It’s nice having this site for sharing stories from my life and times while having Fast Fix Web Design for our WordPress Freelance business because I can post about experiences that I would never post on my business site.
in many ways I’m lucky. Altogether I’ve only had 5 WordPress Clients From Hell. The most recent two are all the result of a single bad decision: working like a sub for one incompetent individual. It’s perhaps a story for another post but we’ve made the decision that Fast Fix Web Design is not going to take on sub-contract work. In just about every case, we end up getting the crumbs while some “UX Designer” gets the $$$$.
Back in September, 2016, a guy for a .org wrote me about updating their website with a new theme, on the cheap, of course. It was a rush job, he said. But about the time I was getting ready to start, a superior in the .org put the kibosh on the project. Now, keep in mind that I’ve already submitted a proposal for a fixed price job. I heard nothing until late November, 2016, when the contract was returned, signed, with a request to get it done fast. I jumped right on it. Right away, I’m getting nitpicked and putting in lots of extra hours. Of course, the contract had a scope creep clause. But I’ve just about decided that scope creep clauses are worthless. It is just better to add the maximum scope creep imaginable into the fixed price bid. I ended up putting in 16 hours beyond the fixed price hours. I billed them for the scope creep. Did I get paid? Nope. ?
But in the course of the job, this guy who was nitpicking me came up with a big opportunity to do the tech work for a site build that he could close for us. And, in fact, the $ looked great. So, like a total twit, I jumped for it. ?. He closed the deal and it required a 50% payment before work began. After a week, no payment. The “reason”. The bookkeeper is on vacation. She’ll take care of it as soon as she gets back.
So I agree to build out the site framework without any specific content. Over the next 3 weeks, the bookkeeper is supposed to have come back and mailed the check. We get past the holidays and it is the first work week of January 2017. I have still not seen a check. I’m told a) that the client has seen the work so they have no incentive to pay. Wha??? the contract required 50% before the work and b) the bookkeeper took a longer vacation but would be back and send the check.
After 10 days, still no check. So I refuse to do any more work. Then the client says that they don’t pay in advance and they only pay net 30 after completion of the job.
I fired both the weasel who had gotten me into these two bad situations and the client! Yeah, no more mister nice guy over at Fast Fix Web Design. No work without the deposit in advance!