The reproduced email
To the Ownership and Management Team at Payroll4Free.com,
Several months ago, I made repeated, good-faith attempts to resolve what I believed and verified were serious legal issues regarding your implementation of new fees, your restriction of access to payroll functions that had historically been available to qualifying customers, and your lack of meaningful response to my correspondence. Those efforts were effectively ignored.
At one point, I was fully prepared to pursue legal action and even started those wheels spinning. But then one day, as I was trying to fall asleep, a revelation suddenly came to me, as often happens. After careful consideration, I made a different business decision.
Instead of investing years into litigation, I invested substantial time, resources, and capital into building a payroll platform that I believe surpasses Payroll4Free.com in virtually every meaningful respect.
Allow me to introduce Diversified Payday.
Ironically, your handling of this matter accelerated its development.
I continue to believe your implementation of new fees without what I consider adequate advance notice raises significant legal questions, including potential issues involving consumer-protection laws, deceptive business practices, contractual obligations, and other applicable federal and state laws. I also continue to believe your treatment of existing customers deserves careful review by regulators and the courts where appropriate.
Those are questions that others remain free to pursue.
As for Diversified Company, we have elected to compete instead.
Unlike Payroll4Free.com, our Free Payroll plan is straightforward. It includes up to two active workers, employees and/or contractors, and those customers receive the same core payroll platform available to paying customers. We do not maintain a stripped-down version designed to encourage upgrades.
When employers grow, they can move to our Basic plan. Those needing additional capabilities can choose Employer Bank or Premium Tax Compliance. Every paid plan includes the first five active workers before additional worker pricing applies.
More importantly, we believe customers deserve transparent pricing.
We even created a comparison specifically for employers evaluating Payroll4Free.com against Diversified Payday.
Pricing:
https://diversifiedpayday.com/pricing
Free Payroll:
https://diversifiedpayday.com/free-payroll
Payroll4Free Comparison:
https://diversifiedpayday.com/compare?vs=payroll4free
I refer to us as “competitors” only because we technically occupy the same industry. Beyond that, I will allow prospective customers to compare the products, pricing, transparency, and overall experience for themselves.
If you genuinely believe your customers would be better served by Diversified Payday, you are welcome to refer them. There is no affiliate commission, referral fee, or reward available to Payroll4Free.com. Sometimes simply directing customers to a platform you trust is valuable enough.
And let us not forget that the wolves are banging on the door demanding prey because of what you did to them. Perhaps you throw our steak out to them instead of the current nothing you do, and they eventually forget about you because they have a free or affordable solution from a truly established parent company that has operated since 2007 without a flaw.
You unknowingly gave me something I frequently warn businesses never to give someone determined to compete:
Time.
Time to think.
Time to build.
Time to improve.
Time to launch.
I never waste that gift.
Rather than spending my resources attempting to obtain a judgment against Payroll4Free.com, which, let me assure you, I would not only obtain but would have been able to use to absorb your company in settlement, I spent them creating what is now a proven, substantially better alternative.
Personally, I find that outcome far more satisfying than years of litigation.
Whether Payroll4Free.com succeeds or fails from this point forward will depend on the decisions made by its leadership, not by me. I simply intend to offer employers another option and let the market decide.
Should Payroll4Free.com ever determine that it is time to discontinue operations, I would be interested in purchasing the Payroll4Free.com domain name. My opening offer would be $100. Every negotiation has to begin somewhere.
Funny, Dynadot.com values Payroll4Free.com at $774, which we would definitely never pay, compared with DiversifiedPayday.com at $2,156 so early after our launch.
I guess even domain appraisers see the reality, and so shall you.
Personally, I would recommend a controlled shutdown and an orderly invitation for customers to move to our company. If you continue operating, it is just a matter of when, not if, regulators take action first, and I promise you, that will not be caused by my actions. I have made my intentions clear.
I wish your customers well, regardless of where they ultimately process payroll.
You may have viewed my earlier correspondence as a legal problem.
In retrospect, it became something far more expensive.
It became the catalyst for building another payroll company.