Doing business with a 'friend'

dbnavan

About this time last year a friend of mine who is a journalist, not well known, phoned me up and asked me for help a website. I used to go to school with him, I amnt particually close to him, I designed the website for him, he wasnt happy, I changed it, he still wasnt happy, was phoning me at all hours dfay and night to do this that and the other with it, eventually I said this is gonna start costing you, I was just getting pi##ed off with him at this stage, he said ye sure no problem, He settled on scrapping all designs and wanting a blog style layout.

I did this for him, and sent him a bill for 200 euro which he agreed to over the phone, that included his hosting and his domain and my time, which at this stage including all his phone calls setting up email accounts, getting blog working, and the 2 designs that he decided to change, was nothing.

That was all last November, I phoned him just before christmas and said look I could really use that money now if you have it, he said no hassle the cheque is in the post. It never arrived so after christmas I phoned him again and he says you know what I forgot to send it to you, I will do it ASAP. March the exact same thing.

Then Nothing........ so I was talking to my sister about it online the other day and she googled his site, except up comes another one, recently updated looks like it was done by a school kid.

He now wont reply to phone calls, emails, texts, letters, nothing. OK so people tell me 200 euro is nothing, write it of and put it down to expeirence. But 50 of that is admin fees, which I paid! And its the principal of the thing, to show what a pain in the ar$e this guy was, he phoned me at 10:50pm the week after my son was born to ask could 'we' put a hit counter on the site. He refered to the work on the site all the time as WE as if he was doing it too or it was my site also.

What should I do, solicter is hardly worth it, mutual friend of both of ours said deface it, but that could bring problems for me. site name is hisname.com

Drift

Maybe try calling around to his house. If you just turn up at the front door and say you happened to be passing and you were wondering could you pick up that 200 euro for the website. (Make no mention of its new "redesign".) I reckon one of three things will happen.

1. He'll give the cash to you.
2. He'll say he doesn't owe it to you ... cue raised voices and angriness but at least you'll have got it out in the open and had your say.
3. He'll say he doesn't have that much in the house in which case I would recommmend you cutting a deal with him for whatever you can, because if you go away empty handed you'll never get anything.

mikemac

Is this website just for personal stuff for the journalist (holidays, family pics) or does he use it for work like putting up stories he writes.
If it's for work over his head to his editor and threaten legal action against the company he works for.

An editor will be terrified of getting their reputation damaged unless his works for the Irish Independent which doesn't have a reputation to protect anyway

humanji

Can you not go onto the site, remove all his editing rights, and put up a large message telling everyone that he ripped you off?

m_stan

To be honest, forget about it. It's not worth the effort or the stress. Some people just dont want to pay and nothing you do will change that. Defacing the site won't serve any positive purpose. Just forget about it, put it down to experience, and learn from it. Next time, get any upfront costs paid in advance, get commitments on the number design changes you can take and don't just do whatever you're asked to do without question.

skywalker

humanji wrote:

Can you not go onto the site, remove all his editing rights, and put up a large message telling everyone that he ripped you off?

I was going to suggest something similar.

Or else, if you paid for the hosting, you then presumably have access to the files. At least remove them all. Whether or not you put a message up publicly telling the world what he did is up to you. One text file could be left privately informing him you've had enough.

Out of interest did you pay for the domain registration too? If you did, then hold onto it. That you can sell back to him at a revised price, taking into account the real price of all those late night phone calls.

Its one thing writing off the money, Its another to allow him to continue to use the stuff foc.

Red Alert

Get someone like Intrum Justitia on to him

sturgo

i had a (sort of) similar situation where a family member did some building work for an ex-girlfriend of mine. the work was partially done and she was over charged by at least E500. basically... a very close friend was ripped off by a relative of mine who I had recomended.

basically, i'd keep business favours and friends / family seperate.

Jigsaw

You say you are not particularly close so there is no real friendship there protect. This guy is arsing about and I suggest you come down on him like a ton of bricks.

I'd head round to his house and state calmly but authoritatively that you have heard enough excuses and that you want paid NOW!! If he doesn't pay then further action would be required. Someone has already mentioned the point that he might work under an editor so it could be worth escalating the matter so someone in a position of influence.

