Part 2: Should I warn DNF Members about bad business, or keep quiet?

[JuniperPark]

I'm not sure why the original thread was closed, but it says to start a new thread, so here it is.

The person in question has read my thread and decided to start communicating with me. He says he had a problem completing a task of the job that was not asked for, not wanted, and was never discussed. I find it odd that a project is weeks late over a specific problem, yet requests for a status report go completely ignored rather than saying "I'm stuck on the ______". That defies common sense to me.

He told me he has a good reputation here, then asked me to close the thread. I have a BIG problem with that - of course you have a good reputation if nobody throws a flag when you fail to do your job. Hopefully there is no connection here, but DCG closed my thread shortly after.

The latest is that I've asked him if he wants to complete the job and we forget about this, or not. We'll see.

If he does not want to resolve this, I have decided based on the comments posted that I WILL let you know who this was.

Original thread:
http://www.dnforum.com/showthread.php?t=197762&goto=newpost

 

[Luc]

Dale,

Your blackmail tactics are despicable.

If you would like to report a bad experience with me, just do it.

The project was to make a bulk Overture BID checker. I have told Dale in my FIRST e-mail that I am NOT sure if I can pull it off due to the complexity of extracting letters/numbers from the security graphic. This is why I did not want him to pay until after the job is done, I was not sure if I could do it in the first place.

Anyone who ever checked Overture bids knows that there is a graphic security box you have to go through before you can get the results.

I was unable to get around that. Dale said that I should just make it open a bunch of IE windows so he can type in the code directly, but that doesn't work for very different reasons (would require a packet sniffer to intercept IE data coming back from Overture).

I have apologized many times for the delay. I have NEVER given a set time frame (said it will be about 2 weeks) because I didn't feel the project was a high priority and because of the complexity. My communication was horrible, and I have also apologized for that. There is no excuse for the lack of updates, that is completely my fault.

Money never changed hands. I have put in at least 8 hours of my time into this and it is a total loss for me.

What disappoints me the most is your approach in publicly bringing this to the forum. I have no problem with you posting "Hey, I had a bad experience with Luc L." but the approach you chose was very unethical.

I will never do business with you Dale and I advise everyone reading this to avoid dealing with you as well.

Luc L.

PS: For the record, I never asked you to close the thread because of my "repuation" here. My exact words were: "I'd appreciate it if you locked the thread concerning this. I have apologized for the inconvenience several times. No money changed hands and there was never a 100% guarantee on work completion (this was as I mentioned due to the complexity involved in bypassing the image verfication). Poor communication on my part lead to this and I apologize."

 

[JuniperPark]

So.... Luc has decided to ruin his reputation rather than actually do the job he was hired to do. That, in itself, is quite interesting.

I'm now accused of "blackmail". If hiring someone to do a job, then having them not only not do the job but IGNORE requests for a status, then sure, I'm a 'blackmailer'. As is every single employer and project manager in the world.

Luc, you didn't apologize for anything until after ignoring my emails I sent you a PM here telling you that I can see you're online every day and asking why my emails were ignored. I guess seeing that you're on the forums every day made you realize a lot of the excuses wouldn't cut it -- it's hard to say you're too busy to answer an email when you are crusing the forums and even posting appraisals, for crying out loud!

Let's see... the next apology didn't come in response to any of my otehr emails where I kept trying to give you another chance -- those you completely ignored. No, you waiting until this thread was posted before you realized that completely ignoring a customer on DNF might be a stupid idea after all.

Then comes the bogus excuse about a problem creating an 'image reader' -- something never asked for, not required, never discussed, and NOT WANTED.

According to your previous communications, you never put a minute into this project, and twice you were going to 'start tomorrow'... now that has changed to 8 hours? Interesting.

Another new twist you've added this morning: My original design "...doesn't work". So why did you accept the job and quote me a price and a timeline if it wouldn't work? The answer is obvious... you're making this up as you go along. Packet sniffer? That's funny, your DRT product does this with several windows without a problem.

So, here's the bottom line: I laid out the project in detail, you quoted a price and a timeline, I accepted, you failed to do the job, you ignored all communications (until you realized that would come back to haunt you), now you call ME a "blackmailer" and advise people not to do business with me.

Nice Luc. Great guy. So glad I hired and trusted you. Good luck at iReit

 

[Luc]

If you can show me a way to scan your 11,000 domain keyword bids with just your web browser quickly, efficiently and without being banned and without an image reader, and output the bid,keyword,etc data into a CSV (which is exactly what you describe) I will give you the $550 I quoted for the project.

Any programmer who looks at this will tell you what I've been telling you since the first e-mail, it cannot be done without an image reader.

Good luck to you too.

 

[Andrew Shaw]

Perhaps this should be settled privately.

I for one can say that I've had very many dealings with Luc, and have never recieved a late payment, nor has a transaction ever gone sour. Perhaps Luc put more on his plate then he could handle but from what I understand, no funds were exchanged.

I hope you two can settle this in a professional way, as you are both highly respected around here and many people do look up to you.

Andrew

 

[JuniperPark]

Luc -

Again: complaining that you don't understand the original specifications weeks after the project was to be COMPLETED and no problems reported during the project suggests you're just making things up after the fact.

Not to mention it's silly to suggest it can't be done when DRT already does 90% of it, except looking for a prompt in HTML.

Perhaps this should be settled privately.

I for one can say that I've had very many dealings with Luc, and have never recieved a late payment, nor has a transaction ever gone sour. Perhaps Luc put more on his plate then he could handle but from what I understand, no funds were exchanged.

I hope you two can settle this in a professional way, as you are both highly respected around here and many people do look up to you.

Andrew

Andrew --

Up until his post a couple of hours ago I was trying to deal with Luc privately and I thought he was going to actually complete the project and this would have all gone away.

Luc could have backed out of the project at any time without hard feelings -- he chose to ignore my emails and lead me on.

It was Luc who chose to out himself rather the work this out. I would have thought he would have taken the high road, but he chose not to.