Questions and answers

No. Hamilton & Merchant is a business debt relief and consulting firm. When a case requires legal work, such as a bankruptcy filing, litigation, or a specific legal claim, we coordinate with licensed attorneys in our partner network and stay engaged with you through the process. We say this up front because a lot of firms in this space blur the line.

Yes. The first call is free and there are no upfront fees. If we engage, the scope and price are provided in writing before any paid work begins.

We negotiate directly. We make the calls, write the counter-offers, and close the agreements. Partners are brought in only for work that requires a license we do not hold, and we stay involved when they are.

No. Bankruptcy is sometimes the right step and often it is not. Negotiation, workout, restructure, and turnaround paths usually come first. We tell you where your situation falls and why, and if a bankruptcy attorney is the right call we introduce one.

The firm is Florida-based, with its office at 25 SE 2nd Avenue in Miami, and it works with businesses across the United States. Most of the work happens by phone, text, video, and email, so location is rarely a barrier.

The firm was established in 2015 as a loan brokerage and moved to business debt relief in 2020, after watching too many of its own clients get crushed by predatory financing during the pandemic. Business debt relief has been the firm's only work since.

Call anyway. We will give you a plain read on the agreement you signed. If it is serving you well, stay with it. If it is not, we can help you think through what to do next.

That is common, and it is part of the conversation we expect to have. Consulting on the operating side is half of what we do. Working on it alongside the debt is usually what makes the recovery last.

A merchant cash advance, or MCA, is a purchase of a portion of a business's future receivables at a discount. The funder wires an advance today and collects a fixed payback amount through daily or weekly debits from the business bank account. Because it is structured as a sale of receivables rather than a loan, it is priced with a factor rate instead of an interest rate and is not regulated like a loan in most states.

Multiply the advance by the factor rate to get the payback amount. A $50,000 advance at a 1.35 factor means $67,500 has to be repaid, so the cost of the money is $17,500. Divide the payback by the number of business days in the term to get the daily debit. On a nine-month term that is about $357 per business day. Our MCA cost calculator does the arithmetic for your own numbers, including the annualized rate.

Often, yes. Funders have workout desks with authority to restructure or accept a reduced lump sum, particularly once a file is in default and the alternative is litigation with an uncertain outcome. How much movement there is depends on the funder, the contract, whether a personal guarantee or confession of judgment was signed, and how early we get involved. We open contact with each funder by name and negotiate the whole stack, not one advance at a time.

The contract usually treats a stopped debit as a default, which can trigger the full payback amount, default fees, a UCC lien on the business's assets, notices to your card processor or customers, and a lawsuit against the business and any personal guarantor. None of that happens in a single day, but the window is short. If a debit is going to bounce, that is the moment to call us, before the default clock starts.

A confession of judgment is a clause in which the borrower agrees in advance that the funder can enter a court judgment without a trial if the account defaults. Florida Statute 55.05 makes powers of attorney to confess judgment absolutely null and void, so one cannot be entered in a Florida court. Since August 2019, New York's CPLR 3218 also bars filing them in New York against debtors who do not live or do business there. A judgment validly entered in another state can still be domesticated, so read the clause with us before assuming it has no teeth.

A reconciliation or true-up clause lets the merchant ask the funder to adjust the daily debit so it matches the agreed percentage of actual receipts when revenue drops. Courts treat the presence and quality of that clause as one of the main signs that an agreement is a real purchase of receivables rather than a disguised loan. Many merchants never use it. If your revenue has fallen, invoking it in writing is often the first move.

Stacking is taking a second, third, or fourth advance while earlier ones are still being repaid, usually to cover the cash the earlier debits are removing. Each new advance adds another daily debit on top of the last. Most MCA contracts prohibit it, and by the third or fourth advance the combined debits often exceed the gross margin of the business.

A UCC-1 financing statement is a public filing that gives a funder a claimed security interest in the business's assets, including receivables and bank deposits. After a default, funders send notices to banks and processors demanding that receivables be paid to them instead, which is what a frozen account or a diverted card batch usually is. Some of these notices overreach, and the response depends on what was actually signed.

Rough numbers are enough: monthly revenue, what each funder or lender pulls and how often, rent, payroll, and anything with a deadline on it such as a notice, a lawsuit, or a bounced debit. If you want a head start, the free diagnostic takes ten minutes and does not ask for an email.

It varies. Stopping the bleeding, such as pausing or reducing daily debits and getting a frozen account released, can move in days. Negotiated settlements and lease restructures usually take weeks. The operating-side work that keeps the relief durable is often a quarter or two of steady effort. We give you a realistic timeline for both at the start.

There are no upfront fees and the first conversation is free. If you engage us, the scope, the fee, and the timeline go in writing before any paid work begins, and there are no surprises after that.

Some paths affect business or personal credit and some do not. A negotiated settlement that is paid as agreed is usually far better for credit than a default and a judgment. We tell you which category each option falls into for your specific situation and whether the trade is worth it for where the business actually is.

Payroll-tax and sales-tax debt are treated as the first priority in any plan we build, because they follow owners personally. Negotiating with the IRS or the Florida Department of Revenue is licensed work, so we bring in a tax professional from our partner network for that part and stay in the room. Our guide to private versus tax debt explains the difference.

Yes. Rent is often the largest fixed cost in a distressed business, and most landlords would rather renegotiate than replace a tenant. We negotiate reductions, deferrals, restructures, and, when it fits, clean exits. Almost every lease has a personal guarantee, so the timing of that conversation matters.

Yes. The fourteen industries on the site are the ones we see most often, but the playbook transfers. If your business owes money and cannot see a clear path, call. If we are not the right fit we will say so and point you somewhere that is.

Yes. What you tell us stays with us. We do not share your information with funders, lenders, or anyone else without your direction, and we never sell it. Our privacy policy sets out the details.