Debt collectors. The businesses took the risk when they loaned money or provided some kind of service on credit.
I don’t use debt collectors any more, but I have a construction company and a few times a year people just decide not to pay for their work. If someone really truly refuses to pay I could take them to small claims court, and I have, but it’s a ton of work and lawyers won’t bother with anything under 10k. I’ve literally had a judge say “so petty” about me taking someone through small claims for a $1200 they’d been dodging for years So some jerk can stiff me for $1500 and I have basically no recourse. I’m not talking about some impoverished person who I took advantage of, these are people with nice homes who make a habit of not paying bills. I’ll work with people who are short on cash and honest.
Even though debt collectors are 0/3 in the times I’ve used them, it’s at least something to fire off a final ‘fuck you and your credit’
I had this happen to my Angelfire account in 1997, logged in and I had access to someone else’s crappy website. After that I stuck to Tripod.
Sucked because the hit counter on that page was huge, I was almost ready to take down my “under construction” gif