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Comment by deskr | Hacker News Reader

I'd assume Ireland has something like bailiffs in the UK.

Delta tried not paying around £3000 owed to a customer. He got a court order and sent bailiffs who went to the airport, closed the checking and said they were going seize the plane to pay for the debt.

There's a good short documentary about it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QSj9odUD_c&t=320s . This link starts at 320 seconds, where the action starts. Start from the beginning if you want the back story.

Spoiler: Delta called the police who explained to them that they were about to pay up or lose the plane. Delta paid up. Actually, the managed used her personal card to pay I'd assume Delta paid her back.

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That was amazing, and we absolutely need this kind of enforcement of court ordered judgments in the USA. It's mind-blowing 1. that Delta fought/ignored to the point where police had to shut down their operations, and 2. how much they even fought back when their counter was already closed down! This corporate mentalities of "We'll do anything except pay what we owe." and "We should always be able to throw more lawyers at a problem to delay it."

Not to mention having the manager pay the police out of her own pocket. Doesn't Delta have a petty cash policy giving discretion to managers around payments of small amounts like this? The whole thing was both bonkers and very entertaining!

This is one of those “left hand doesn’t talk to the right” situations. Delta has an arm of the company that only deals in disputes and has another arm that does check in and routine services. I think the manager did a good job here - I highly doubt there is a listed provision for allowances like this, but she paid anyways because she understood what the right thing to do was after confirming everything was legit. Unfortunately, companies have to play so defensively because they hold so much power, otherwise people will take advantage and bleed them dry. Note that this isn’t a political comment, I’m not interested in what should be, rather what is. If a company makes an honest mistake, courts will typically side with the less powerful party when possible. For example, JCPenney did a promotion with Firestone back in the day where you could get your car battery replaced for life. The intent of the promo was life of the car, ie 8-12 years, but the language really said “basically forever.” There are people to this day, decades later, still getting free battery replacements[1]. Hell, there are people who even hunt for the batteries and make good money when they find them in scrapyards. This promo turned into a perpetuity JCP did not want or intend to have on its books. That mistake went all the way to the top of the company and caused real change in how they did cross promos. I’m willing to bet this delta fiasco went to the CEO’s desk and the company addressed it, one way or another.

[1] https://www.forabodiesonly.com/mopar/threads/jc-penney-lifet...

> companies have to play so defensively because they hold so much power,

You mean they decide to play defensively because they have the power to be a pain in the neck.

>If a company makes an honest mistake, courts will typically side with the less powerful party when possible.

I'm seen way too many malicious "mistakes" punished with a slap on the wrist to really believe this.

> It's mind-blowing 1. that Delta fought/ignored to the point where police had to shut down their operations, and 2. how much they even fought back when their counter was already closed down!

All over 3000 euro. For an operation as large as an airline they may as well have been arguing over a dropped penny.

What physical assets does X have in Ireland to seize? The Fenian street office in Dublin is leased and TikTok took over most of that space anyway.

Well, what about bank accounts then? Can be seized too.

Twitter are very likely to use some payment providers in the EU, I imagine those can be ordered to withhold part of the money owed.

If X owns the building they can seize that, tennants be damned.

Already said in the post you responded to that they lease it. It's publicly available information.

Not sure how many staff there are left in IE, but if we assume 200 and with a laptop resale rate of maybe ~€1K that’s a third of the way towards the repayment.

First things baliffs typically seize are bank accounts, way less fuss with them than with physical assets. You typically only seize physical assets from broke people, or from companies that went bankrupt.

Then why do you think Delta's plane almost had to be seized instead of one of their bank accounts?

There's a strong chance Delta don't have much legal/fiscal presence in the UK. Probably also why they didn't feel a pressing need to pay fines in the UK.

There's a much higher chance that Twitter have a legal and financial presence in Ireland, especially being that it is/was their EMEA HQ.

This is the greatest thing i've ever watched. thank you

I want to say the Daily Show had an episode about someone calling the sheriffs on Bank of America, and them visiting a local branch to enforce a court judgment

That video is also a great example of just how abusable the bailiff system is.

All the "agents" care about is getting the money for their client. For this, they're willing and apparently able to abort at least one flight, and possibly others, costing people on those flights possibly thousands each with rebookings etc, all for £3k.

I've only has the displeasure of interacting with a bailiff once, when I was a naive student. The guy knocked on the door asking after a previous tenant. We went through for any mail addressed to the guy he was after, and while doing so seemed to revel in explaining how he had the power to barge in by force and arrest me if we wanted. In the moment I was slightly incredulous but nodded along. Was only after the fact I researched to find you're within your rights to turn them away unless they're accompanied by actual police.

Seems like the perfect job for power-tripping sods.

In general I agree, the bailiff system should be abolished for personal debts.

Except these are High Court bailiffs collecting a commercial debt. They just enforce the powers of the court. Useful in this situation where the executives are in a different country. The High Court can do a lot worse than stopping check in if you don’t comply with its orders.

Sure, no problem with their use against companies.

I don't care about the cost to Delta in that video, but I do think this particlar strongarm tactic was way over the line, due to the significant financial impact it could've incurred to innocent bystanders

Years back, a software consultancy owed me money. I took them to court and eventually called in the bailiffs for non-payment.

Are you seriously saying I should not have done this, just because it might have inconvenienced their other customers!

Get a grip sunshine; and put the blame where it it due.

>I don't care about the cost to Delta in that video

I do. if it was something like 3m euros I'd understand the greed, even if I don't condone it.

3000? They just seem petty. As the article said, this was something a manager could pay out of pocket (and I hope they got reimbursed). It should have been a rounding error already built into their budget that they paid immediately. Delta clearly didn't care of the "innocent bystanders" either, or they were willing to bluff with them as ransom. I've had delays for stupider reasons, but this would at least be a hilarious story to share as a passenger.

It's not like some working class that may not have that much in liquid to pay off.

I find it difficult to side with Delta when they're trying to shirk their legal obligations to their customers.

There's a comment in the video that this is david vs goliath, and they give david some leverage. I think that's the perfect use for high-court bailiffs. The other way around, maybe not so much.

(Ironically - obeying court judgements is not without control of the airline, so if this caused delays, those customers could claim compensation also.)

Debt Collector != Court bailiff

You clearly had the former masquerading as latter. In Blighty, a debt collector tricking a naive student into believing they have court authority (!) is their Standard Operating Procedure.

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