It is a sad day when greed shows itself in such a way. Hate to say….I am siding with BP a bit on this one. They have and are trying to make it right, why the need to get raped themselves? Oh yeah…” Internet advertisements from lawyers boast of the ease with which payments far in excess of actual losses can be obtained”
It was a train wreck and whenever these occur there always seems to be more passengers than there were tickets sold. Not too much sympathy for BP – they were also guilty of cheating by not following rules, regulations and procedures. But it is disappointing to find this high of a level of the claimants’ lack of honesty and integrity – this kind of behavior from the ambulance chasers is never a surprise.
It certainly does look like folks are jumping on teh bandwagon for compensation. They are following Rahm Emanuel’s admonition, “Never let a crisis got to waste”. And, it is but another example of re-distribution of wealth that is rapidly becoming the norm in ths country thanks to our “new age” government.
I feel for BP as many people have taken advantage of the situation. I know folks who received compensation that could had continued to work if they really wanted, today they are well off starting companies that are working directly or contracting for BP. I think BP should get through the hard times and find out who really wasn’t affected and take advantage of their situation. I was affecting losing a company but got back on my own feet honestly.
At the heart of the dispute is BP’s desire to force claimants to engage in something it calls “revenue smoothing,” a kind of “creative accounting” that is anything but objective. As any small business owner knows, revenues are not consistent. Sales are better in some months than others. Frequently, a longtime customer who operates on credit may fall behind on payments, only to catch up a few months later. In other words, business operations are anything but “smooth.” BP, the 4th largest company in the world, has made it known that they do not understand this business 101 concept.
The fact is, during the months of talks that the parties engaged in prior to the settlement, BP did not ask for one form of accounting to be required in lieu of another. While they were well within their rights to negotiate a requirement that accrual accounting be used to calculate claim values, they simply did not. The best legal counsel in the world – $1,000 per hour Manhattan lawyers hired by BP – never brought the point up. BP’s hired gun financial experts with MBA’s and actuarial scientists with PhD’s never broached the subject. Out of those negotiations came a 1,200 page, highly detailed settlement document that dots every “i” and crosses every “t”.
Until last week, BP stood firmly behind the rules laid out in those 1,200 pages. In fact, at the court hearing to finally approve the agreement back in November, BP’s lead counsel, Rick Godfrey, had this to say, ““[a]fter nine months and one day of robust and sometimes heated negotiations where we met 145 times face-to-face, BP believes that this settlement is unlike any other in the history of the United States, and we believe it to be good for our system of justice. BP has no intention of having justice delayed for those with legitimate claims.” The difference today is that BP wishes to be the sole arbiter of exactly what is “legitimate.”
That’s interesting. But what prevented the checkbook signatory from employing the same common sense interpretation? Why should BP have to specify an accounting method? Was it not up to the plaintiff to prove their case each time, with a person in authority signing off that the amount were legitimate??? I can’t imagine that the agreement was that BP owed every dime claimed, with no ability to dispute. They opened their wallets pretty wide, and shouldn’t have to go under because of the criminality of the Louisiana plaintiff.
Typical of the American legal system and its pathetic clients to try to fleece or take advantage of BP
It is a sad day when greed shows itself in such a way. Hate to say….I am siding with BP a bit on this one. They have and are trying to make it right, why the need to get raped themselves? Oh yeah…” Internet advertisements from lawyers boast of the ease with which payments far in excess of actual losses can be obtained”
It was a train wreck and whenever these occur there always seems to be more passengers than there were tickets sold. Not too much sympathy for BP – they were also guilty of cheating by not following rules, regulations and procedures. But it is disappointing to find this high of a level of the claimants’ lack of honesty and integrity – this kind of behavior from the ambulance chasers is never a surprise.
It certainly does look like folks are jumping on teh bandwagon for compensation. They are following Rahm Emanuel’s admonition, “Never let a crisis got to waste”. And, it is but another example of re-distribution of wealth that is rapidly becoming the norm in ths country thanks to our “new age” government.
I feel for BP as many people have taken advantage of the situation. I know folks who received compensation that could had continued to work if they really wanted, today they are well off starting companies that are working directly or contracting for BP. I think BP should get through the hard times and find out who really wasn’t affected and take advantage of their situation. I was affecting losing a company but got back on my own feet honestly.
At the heart of the dispute is BP’s desire to force claimants to engage in something it calls “revenue smoothing,” a kind of “creative accounting” that is anything but objective. As any small business owner knows, revenues are not consistent. Sales are better in some months than others. Frequently, a longtime customer who operates on credit may fall behind on payments, only to catch up a few months later. In other words, business operations are anything but “smooth.” BP, the 4th largest company in the world, has made it known that they do not understand this business 101 concept.
The fact is, during the months of talks that the parties engaged in prior to the settlement, BP did not ask for one form of accounting to be required in lieu of another. While they were well within their rights to negotiate a requirement that accrual accounting be used to calculate claim values, they simply did not. The best legal counsel in the world – $1,000 per hour Manhattan lawyers hired by BP – never brought the point up. BP’s hired gun financial experts with MBA’s and actuarial scientists with PhD’s never broached the subject. Out of those negotiations came a 1,200 page, highly detailed settlement document that dots every “i” and crosses every “t”.
Until last week, BP stood firmly behind the rules laid out in those 1,200 pages. In fact, at the court hearing to finally approve the agreement back in November, BP’s lead counsel, Rick Godfrey, had this to say, ““[a]fter nine months and one day of robust and sometimes heated negotiations where we met 145 times face-to-face, BP believes that this settlement is unlike any other in the history of the United States, and we believe it to be good for our system of justice. BP has no intention of having justice delayed for those with legitimate claims.” The difference today is that BP wishes to be the sole arbiter of exactly what is “legitimate.”
That’s interesting. But what prevented the checkbook signatory from employing the same common sense interpretation? Why should BP have to specify an accounting method? Was it not up to the plaintiff to prove their case each time, with a person in authority signing off that the amount were legitimate??? I can’t imagine that the agreement was that BP owed every dime claimed, with no ability to dispute. They opened their wallets pretty wide, and shouldn’t have to go under because of the criminality of the Louisiana plaintiff.