Perks Coffee (1781 Upper Water Street) next to the Halifax ferry terminal was closed abruptly Tuesday afternoon when a bailiff from the sheriff’s department showed up unexpectedly with an eviction order, says Perks owner Marshia Inkpen.
Inkpen says she has never been late with the rent, and mailed off October’s rent cheque as usual. She claims she wasn’t notified until Friday afternoon that the cheque hadn’t been received, so Monday sent an employee to the bank, stopped payment on the initial cheque and wrote another, then called landlord Michel Lindthaler to notify him a replacement was available. Then the bailiff showed up.
As Inkpen tells it, the dispute reflects a personal conflict between herself and Lindthaler, from whom she bought the business 10 years ago. “I laid off a good friend of his, who was my head chef in the kitchen.”
Inkpen says this morning she will ask a judge to quash the eviction with an injunction order.
Lindthaler has not yet been available for comment.
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This article appears in Oct 22-28, 2009.
I never had any problems with PERKS. But why were they paying by cheque? Why not just do all the payments online like everyone else does and avoid such problems like this?
Why? Because invoicing/paying bills for a business (especially one large enough to have multiple locations) is a little more complicated than keeping track of your apartments rent and utililities. Their bookeeper could probably spend all day paying shit online, not the best of use of that resource, especially if you’re paying them by the hour.
This all sounds childish to me. Bailiffs moved pretty quick, don’t you think? Perhaps too quick?
My neighbor of last year went 5 months late with rent before the sheriffs department got involved. That’s when I found out my landlord had to pay near 300 dollars for them to show up and “provide their services”. These guys showed up so fast cuz someone payed enough for it to be their problem. Otherwise they would be spending their time with the real danger involved in their job which is court appointment and prisoner movement. Coffee shop owner or tenant doesn’t really compare to that now does it. Someone paid for that. What does spite cost these days I wonder?
Whether they mailed the cheque or not, whether it got lost in the mail or not, there is one glaring issue that should be pointed out. Marshia Inkpen said she wasn’t notified until friday (the 23rd of the month) that rent was not received. Rent is usually due at the beginning of the month, the first. How did it escape notice that the cheque had not been cashed for three weeks? Also, I am pretty sure you must be at least a month late(i.e. into novmeber) before any action can be taken in the form of eviction. Which would lead me to believe that Marshia Inkpen was more than a month behind on rent. I am interested in hearing more details about this, and I firmly believe there is more going on than a simple case of Michel Lindthaler having a grudge because of a fired friend.
If Perks has to move from that location I will actually cry. It’s not that I love their coffee so much or that their service is anything to write home about. I’ve spent an awful lot of time there over the years despite those things and thus have a lot of memories of that place. It would be the end of an era 🙁
Perhaps it will be good to get Perks out, and replace it with an Uncommon Grounds or Just Us! franchise. You can never have too much fair trade coffee.
I believe Perks sells FAIR TRADE coffee. Perhaps people should know what they’re writing about before they write. I could say that you are an idiot, but I wouldn’t until I knew for sure.
carrying a fair trade option is not the same as being a fair trade organization. Why on earth wouldn´t you rather support, small, local businesses that are actively involved in communty development? Saying Perks is fine because it has fair trade coffee, is like saying Walmart is fine because not all of their clothing comes from sweatshops. And I know for sure that you´re an idiot
Can’t wait to see this one play out…
Perks is a small local business.
Who the heck are you to judge it’s community involvement ?
I hate that they serve their coffee in styrofoam cups and then offer some lame justification about it actually being good for the environment. It’s a great location for a cafe, hopefully, we’ll see a less mediocre business take over the space.
Heard that Subway was interested in moving into the space if it became available. That would be the Subway that was already moved because of demo work.
Jai
Read this
http://www.dartcontainer.com/web/environ.n…
Educate yourself
Lol. Paying rent online. LOL
@vividangel———–
Do u like Tim Horton Coffee?
@ Jimmy Bean, no I do not like Tim Hortons coffee, and I don’t like Perk’s Coffee either, all they serve is mother parkers coffee, it’s gross. I like second cup and starbucks myself.
@vividangel———
You should educate yourself before making “STATEMENTS”. You would rather support the Americans by purchasing Starbucks and Second Cup. Send your money abroad and pay salaries to an American Head Office. Way to support the LOCAL economy.
If you did educate yourself you would be aware that Perks , a Halifax Based Independantly Owned Company, does sell Fair Trade Organic coffee and also supports a LOCAL NS roaster. Yes they do use some Mother Parkers Coffee, A CANADIAN COMPANY.
Mother Parkers roast the Tim Horton blend as well. With all the canadians in this world supporting this canadian chain, I am sure MP coffee cannot be all that bad :)Last I heard they also did the MacDonalds Coffee.
Dont get me wrong, I have been to Star and Second and the do have some nice coffee but when I have the chance I would support someone local. In Dartmouth I find it so easy to pull up to the East Side Marios Entrance to MicMac mall, run in and grab a cup of Pirates Brew on my way to work. Which is one of the blends raosted by that local roaster. Much faster the any drive thru.
Let’s have a lesson in the banking process, shall we? When a cheque is cashed, it may take three weeks for the business to actually notice if the payment has been made or not. Depending on the way they keep their books and if they have access to internet banking (which, by the way people, is not free to businesses. The services on average run about 25 to 40 dollars a month for business internet banking, on top of the other fees they pay). So, if they go with the regular statement, they wont receive anything for at least two weeks, depending on the statement period, and that depends when they issued the cheque, when it was actually cashed, etc. Then it falls into the landlord’s lap. I’ve talked to landlords who don’t even check to see whose rent they have until they get the cheques deposited images they get in their statements. It’s perfectly reasonable for it to go unnoticed for three weeks. I also buy the personal vendetta story. If he paid for the sheriff to come that quickly, and given that the eviction is tenuous (especially considering if the business can provide the books to back it up), it seems like a logical explanation.
Please not Uncommon Grounds. The branch across the street from Perks has the most lackadaisical, sullen, and uninvolved staff I’ve ever encountered. I liked their sandwiches, but they frequently ran (run?) out before 2. I asked the guy at the counter if he kept track of the number of customers who left because there was no food. He shrugged. I haven’t been back.
Yeah, that sounds like the responsibility of a minimum-wage employee! You sure showed him!
If anyone actually knows Marsha Inkmen or anything about the way she runs or used to run her company they would all agree that she is a despicable person. She fired her head chef without cause. He worked there for 20 years. She sent a uniformed cop to his door on thanksgiving weekend after he finished his shift and served him with his walking papers. She then called all her staff and tried to get them to file a sexual harassment suit against him. One employee agreed to sign the letter stating that the chef sexually assaulted her and there was another that was a witness. The date listed on the letter that the incident occurred, the chef was visiting his son in Vancouver.
Marsha Inkmen’s actions and morals are despicable. She got exactly what she deserved. No one deserves to be treated that way, the chef has been volunteering in the community for 30 years selling 50/50 tickets at local junior hockey games. He opened his house to many young hockey players as a billet. This man deserves more than that, he should be thanked and compensated for his efforts not dragged through the mud. She should be ashamed of herself.
The landlord was not in the wrong, the courts made the right decisions and she got what she deserved.