The Obsessed Programmer

I just received a letter in the mail today on Estari letterhead. I’ve received a few of them lately as a stockholder, asking for nominations for board memberships, etc. I opened it with dull interest and was quickly shocked.

It was from Estari’s auditors, who in going through old records, found an item with my name on it. The claim is that I owe Estari, inc. $2,399.80. Rather, I owed them that amount on 5/3/2004, and actually owe them that principle plus 8% interest over the last 3 years. They asked for my confirmation of the overdue debt in writing.

I pride myself on never having entered into debt. I’ve never spent more money than I’d earned through honest labor. Not for a car, not for education, not even yet for a place to live. I couldn’t imagine what this debt was over, especially such an odd amount. Then I saw the “Description of Collateral”.

42,662 shares of Estari, Inc. stock.

Suddenly I remembered an exchange with the owner of Estari, from way back when I was 17. I remember thinking something funny was going on. I wrote a note on the debt papers before sending them back to Estari describing my recollection of incurring the debt:

A note on this “debt”:

I became employed at Estari at the age of 16, having never been employed before. The leaders of Estari showed me great respect and admiration for my intellect, particularly George, Sr.

Within a year, I was given “golden handcuffs,” as I was led to believe. I had all but forgotten this particular exchange–I was told I was being given another load of stock, but the nominal price was being waived by means of this loan–a loan which, I was told, was meaningless, mere paper formality. After all, I was told, if God forbid the stock never went public, the loan would never be upheld since I signed the papers as a minor.

I was young, naive, and I thought nothing of it, then or since. Those golden handcuffs are starting to look like shackles. I am in no financial situation to reasonably repay this ridiculous loan. Today, 2007, I receive my first notice that I am 3 years overdue on this “loan”? At 8% interest?

If the collateral is the stock shares, please take the collateral and end this sillyness. If you seriously expect to collect on this dusty “debt,” please advise me of my options.

Ben Dilts

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 9th, 2007 at 12:43 am and is filed under Personal. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.