Web Design Fraud

SwissConvo

I NEED HELP AND ADVICE!!

Well basically i have three business's (Id prefer not to mention the 3 business's) but basically the recession hit all three of them. I was losing more and more money each day. It was heart breaking to see all three, which i had put my life and soul into, just become a weak business not able to cover the cost of bills. I tried everything but nothing seemed to be working, the stress was building and i was running out of ideas when i was told about web sites, now im not one for technology, i wouldn't know anything if I'm being honest. So i got onto web designers, i came across this company of where i wont mention on this.

He talked me through web design and what he was going to create for me and how it is going to change my business's back into trading successful. He told me how web sites work and how the future is going to be all about web sites and ordering from it. So as ya do, i went along with it, he appeared to know what he was talking about. So he began to build the three websites for me, the communication throughout the process was terrine, they would say they would have so much done by week 2 but that would turn into week 4 or even week 6, now we had set a deadline, but it got pushed back and back and back.

Il just skip ahead and basically tell you why im writing this, i paid 35,000 and well iv got 3 unfinished websites and 3 stores closed due to them not making money. The websites were never done properly, he and his team took so long that i just couldn't keep them open as i was losing so much money.

What i want to know is..
Are these websites mine or his?
Are they worth money?
Can i get back some money from him?
Can i sell them?

Im disgusted with the company. Bare in mind, our first meeting was around October 2011 and i had to close the three shops January 2013.. so in that time frame the company failed. Who needs that much time to create the websites?

He took my money and what he done with it i honestly don't know.

As iv said before i know very little about web design and technology so im not sure how to go about this? If people could get back to me , id be very thank full!

Trojan

I'm sorry to hear that the business failed, that's always disappointing to hear. I hope something was salvageable that you can rebuild with.

Did you sign a contract with the provider? What does the contract specify in terms of (1) their deliverables to you, and (2) costs? Any terms in relation to copyright and IP ownership?

When you say 3 websites, was it one site for each of your existing businesses? Are your businesses retail outlets, and the sites ecommerce-enabled?

Just a reminder: don't mention the name of the provider here as you've mentioned fraud.

a fat guy

A solicitor would probably be able to make more sense out of this I think...

At the very least, a solicitors letter might kick the guy in the arse.

As for the time they took to make, that depends entirely on what they were meant to do.

If we're talking about a few static pages that don't actually do anything, then he's absolutely taking the piss.

If we're talking about something like Donedeal, then maybe (There are three of them and I'm assuming he's not using a CMS)? I'm not actually that experienced outside of college, so bear that in mind if you take my opinion on board.

It does sound shaky though.

Cuddlesworth

SwissConvo wrote: »

What i want to know is..
1.Are these websites mine or his?
2.Are they worth money?
3.Can i get back some money from him?
4.Can i sell them?

1.Depends on the contract.
2.Without getting into specifics of the actual sites, its doubtful they are worth a penny to anybody but you.
3.Lawyer up for that one.
4.See point 2

Sorry to hear about your trouble, but the best thing you can do at the moment is to take legal advise to see if you can recover money or sue for damages.

Fussgangerzone

What Cuddlesworth said.

Additionally:
What's the time difference between when you paid them, and presumably, work was supposed to start, and now?

In terms of delivery, what do you have?
How much of a website do you have in each of the 3 cases?
What exactly made them unusable?

On a side-note, this guy sounds like a conman to my ears. He was promising things there was no way he could guarantee. I can't imagine a judge giving him much sympathy, but at a same time he might have his arse covered, legally speaking.

Oh and I'd be demanding the money back if it's as bad as it sounds. Don't even think about accepting the sites off him now. They're not likely to be worth anything, even to you.

Mister Man

I'm hoping you have a contract with this guy/company? If not, you'll probably never see anything from that guy again.
To answer your questions, to the best of my knowledge:

1. Depending on the contract (If you have one) - I'd recommend arranging a meeting with a solicitor.
2. The websites may be worth money. Most likely not worth €35,000 altogether. It really depends on what the three websites are exactly. As said, if it's a static website (standard HTML/CSS) it's not worth much, if anything. If it's something more complex, it may be worth a few quid.
3. Without a contract, probably not. With a contract, and a good lawyer, you might have a decent case for getting it all back. Also worth arranging a meeting with a lawyer and seeing if it is possible.
4. If the websites are yours according to the contract, then yes. I'd imagine it's quite tailored around you're closed businesses however. I'd see that as a problem for selling it, as the design was probably made to fit your color scheme, needs, etc. Consult a good website Design company and see if you can meet up with someone. They may be able to tell you if it's marketable or not. He might also be able to tell you where to attempt to sell them. Don't go into selling it, if you're expecting your money back though. They may be worthless altogether.

