Community Expert

Question

Nightmare Clients and Client Horror Stories

Forum|Forum|9 years ago
August 17, 2016
14 replies
7154 views

"Make it... pop."

"I don't know what I want, but I'll know it when I see it."

"Scan my high-res GIF logo."

"Thank you for the idea. My nephew has Photoshop, and he'll take it from here."

Share your client horror stories, so we can all laugh... or cry... with you.

This topic has been closed for replies.

Peru Bob

Community Expert

I came across this site:

Clients From Hell

Benjamin Root

Legend

Pariah Burke wrote:
"I don't know what I want, but I'll know it when I see it."

Yes!

And "Thanks! I have a professional camera and think I'll just take the pictures myself."

Last but not least, the infamous, "Those are nice pictures! You must have a great camera!" and it's variations, which every photographer will hear at least once in their lifetime.

gener7

Community Expert

An oldie:

Reporter to Concert Violinist: "I like your performance, you have an excellent violin."

Violinist: "Thank you, I like your articles, you must have a great typewriter".

Benjamin Root

Legend

Ah, that meal was delicious! You must use the finest cookware!

CJWilkes

Inspiring

Part of the reason I choose not to shoot weddings anymore:

I don't like my (body part)

My bridesmaid was just in an accident and has a huge gash that needs to be gone

My (relative) does not like a body part

We don't want any kissing images

I want to look my very best

Can you take care of blemishes?

Oh, BTW, we do not want any photoshopping done at all!

Nancy OShea

Community Expert

OK. I'm about ready to nominate my husband for worst client of the year. I programmed a new web site for him. It's a complex site that relies heavily on both server-side and client-side scripts for layout and content delivery.

DAY 1:

Hubby: "it's too slow, nothing is loading for me, what's up with that?"

Me: Everything loads lightening fast for me. I'm on the same network. Metrics show the site loads in 1.3 seconds and it gets very high marks on Google's Page Speed Insights & other optimization tests.

The Problem: He has a NO SCRIPTS browser addon that disables JavaScript.

Me: "You should disable that addon while you're on the site. If you don't, a lot of stuff won't look or work right."

Hubby: "Oh, OK. I turned off NOSCRIPTS and it's all working now."

DAY 2:

Hubby: "I can't get the downloads to work for me!"

Me: "Will you please turn off that wretched NOSCRIPTS addon?"

Hubby: "Oh, OK. I can get them now."

DAY 3:

Hubby: "Something's not right. The slideshow doesn't move and my browser's spinner just keeps spinning & spinning."

Me: "Will you please turn off that wretched NOSCRIPTS addon?"

Hubby: "Oh, OK. It works now. "

DAY 4:

Hubby: "Why is the layout so uneven? There's too much white space, you need to do something about that."

Me: "Will you please turn off that wretched NOSCRIPTS addon?"

Hubby: "Oh, OK. It works now."

I could go on & on but you get the picture .

Nancy O.

Nancy O'Shea— Product User & Community Expert

CJWilkes

Inspiring

Oh no hahahaha

sharp_hands16B8

Community Expert

I've been on the same project for two months. Almost every day I have to have a check in call with the client. But the stakeholders are spread globally. So for nearly two months, almost every night except weekends I have calls in the middle of the night with Australia, and first thing in the morning with South America, and various other times with Nashville and also India. I haven't slept more than 4 hours straight in months.

Why? Because they want to collaborate.

War Unicorn

Community Expert

All these stories cheered me up and made me a sad panda at the same time.

The only time I can think of was a time when a client went deadbeat on me. It wasn't a lot of money but I don't think I know of anyone that hasn't run into a deadbeat client.

John T Smith

Community Expert

About a million years ago (computer clock time) back in the days of Microsoft DOS and the Clipper database compiler, I wrote a membership and donation tracking program for a non-profit, in dBase III and compiled to EXE

The finance and membership managers liked the program so much, I cast my program onto the Shareware waters... with a low registration fee because this was just a sideline for a program that I had already written, and I had no marketing costs

To encourage registrations, my read me file included an offer for a custom report, if what was wanted was something I could do

Someone from a church wrote me a letter asking for a custom report... when I wrote back that I had no record of payment and registration, the reply I received was that "of course" a church should not have to pay to use my program

My final letter was to ask for written proof that their local electric company and telephone company were providing the free service... I never received another reply from that church

Nancy OShea

Community Expert

LOL . Not that we're bashing churches or anything. I do pro bono when I can. But not when they act entitled.

Nancy O'Shea— Product User & Community Expert

Sockratease

Inspiring

Just finished a website for a bible study group run by an old friend. He gave me a few dozen PDF files and a couple dozen audios of lectures to embed. Pretty straight forward stuff.

The worst part was the incessant effort to convert me! He knows my beliefs will never coincide with his, but he never gives up (so I started trying to convert him to Atheism, just for fun) (that almost worked, but not for long) (persistent little bugger!).

At least I thought that was the worst part! After it was done, he loved the site and said he bought 10 more domain names and wants me to make them all!! I thought that was great!

So I asked him what he wanted on them.

He said he had no idea and wanted me to "just make stuff" for them.

He really had no idea why I couldn't do anything for him so far as creating content for something like that. I am unashamedly ignorant of the material and totally incapable of creating content that would be meaningful.

