Home>Levelset Community>Legal Help>We use a rep as a middle man on some our projects. Do we have a legal right to send lien notice to end customer or must they go to the rep? What is the construction industry practice? Texas company
We use a rep as a middle man on some our projects. Do we have a legal right to send lien notice to end customer or must they go to the rep? What is the construction industry practice? Texas company
Subcontractor send POs to our rep. Rep then sends us a PO. We send quote to rep and they mark it up and invoice the subcontractor. They receive payment from the subcontractor.
1 reply
Sep 25, 2018
It's totally normal to be unsure of the Texas notice requirements, especially when the job doesn't exactly have a "normal" owner-contractor-sub-supplier structure. First, regardless of whether the notice would be effective to preserve lien rights, monthly notices may still be sent - and by sending notices, even when not required, a claimant can work to speed up payment. Typically, the more parties aware of your payment dispute, the better. Further, when notice must go to certain parties, it might still be beneficial to send that notice to non-requied parties. For example, parties hired by someone other than the general contractor will likely need to send notice at some point in the job - but that notice will very typically only need to go to the prime contractor and the owner. However, sending these notices to other parties up the payment chain could work to put pressure on your customer to make payment. So, to your question, sending your customer monthly notices is within your legal rights, and it could be helpful to compel payment. But their receipt of that notice is not mandated by statute, and it will not preserve any legal or lien right.