. Do your best to justify it but pick a number.
WRITE A LETTER to the Registered Agent. Keep it brief (believe me they don't care about the story). And make a demand for $7500. You will get a call from an attorney and you will haggle out $2500 and get a check. I can assure you from reading your post that $2500 is way more than you lost.
I'll send you my bill in the morning!
) that if I get to the correct area, what you said may happed, that they just call me and settle. 