But he kept insisting that I just find stuff for it.

He linked me to another site that had a bunch of articles and pdf files, then asked me to just post all of those!

I asked if he had permission to use their material on his site, and how I should credit the original source. He replied to just use it uncredited...

Needless to say, I explained about copyright laws and how I really did not want to get involved in a possible legal dispute.

He said that since it was for god, that there was no way anything bad could happen!!

So I told him I would write the site owners who had the material he wanted to steal and ask permission. He insisted I not do that in case they said no...

I hate to turn down work at this early stage of my career, but I had to.

I still find it HYSTERICAL that being untrained and not having a degree or certification, the only web work I can get is from Porn Sites and Churches!

What a resume

try67

Community Expert

I guess he skipped class when they taught Exodus 20:15... You did the right thing, though.

Sockratease

Inspiring

It never ceases to amaze me that clients in general have no idea that you can't just take pictures, videos, and articles from other places and use them freely.

But this guy should have known better - especially after it was explained to him why it's unwise...

But yeah, I did the only thing I could. I'll see if he wants the same content from the other site, just repackaged. Or split the content between sites? Or make a few sub-sites with similarly themed stuff from the main site and keep the main site as a complete library?

There are still ways to get money from him legally!!

Hopefully he'll "See The Light!"

D

DonaldDoss

Participating Frequently

I had to shoot a car lot on September 12, 2001. Yeah, the day after September 11th. Think back to that time. We still thought there might be survivors under the rubble. The sky was silent except for military jets. I had to go shoot.

The client was donating a "portion" of any sale to red cross. Nothing altruistic here. He would only donate if someone bought a car from him. In between takes, he was joking that he wasn't going to say what the portion would be.

Pariah Burke

Author

Community Expert

DonaldDoss wrote:
I had to shoot a car lot on September 12, 2001. Yeah, the day after September 11th. Think back to that time. We still thought there might be survivors under the rubble. The sky was silent except for military jets. I had to go shoot.
The client was donating a "portion" of any sale to red cross. Nothing altruistic here. He would only donate if someone bought a car from him. In between takes, he was joking that he wasn't going to say what the portion would be.

I remember September 12th well. I was teaching a new crop of Adobe Support technicians.

Your client sounds like a real peach.

pziecina

Legend

It's not just clients that can create problems, (in this case for themselves) -

Discussing new ideas for the web site, (designers first time in such meetings, most people normally say as little as possible in such cases).

Designer - Can we not use 3d graphics?

Me - yes, but it takes a lot of time, and images require a 3d viewing device anyway

Stakeholder - How much time?

Me - For images it will take at least 3x longer.

Designer - We will supply the images, in the same time span.

Designer - What about 3d animations?

Me - We could use WebGL 3d, but there are no tools so everything will have to be done by hand, (JavaScript).

Stakeholder - Do these require a specific viewing device?

Me - No, it can work in all modern browsers, and modern mobile devices.

Stakeholder - Can we have a demo of images and animations using 'xyz' by the end of the week, (it's Thursday am)?

Me - No, I'll need at least 3-4 weeks.

Designer - My department can do it.

After meeting -

Designer - What was that you said to use, and how does it work?

It's now 3 months later, and I am still waiting for the designer to supply even the 1st image, let alone the WebGL 3D animation. Last I heard he was looking for a new employer.

try67

Community Expert

That reminds me of another annoying habit some clients have... Namely, asking you to create a "demo" (for free, of course), so they can decide whether or not they are interested in the project. What they don't usually understand, though, is that it takes as much effort and time to develop a demo as it does the full thing. You sometimes even need to work more on a demo version, because it's basically a full version of the project that's been limited on purpose.

Nancy OShea

Community Expert

Client: My new website doesn't look right. Fix it!

Me: It looks fine to me, what's wrong with it?

Client: You must be kidding. Everything is messed up. You've got to fix it!

I sent some screenshots to prove the site looked fine at my end. It turned out the client was using an inferior web browser (IE7 in Compatiblity Mode) and their Zoom settings were cranked up to 400%. Palm to forehead

Nancy O.

Nancy O'Shea— Product User & Community Expert

try67

Community Expert

From today...

Client: Can you fix these two calculation scripts for me for $X?

Me: Sure, send me the file and I'll have a look at it.

Client sends file... It's a mess.

Me: Listen, you have a lot of problems in your file. I can fix it all for you for X+(a very small amount), to make sure it all works as it should.

Client: No, that's OK, just do what I asked for the original amount.

Me: OK, but it might not work correctly because of the other issues.

Client: OK. Just do what I asked for.

I send back the edited files...

Client: What is this? There are error messages and it's not working correctly!

Me: Yes, I know. I told you that's what would happen if the other issues are not fixed, but you didn't want to do it for the additional cost, so now it's your problem.

Client: You stole from me! You didn't do anything!

Me: No, I did exactly what I said I will do and I warned you in advance what the results might be. If you want I can fix it now, but it will cost extra, due to all the time I wasted on this.

In retrospect I should have not taken the job in the first place when they refused to pay extra to solve the rest of the issues they had in their file... You live and learn, I guess.

John T Smith

Community Expert

I always accomplish everything I want to do each day... my wife says that is because I don't want to do very much

Now that I'm retired, my wife thinks I work for her... so I guess that means that I am HER non-performing employee problem!

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