OP - Is it possible to see the websites he's given you? Or are they still incomplete/un-viewable to public?

SwissConvo

Thanks to everybody for your reply.

The 3 websites, would be on similar lines to clothes shops, it had that idea of viewing products and buying them through the website.. Basically thats the 3 websites in a nut shell.

Im not sure if they were HTML or CSS? Like i said i know very little about all this, i pretty much dived into it because i was desperate to keep my business alive.

I have thought about a lawyer but i just wanted to get other opinions first because i could be fighting a losing battle here..he's the type of man that would have little tricks and ways to talk his way out of anything.

i have all the http:// address to search for each website but when i do they are not found. They use to be but he has obviously turned them off, but i dont seem to have any access to them now?

I have emailed and everything kept from this company!

uck51js9zml2yt

did you have a contract.?
did you pay up front or was it a deposit with the balance on completion?

Trojan

Just to play devils advocate, here's a real situation I was in a couple years back.

I spoke to a prospective client with a really messy site, awful design, it needed serious rescuing. They told me the web designer wasn't great, and with the evidence before me, boy did I have to agree.

A few months later, I ran into another one of his former clients with a really similar story - designer had been too busy to do a proper job, he was half-hearted, sloppy design work, site was barely functional. The site was all over the place. Oh man, clearly this guy sucked.

I eventually did some work with both companies and my view on that designer turned around 180 quicker than you can blink. Both clients were difficult in the extreme. They were flighty and indecisive, changing their minds on issues regularly. They didn't want to invest financially in the site - leading to those awkward "I'm ready to proceed with phase 4 just as soon as you get a chance to process the previous 3 invoices" type calls. And just as importantly as financial investment, or possibly even more importantly, they were not willing to commit any of their own time to strategic planning or content production.

I now sympathise 100% with that designer and the situation he ended up in, trying to develop those sites with almost no support from the clients - it's a wonder the sites ever went live in the first place!

The Oatmeal captures this kind of situation wonderfully:



--

Back to the scenario here - it is a completely different scenario from mine and The Oatmeal's, let me be clear: I am not implying that the OP here didn't commit to the site like the guys in my story - I'm just saying that what it looks like on the surface isn't always the way it turns out.

There's a good chance the designer in this case took the OP for a ride, but even that's really not a sure thing based on the info we have so far. €10k for an ecommerce site is not unreasonable, no matter what the part-timer and low-ballers tell you. In fact I'd suggest it's probably too low. With economies of scale, €35k for 3 different ecommerce sites built on the same tech sounds reasonable, particularly if it's something like 3 Magento builds with the same base template with custom design tweaks, identical payment processing setup.

If I was advising a client on a quote similar to this, that pricing sounds like they're charging a reasonable amount of money, and importantly, they charging enough to do the job right. (1) Did they do the job right? (2) If not, why not? And, (3), can anything be rescued from the situation?

SwissConvo

Yes there was a contract signed! The money was handed over in cheque in stages!

I see your point in that story but this designer was an idiot to say the least. He tried to think he was professional but he couldn't even turn up to meetings. Looking back now I feel so stupid to have took such a gamble!

When I had a look at the sites before they went live there was so much more work to be done, you could say the basic was done but he had said there would be so much done by this date but like iv said it was pushed back and back.

The whole deal was around 60,000-70,000 .. He had only got 35,000 to date.

The websites now I cannot see to find them at all when I type in the http: address I use to use.

peejay1986

Can you see if you (or the designer) even own the domain you were supposed to have the site on?

http://whois.domaintools.com/

Type your web address in there and see who's details come up.

It might be a situation that the designer has let the domain expire and therefore you can't see the sites anymore. That could explain that part. The rest is just very bad luck on your part.

The fact that the projects were due to reach €60-70k sound expensive but then again, neither I nor anyone else here can tell if you were overcharged since we don't know what the sites involved. But in a crazy way, that part is irrelevant now.

Having a contract should help massively, as long as they're proper. A lawyer should be able to proceed with legal action and HOPEFULLY recover some of your losses. Sickens me that there's people out there who can/would do this.

jmcc

SwissConvo wrote: »

The websites now I cannot see to find them at all when I type in the http: address I use to use.

When did the websites stop being visible? The hosting may have expired or the web dev might have pulled them. If they are Irish hosted sites, I may have some details of where they were hosted and IPs. I also run a full com/net/org/biz/info/mobi/asia website > IP mapping project so they might have shown up in that.

Regards...jmcc