If this is not the case, I'd get onto the website and do a whole bunch of damage, or else something really annoying that spoils it, like every day at 10.00am accessing the site and writing yore ma across the front of it. Childish, yes, but people like that must become aware that there are consequences to their actions.

DemonOfTheFall

You set up the site, so the admin rights are probably with your details. Close the site and cancel the domain.

dade

skywalker wrote:

Out of interest did you pay for the domain registration too? If you did, then hold onto it. That you can sell back to him at a revised price, taking into account the real price of all those late night phone calls.

.

was thinking just that, cybersquatting on him. if you have the passwords etc for where its hosted and are listed as the contact for it you can take it down if you want and put a File not found or even redirect it to something less desirable like was done to bertieahern.com before:D

homerjk

Agree with others about taking it down.
If you don't want to appear to be the bad guy as you are friends you can play dumb and say Well when you never gave me the €200 I couldn't pay for the website hosting to continue.
Get the money, put it back up and put it down to experience.

mickoneill30

DemonOfTheFall wrote:

You set up the site, so the admin rights are probably with your details. Close the site and cancel the domain.

Nah don't do that. Keep the domain. Just redirect it to www.google.com. If he wants it back tell him you'll sell it to him for €500

Savman

If you have access to the domain and hosting panel, just make a copy of everything then delete all the files. You could put up a standard non-personal page like "This Website Is Unavailable - Please Contact Billing Dept." or whatever, keep it professional. Rest assured he'd be ringing you pronto.

skywalker

DemonOfTheFall wrote:

You set up the site, so the admin rights are probably with your details. Close the site and cancel the domain.

Nah thats silly (Id imagine he's paid for the domain for a year upfront & possibly hosting a year upfront too), he looses all the power he has by doing that.


Also goes without saying, but change any passwords before you do anything. Even if you dont think he has access, they might be in some papers or something you've given him to do with the website.

dbnavan

Problem with taking it down or just putting contact billing, or admin, is the site I designed he is not using, he is using this other site, the 2 domains are similer in name mine is eg:desmond-surname.com his new one is des-surname.com so he is really gonna be too bothered if it goes to google, or just a blank page

egan007

Point yours at aporn site....
At least some of his customers will see it...
not your money back but satisfaction none the less

dbnavan

egan007 wrote:

Point yours at aporn site....
At least some of his customers will see it...
not your money back but satisfaction none the less

Really thinking about this option, problem is could it damage me in the long run

skywalker

Is this new site still using the same hosting? Is his email or anything ancillary still using the old address.

Id bet dollars to doughnuts if hes using the new address for his email, hes set up a redirect from the old one. You could at least cancel that.


No matter what Id advise ya to hold onto his domain for a while.

egan007

Understand that....

Heres an idea...

Do up a simple page explaining the situation.
Like you did in the original post.
You can name the guy onthe page as long as it's true you are fine..

Start with
'You are probably looking for 'his name''s website well here's the story....'

Then Optomise it so it ranks above his in google
Lots of users here will help you with that

Send him an email - say you will take down the page when your cheque arrives

sorry for all the smilies but he sounds like he deserves it.

AlmightyCushion

egan007 wrote:

Understand that....

Heres an idea...

Do up a simple page explaining the situation.
Like you did in the original post.
You can name the guy onthe page as long as it's true you are fine..

Start with
'You are probably looking for 'his name''s website well here's the story....'

Then Optomise it so it ranks above his in google
Lots of users here will help you with that

Send him an email - say you will take down the page when your cheque arrives

sorry for all the smilies but he sounds like he deserves it.

Very good idea.

is_that_so

A word of warning:It is not advisable to go locking sites , especially if that is your business. You could end up more badly affected by it. I also got stung myself a few years back by something like this, but it was a small enough amount.

I also know of someone who had a similar problem , but he did eventually get paid some of the money. He tried pulling and locking the site but the client just got onto the hosting company and he got locked out himself.

My 2c, take the domain name if you own it , contact the hosting company and tell them you are moving it elsewhere and just park it with another provider until it lapses. Write it off as a bad debt and learn to say ,"I know you are my best friend but before we start here's a contract".

Sleepy

I'd remove the site with a message along the lines of 'account suspended due to non-payment' or something similar.

