I live in NC. Must I travel to NY to file a small claim and again to go before a judge on a former client living there? The problems occurred in NC. The amount owed is less than $3000.

You would file where the event happened,

There are some exceptions, where the contract between the two people state where law suits have to take place.

Thanks Chuck but I really need to know the law. Small claims in NC says that it has to be served in the County the person resides in. I'm not sure if that pertains across the country or not.

Normally they are referring to the defenant, as to which court has jurisdiction,

Being served is when and how they receive notice of the law suit.

Remember the KISS rule, to keep it simple, go and file, if the court accepts the case, there will be a hearing, the other party then has the right to object to the jurisdiction at the time they receive the notice.

For example if we have a contract and we signed that contract or some civil action happened in NC, a NY court has no jurisdiction at all, same in all areas, So the event will have to happen in the jurisdiction of the court you are filing in. You could not file in NY for a event that happened in NJ.

And it has to be in the right county, so if happened in county A but you live in county B, you have to file in A since B would not have any jurisdiction over it.

And remember in the end, even if the court rules in your favor, that does not mean they will pay, if they still refuse to pay, you will still have to get an attachment, a garnishment and the such, which doing it out of state gets harder
** I sue people regularly in small claims court

File your suit in NC, served the defendant by certified Mail, if the fail to appear to defend, you will be granted a default judgment.

Most states permit a judgment from another state to be collected in their state.

Thanks Chuck! I think that just may work!;) ;) ;)

If the problems occurred in NC, then they'd be the ones to have jurisdiction and that's where you'd file.