I am owed money for office work I did for a business owner that agreed to pay me for my hours, but hasn’t. I have sent a certified letter demanding my owed wages and the owner won’t respond to messages or anything….what should I do?

I am sorry to hear about this situation. Your rights will be primarily dictated by the terms of the contract you signed when you gave the deposit, as well as any subsequent written communications with them. Assuming the terms therein are favorable, a demand letter from an attorney setting forth what specially you want from them and why it’s permitted is the best chance you have of getting this resolved quickly in your favor.

I would start with a demand letter and see if you can work out a confession of judgment and a payment plan with debtor

Yes, you can send such a notice for nonpayment. I would send one in the form of a demand letter.

Please resubmit this as a proposal so we can bid on the opportunity. Please include in the proposal the length of the contract applicable to the loan. Here is a link: https://www.contractscounsel.com/client/create-project/step-h1.

What I suggest you do is write a polite, professional, and firm letter to the person(s) and send the letter in a manner in which you will get a receipt, such as certified, return receipt through the post office (this costs $8.75). Keep copies of everything. Let the person know they must stop immediately and remove any and all defamatory posts.. Do not make any threats. You can have an attorney do this for you, but it will probably cost you around $1000. After you send this letter, if the problem doesn't stop, the next step would be to get a civil anti-harassment order through court. This is something you can do yourself. If this doesn't work, you can return to court with a request (motion) to the judge to hold the defendant (respondent) in contempt and ask the court to impose fines. Another option, of course, is to sue for defamation (even for a business), but this type of case would cost you thousands and thousands of dollars, and there's no guaranty than you would win and get paid by the defendant. Although this is a "women's law" website, the website has a great explanation of various types of restraining orders in Washington State. Please look at the explanation for civil harassment: https://www.womenslaw.org/laws/wa/restraining-orders/civil-anti-harassment-orders You can, of course, skip writing a letter and go straight to filling for harassment, but judges tend to like to see some reasonable effort on the part of litigants to resolve their problems on their own prior to going to court. I normally would offer to help you, but I'm going to be traveling and am not available until some time after October 17th or so. I also do not engage in litigation any more myself. Oh, I want you to know that most Washington counties have a website for their courts that provide lots of information and forms for obtaining various types of restraining orders. Best wishes, Merry Kogut