The guy's clearly taking the piss. You could always try the small claims court?

dbnavan

Heres what i did, <snip>

Smellyirishman

Interesting. Keep us posted.

professore

dbnavan wrote:

Heres what i did, <snip>

He looks like the missing link .....

m_stan

dbnavan wrote:

Heres what i did, <snip>

I think the following is a mistake. Aside from that, while I wouldnt do it myself, I dont think its totally unreasonable.]


this fee will increase by 25 euro, for every week he ignores it.

egan007

dbnavan wrote:

Heres what i did, <snip>

HE HE nice one

skywalker

Not what I would have done personally, but its done now so no going back.

Why can I see the comments section on his official site being taken down fairly soon?

egan007

Stick a Counter onthe site to show him what kind of hits you could of got him,
that will be highly hit....

Plus - Put a link to your own website for advertising you might recoup the money with more work

SimpleSam06

The traditional response is to heave up the oul' goatse and say it got hacked, then charge him two grand to take it down. Honestly, some of these clowns think the internet is like getting your house painted.

Cianos

Adding the increasing fee is OTT in my opinion. You now run the risk of becoming the bad guy. If this gets around the Irish journalistic community (which it easily could because Ireland is such a small place), villain will be known as the guy too scabby to pay a 200 euro fee. If you leave it at that, he has no fallback, nothing to argue against. If you are adding your own counter-fee, which was not agreed to in the first place, it casts a shadow of doubt on your claim.

It probably also makes it less likely that you will get paid imo.

egan007

I agree, ask for the basic you are the good guy etc....
This is the kind of thing that gets into the paper anyway so put your brand up there na dget the free press

Dave!

I'd also take down the increasing fee... He'll never give you the extra money, and you'll look bad.

Just looking at the other site.........
<snip>

Check out the gallery. Poor b*stard.

intheknow

He He...Handsome Devil !!:D

mathew

DaveMcG wrote:

Check out the gallery. Poor b*stard.

If your talking about the posture. He's got cerebral palsy.

No excuse for what he did tho. People that use friends like that, and dont pay up after agreeing really annoy me.

You page isnt appearing on a google search OP.
Heres the registration info of the current site <snip>
Id consider contacting Bernard Corrigan. See what he has to say.

kdouglas

no idea what your original site was like but god damn the new one is ugly...

one thing you'll learn from this is when you do a site for someone, even if they are friends, put in writing exactly what will be done, learned this the hard way myself too...

keep us updated on what happens, im curious to see how this pans out...

DonJose

intheknow wrote:

He He...Handsome Devil !!:D

LOL, that handsome devil is a dad!!!!:eek:

Miguel_Sanchez

For what it's worth I think that it's a bad move doing what you did. It seems petty and unprofessional.

The best thing would have been to just redirect the site to google or put up a simple message that says 'Site Closed'. I think this could reflect worse on you than him in the long run.

seamus

dbnavan, as you had being doing initially, don't mention the name or otherwise post any information by which you could identify this person. Ultimately we have only your word to go on (however much we trust it ).

For the record, I agree with Jeff ^^.
If you plan to do this kind of thing in any kind of business manner, then you went a pretty unprofessional way about removing the hosting. Theoretically, it may also cause you legal problems. You're the service provider. You have the right to suspend the service, not to alter it.
If you were supplying him with a phone service, for example, you'd have a right to suspend the service, with a message to callers saying, "This number has been suspended". Not, "This customer has refused to pay us, so we're going to tell you, the caller, that he's a deadbeat bastard."

Best thing to do is to put up a blankish page - "Service Suspended. The hosting service for this domain has been suspended. If you are the domain owner, please contact xx@xx.com".

Cianos

Jeff_Lebowski wrote:

For what it's worth I think that it's a bad move doing what you did. It seems petty and unprofessional.

The best thing would have been to just redirect the site to google or put up a simple message that says 'Site Closed'. I think this could reflect worse on you than him in the long run.

Not if he goes about it in the right way. If he leaves the +25/week thingy there, then I'd agree with you. But otherwise, he's been screwed over, has given the guy a very long time to pay and has been lied to several times. I dont really see it as petty.

Chucky the tree

dbnavan wrote:

Really thinking about this option, problem is could it damage me in the long run

Lemonparty