Dell Is Holding Me Personally Liable For My Company's Lease

[gglass4u]

About a year ago I worked for a small corporation and helped set up an account w/ Dell Financial for a loan for three computers. About two months ago Dell called me saying that payment was due. I asked why they were calling me, (it is a company account and I'm no longer w/ them) and upon further inquiries found out that Dell had placed me as a personal guarantor for the equipment. When the account was first set up, the Dell employee told me they needed my tax info to validate that the company was on sound footing (its a small company, of about four employees). Now they are telling me that by doing that I had agreed to be guarantor and sent a copy of the contract, with my name on it. I never signed anything. They have my name and a "pin code" listed on the contract which they say is as good as a sig. I never agreed to this contract at all! Also,instead of it being a loan,they set us up for a lease. They said that since bills have been payed for nearly a year (another employee was paying them)the account cannot be changed to a loan. The company I used to be with still has the computers. I have attempted resolving this with all of Dell's depts to no avail and have sent a letter a month ago to Dell Legal informing that I am disputing this and asked them to investigate and pull any tapes. They have not replied. How do I get out of this?

[turbowray]

Have you contacted the ones with the computers? Since it is a lease, return them so no more is added to the bill!!

[gglass4u]

i've already asked dell if the computers can be returned. they say that they cannot be returned w/out paying more than 8 grand for breaking the lease. the equipment was first valued at 6 grand.

[Mr. Knowitall]

Have you tried to get the company to pay its obligation, or have you been working only with Dell so far?

[gglass4u]

i have contacted the company, but the president agrees that when the contract was first set up it was supposed to be a loan and i was not to be on the account other than as a contact. i've contacted dell and explained all this to them, as well as the president of the company. dell still refuses to budge. i've called up their resolution dept. a number of times and with various managers requesting that the account be placed on immediate hold pending an investigation by them on the validity and accuracy of the contract they have on record. i have requested that they pull the tapes of when the contract first was set up and they stated that they are not able to do so and only the legal dept could do so. i've sent a letter to the legal dept (the only way apparantly to reach them) and they have so far refused to reply. meanwhile, the account is beginning to hit my credit as dell reports it as becoming further into delinquency.

[Mr. Knowitall]

I think they're being unreasonable. Unfortunately, you may have to sue them.

[seniorjudge]

http://forum.freeadvice.com/showthread.php?t=335186

[gglass4u]

i never agreed to any contract. i never signed anything or agreed to anything on the account. i didn't even know that i was on the contract until dell recently contacted me. i never even authorized that contract or finalized the account when it was being set up. it was finalized by another person at the company. all i did was start the setting up of it and then just gave them my info as a contact and sent them my credit info so they would know that the company was sound. the company then finalized the contract and the account. when i was first speaking with the dell rep's it was always about a loan and not a lease, and when i asked why they needed my tax info, they stated it was because the company didn't have enough credit history and they just needed to verify that the company had good employees and to confirm a contact person and that the company was not some fly by night job.

[turbowray]

O.K, straight out question, because I have not seen the answer yet, and please only answer the question I ask. What has your old job told you that they are going to do about it? Are they going to pay you since they are the ones with the computers? Have you even tried to get your money from the company you worked with? Please answer these questions, and nothing more.

[gglass4u]

i have spoken w/ the company they have told me the same - the account was not supposed to be in my name and the account was supposed to be as a loan instead of a lease. the head of the company found this information about the contract at the same time that i found out (i told them) and that they are in agreement w/ me that dell has messed up and signed me and the company on for things that were never agreed to. i asked why the company could not know about the contract until now. they stated that the employee who was paying off the monthly bills just paid them off assuming that everything on the contract was correct and never contacted anyone else in the company about it. the company was late on payment one time and that is why dell has contacted me. i told them that they need to pay me the money for the account since it is in my name as personal guarantor (the account is actually in their name) they refuse to do so. i also told them that they then need to pay dell on time or else my credit will be hurt, but since i contacted the company and informed them of the contract and yelled at them for me being on the contract, they have stopped payment because they believe that if they continue making payments before this issue is resolved, then dell will not fix the errors and will keep the contract as is on their records.

i also asked dell if the computers could be returned, they stated that they could be, but i would have to pay an end of lease fee of around $8,000. the equipment was first valued at around $6,000 when the account was first set up!