What can I do about not getting paid?

I was babysitting for this woman for a while and they ended up moving, so we made plans to meet up so she could give me the money she owed me. I can't remember why, but we ended up not being able to meet so she said she would send me a money order. It's been a little over two weeks and I haven't gotten it yet, so I've been blowing up her phone. She refuses to reply or call me about it even though I can see that she read the message (thank you iphones!). She paid me under the table, so I'm not entirely sure what I can do at this point. She owes me a little over $400.

Since this is a high amount you might need to take her to small claims court.

Depending how old you are you can type up a bill (make sure it look professional, use a program like Microsoft Publisher) & mail it to her. Put a due date on it & get it certified.

If she hasn't paid by the due date, contact a lawyer.

You can't prove that she owes you anything. If you keep "blowing up her phone" she could attempt to press charges for harassment. Consider it a lesson learned.

Keep bugging her! Drive over to her new place and ask for your money.

Just because you're 19 doesn't mean you can't involve your parents, especially if you still live at home. What do they have to say about this?

Regardless, the problem you have is that this NEVER should have gone on so long (unless you were getting signed receipts from her every time you showed up without getting paid. That's different).

But assuming you didn't, you'd have a real problem getting this money through small claims. She may be a dirtbag and dishonest, but courts don't care about character. They care about what can be proven. Even if you kept a calendar and kept a list of the dates you babysat, anyone who would do this to you is very capable of denying as many as she wants. Now what?

The only way you can prove she's lying is by finding witnesses who for some reason happen to remember that on July 18 they were with her. That would be a nightmare to try and track down.

By the time you're done with court costs, and the time involved, this won't be worth pursuing. You can threaten small claims court, but if she's halfway intelligent, she'll know you can't prove most of this.

You have to go to court and ask what form you need to fill out when someone owes money for labor work. She needs to pay you but she is not going to until you take her to court. Maybe if she gets served by the court she will decide to call you and pay you or she will ignore it but has to show up on court or she can get arrested. So stop calling her and go to court ask for the case to be presented legally. Also if you have evidence in your phone call log of all the times you have called her left her messages voicemail or emails, keep it all for evidence so you can win the case. You don't need a lawyer you can do it yourself. Show her unanswered phone calls and everything you have. If you don't have any evidence at all then you can't do anything about it. Next time do a contract signed by parent to pay such amount by such date, this is a huge evidence in court.