Kunal Johar, ESQ

ToVieFor was a startup from NYC that won some business plan competition.  Among the many lessons we’ve learned, one is never work with other startups.

I can’t recall the exact details, but I do remember not getting paid.  This was pretty standard when we’d work with a startup that went under.  In their case, they spent the last of their funding to buy their staff iPads.

January 8, 2011
SUBJECT: TVF / VO Relationship – Final Opportunity to Resolve on Good Terms 

Melanie,

I wanted to give you one final opportunity to right this situation before we take maximum action. I believe it is in all of our interests not to pursue a path that could lead to costly legal action for both parties.

We have already taken a small step and you should be receiving a final legal demand letter shortly. Please plan to have our payments made in full by Monday. Your options are to overnight us a check to our offices at 1629 K St NW STE 300, Washington, DC 20006 or wire us money to the account you have previously paid. If you need this account number we can provide it again. Due to your failure of payment your credit terms have been revoked and we are demanding the total amount to be settled. This amount totals $9,565.00.

Consider this the final opportunity in which we can end our engagement in an amicable fashion and on good terms.

You have made false statements with regards to your firm’s financial position and you have also provided vague language with regards to our final payments. As you have previously discussed your negligence in paying other vendors we are seriously concerned about your motive to paying us. This is the last correspondence you will be receiving from me directly prior to escalation.

I would like to remind you with regards to several facts of our agreement:
– We are not under a nondisclosure agreement with ToVieFor
– We retain copyright to our work until it has been paid for
– Your failure to pay promptly has become a serious breach of our agreement
Given the above, we have the right to take serious action
– We have the opportunity to enforce our copyright claim and issue a cease and desist on your internet services provider to immediately terminate operations of toviefor.com

– We have the opportunity to revoke our claim to payment and auction the intellectual property developed to recover our losses

– We have a trove of email communication and other correspondence records indicating the highly unethical and illegal behavior of TVF’s principal officers. We will release these documents to the appropriate authorities

Furthermore we have evidence that there may have been a misuse of the corporation. As such we will take full action to pierce the corporate veil and hold both you and Susanne liable for payment on a personal level.
The above actions are not desirable to any of us. While we had a great working relationship with you, your blatant disregard to financial commitments has put a serious strain on us.

We would prefer not to act as described in this email. Please honor your commitments.

Please acknowledge your payment action by close of business Monday. Detail your method of payment (overnight check or wire transfer) with an independently traceable confirmation number. Should you issue a check and the bank presents an insufficient funds notice we will provide no further warning and take the maximum action per this email.

Thank you for your time,

Kunal

============ 37 Minutes Later ============