Jerry,
You run a business, not a bar that you opened after retirement to make friends.
You did reach out and try to resolve it.
You over reached to the clients advantage by doing more than what you were supposed to do.
All your actions were focused on positively resolve the issue and all your moves you made took the dealer's interest into consideration (they kept getting leads).
Out of all your options you listed:
1. Write off a 4 figure loss.
2. Let my attorney take them to court.
3. Sell the number to a competing VW dealer.
4. Change the ring to number from the dealership to the owners cell phone.
Number 3 and 4 won't get you what you want and they get personal. You will get a momentary satisfaction but nothing more than that.
Number 1 you do if you invoice $5M plus a year and you just want to move forward and focus on growing the business. A lot of people may disagree on this one but it is a deep personal choice; I used to get rattled when people didn't pay me a few hundred bucks and noways I realized that it was costing me money by taking my focus away.
Number 2 is how business follows when you don't pay your bills and it doesn't make you a bad guy for doing so. Is not personal, it is the way business works in the America--you don't pay the cable you don't get to watch HBO, you don't pay the electric bill you get to pee in the dark at night, etc. The funny thing is that the other guy knows what is coming--he chose it to be that way.
I deal with this everyday, if someone doesn't think that what I provided was worth it what I charged them for a reason we can talk and reach an agreement. Just like you I will do everything that I can--even to the loss of money--to find a win-win situation. When someone just flat out doesn't pay, send them to collections.
