Can you please confirm if Louisiana requires payment terms be included in the preliminary notice? We have a customer contesting our lien rights. If so, when was this put into effect. Thanks
1 reply
Jan 25, 2018
Whether payment terms must be included in preliminary notice depends on which notice is being referred to. In Louisiana Notice of Contract (required of a GC for projects exceeding $25,000) requires that the price of the contract and when payment is due under the contract to appear on the notice. The Louisiana Notice of Lease calls for a copy of the lease to go along with the notice under RS 9:4802(G)(1): "the lessor of the movables shall deliver a copy of the lease to the owner and to the contractor not more than ten days after the movables are first placed at the site of the immovable for use in a work." However, no other preliminary notices (such as Notice of Lien Rights) appear to require any payment terms on the face of the notice. While not all errors and omissions on a Notice of Contract will be fatal to lien rights, failure to include the contract price will likely result in the loss of lien rights under section D of RS 9:4811. Louisiana Notice of Contract is required by RS 9:4811 which appears to have been in effect since 1989, but it was amended in 2003. Notice of lease required by RS 9:4802, which has been in effect since 1981, but was amended as recently as 1999.