Exposing Faulty Clients
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- BrokenHD
How do you guys and gals deal with faulty freelance clients?
i think I need to put my foot down on a client who hasn't paid for design services rendered over a year ago (!) He has not responded to repeated emails and phonecalls.. and before that it was just excuse after excuse.
He runs a clothing company with someone else. I was thinking of reporting him and his company to the Better Business Bureau.
Are there other suitable (& legal) threat/consequence tactics I can use? Perhaps a sort of high traffic "Client Review" site where i can share my experience with others?
I don't want another designer to fall sucker prey. Not to mention a little well deserved retribution mhmm. How do you deal with these particular slimeballs?
Should I just move on? Its not that much loot, but its more the principle of the thing.
grrrr.
- SeriousFreelancing0
what was the services, and how much did you charge, how much did you not receive?
- BrokenHD0
Services = a bunch of logo ideas and some finished vector art meant for T-shirts.. plus I prepared two technical specification sheets for him. He paid in installments, which I should've never accepted. Final total still owed = around $200. Like i said not that much, which is why I feel he's sucha cheap bastard.
- no, don't feel like a cheap bastard, even if it was $50 is your money man. You earned it and he owes it to you. period.Miguex
- Miguex0
depends on the amount, you might be able to go through small claims court. I had that problem before for something like $800 bucks, and everyone told me to forget it, use it as a lesson and don't repeat the mistake.
I bought the domain name with the first/ last name of my client, and respectfully emailed him and let him know that he had 30 days to pay everything he owned, or I was going to use that web address to publish a blog, that will contain detail descriptions of our practice together during the project and that I was also going to include screengrabs of the emails, where he stated he kept mention he was going to pay me.
No insults, no lies, no exaggerations, just facts, and the next time someone googled his name, this site was going to come up first.
I got a call from him 12 minutes after I hit "sent" on the email.
He straight up insulted me and told me he was going take me to court, and that he decided that not only he was going to pay the amount he owed me, but he was going to spend it on a lawyer to destroy me.I let him finished his rant, and told him I got everything he said on tape. (which I didn't)
He hanged up.
He call me the next day, he apologised and that week I received my money, under the condition that I will never make that site public (which was never made).
I got my money, and will never do business with that guy again.
- lol...damnabettertomorrow
- I pretty much felt like chuck norris after that, I'm going to say..
It was a nightmare though..Miguex - haha, lol @ chuck norrisepigraph
- kingsteven0
"Be nice to people on your way up because you meet them on your way down."
- i had this problem with a t-shirt company, but it was £1500...kingsteven
- did you got the money in the end?Miguex
- about 8 years later i got offered to build another site for one of the guys but at 20k, not 3kingsteven
- also, thinking about it. i've had various dealings with both of them since. it's a business, not a job.kingsteven
- thisfreelancelife0
After 90 days I have my lawyer send a letter, after 120 I file for small claims court. ( You can file yourself )
The thing about a lawyer is that it's cheaper than you think. ( Round $50 per letter ) If the client contacts you it adds to evidence going to court.
Currently I am having issues on the other side, Freelancer who took the money and ran without doing the work. This whole system works backwards as well.
- i've had 2 freelancers take the money and not deliver in the last year.kingsteven
- a designer and a wp hacker,,, we had another couple of jobs lined up for both of them... just don't get it.kingsteven
- worst is i see one of them out occasionally and he either gives me some sob story or runs off.kingsteven
- omg0
Lawyers are expensive. Fists are free
- kingsteven0
I had the misfortune of not being able to pay 5 freelancers last year (when one of the directors' ridiculous speculative pitches didn't come off and he refused to pay). These were people I knew socially, and it ate away at me every day. Eventually I had to split from the company and at the start of this year maxed out my cards paying them back, still in debt but on good terms with everyone (even the director, who emailed me last week bragging about a $10m deal he just made in the states). Anyway, it's never as simple as "Lawyers are expensive. Fists are free"... and some day you'll be the cunt.
- so you're willing to payback the banks, but totally crap on a designer, and you expect violins here?omg
- i think he said he maxed out his cards paying back the designersthisfreelancelife
- no offense, i feel for ya, just still against people who make you work and then not pay you...?omg
- sorry then my mistake. i guess if you personally know each other, then its okay, else fist are still freeomg
- aye man, i was the face of the company, and i'd been introduced to these people though designer friendskingsteven
- so i had to take on personal debt to keep things sweet. my point is don't make any enemies.kingsteven
- oh, and i now have a company with one of said freelancers that's landing really interesting work. so no violins plz.kingsteven
- nah we don't know each other, but I understand your point omg. In my persoanl situation i still dont have a contract I paid the freelancer from my own pocket. Ugh! I could have bought a new TV...or even took my gal on an all inclusive week vacation!thisfreelancelife
- thisfreelancelife0
@kingsteven sorry bout freelancers running off. This is actually my first opportunity hiring a freelancer. Real mistake. I tried to be cool and pay 50% up front, I offered to extend deadline and even pay more.
Just doesn't seem to matter. I could never act like that personally!
- yep, small job, £900 for a Wordpress. It's difficult to build a holding page for a grand so we like to keep a few bedroom coders on the books...kingsteven
- coders on the books...kingsteven
- It was just a temporary thing while they raised capital for a full rebrand. We we're faced with the decisionkingsteven
- to either do it ourselves, or pay someone else (not an option ATM see above).kingsteven
- ended up paying them back, didn't get the contract... all because of this guy.kingsteven
- it doesn't make me feel good that he's obviously feeling really bad for it either. seems to have some personal problems.kingsteven