Diabolical Service

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Max Power

Established Member
Joined
26 Mar 2007
Messages
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Location
County Durham
I thought I had heard horror stories of bad service on here but they pale into insignificance when compared to what Im experiencing at the moment.
Getting on for 11 weeks ago I engaged the services of a (local-ish, 30miles) web site provider.
I came across them on someones facebook page and the site they had provided for him looked ok.
I emailed them my requirements and they got back to me very quickly with a reasonable quote.
I asked them to confirm a few things and once again they got back to me very quickly.

They requested payment by card but I haven't got a card for this company as I'm just setting it up so agreed to go to their offices the next day and make payment . Which I thought would be a good opportunity to check them out
They are located in a large modern building with large office, lots of busy looking staff and receptionist etc so nothing untoward there.

I was promised a site that I would be extremely happy with and given a receipt confirming three weeks as the approximate completion time.

Everything went rapidly downhill from there. I sent them several numerous emails detailing my content requirements which they rarely replied to, I was then informed that it could either be (I forgot the word but suitable for mobiles tablets etc) or have a news section I could update myself but not both.
After deliberations I opted for the former and they agreed to upload news items for free for a year.

After about six weeks of nothing much happening and more emails to them than I could count I sent them the following rant

Firstly Jonathon,
Congratulations, despite suffering more years than I care to remember, dealing with (in a professional capacity) second and third rate home improvement companies, largely staffed by illiterate canvassers and disreputable con men, your company has managed to attain a level of poor service that I would previously have thought impossible to achieve.

I have over the last several weeks sent email after email ,which you never acknowledge let alone respond to. To date I don't even know if you have commenced work on my website.
The only thing you have shown any sign of efficiency at so far is your extraction of payment, from which point your interest in the work went rapidly downhill. You can certainly "sell the sizzle" but I doubt that you even know what the sausage looks like.

I would have expected at the VERY least to have received the initial page layouts before now, but I have received ABSOLUTELY nothing, diddly, nought, zero, zilch , zip.
I can not allow this state of affairs to continue as I shall have long since deceased, either from old age or stress before you get around to showing any signs of customer care

Can you PLEASE let me know by noon tomorrow (Wednesday) at what stage the project is at and who I can communicate with for the remainder of this nightmare
DO NOT say Alex as I wish to have no further dealings with him, as he is as ineffective as a chocolate fire-guard

I was then contacted and promised my own dedicated designer who would now take responsibility for the build.
For the following week or so things did improve, My emails were returned and my suggestions were acted on, although the quality of the work was dismal at best (The graphics they provided were worse than amateurish)
From then things started to slip back, unreturned emails and no progress with the site.

In exasperation I started sourcing my own graphics from someone I found on People per Hour and he has been providing excellent work in double quick time, which I have been forwarding straight away, but nothing has gone on the site yet despite numerous emails.

It is now close to eleven weeks, I dont even have a completed home page. I am sick to death of this company :twisted: and emailed this on Friday

Hi Andrew its important that I get things moving on as its now over two months since I paid your company for a website and to date you have provided a partially built homepage.

In an act of desperation I have been sourcing graphics at my expense (were to have been provided by you) to try and move things along.
Things however have ground to a halt yet again.

I haven't encountered any problems with the graphics company or the copywriter I have been using. I tell the graphics company what I want, I forward them any modifications to be made and they send me amended versions to be signed off
The copywriter requests instructions and sends me a draft, I send him amendments, he forwards an updated version for my approval.
Nothing complicated in that.

Your company however seems to follow a completely different work ethos,
I have lost all faith in your company ever getting this project satisfactorily completed
I have lost count of the number of emails I've sent.
I understand now ,why the "people in charge" stay anonymous and insist on payment up front. No one would pay once they had experienced your dismal service

My preferred option at this point would be for your company to immediately issue a full refund of the payment I made at the end of August,
This was to
"Provide a website that would tick every box in a three week timescale"
This clearly hasn't been provided and I doubt that it ever will. Frankly I am fed up with dealing with you .


Please forward my points to whoever is in a position of authority i.e. a Director or at the very least Senior Manager
I shall expect a response no later than Monday am, after which I shall be taking this further

A thoroughly dissatisfied customer

I then started doing what I should have done before engaging them, and the result is to say the least , dire reading
The Directors are a married couple that previously ran a business of virtually identical name that went bust. He frequently uses an alias. My experience is typical, they regularly bill peoples credit cards without consent, in fact most of the complaints could have been written by me, they are so similar to my own experience.

I am now of the opinion that conversing via telephone or email would be pointless with these people ie it would be water off a ducks back to them.
So I am going to lose a mornings work and I will be outside of their offices for them opening :twisted:
I am NOT happy
 
That is certainly one route I shall go down Roger, if my visit is unsuccessful, but hopefully this toe-rag operation won't want the aggravation of grievously unhappy customers on their doorstep.
 
Hang on, you paid in full up front? From someone who's been self employed for more years than I care to remember, it doesn't sound like a very good way to do business.....
 
My thoughts entirely Roger, obviously a bunch of crooks, i just want to be rid of them.
My only concern is, they now hold my .com and .co.uk which I bought previously and lots of people have said they couldnt get them transfered without paying those crooks exhorbitant fees
 
Thank you MMUK for stating the obvious, however I have regularly taken far bigger amounts as deposits than the matter here concerns and they are not a small backstreet concern, they have large modern offices in a business park with lots of staff,so I wrongly assumed they were reputable.
 
Is it out of order to ask the name of this company? I'd like to look into this further for you (I have friends in that field and some in more 'official' fields of work).
 
MMUK":dlfw78vm said:
Is it out of order to ask the name of this company? I'd like to look into this further for you (I have friends in that field and some in more 'official' fields of work).

Are they in the Darlington area (?) Just asking, I used to work up there, the description of the office etc is SO like the firm I am thinking of, that were awful to work for as well......
 
MMUK I will PM you their details, I don't want to start slating them on the internet until I've got sorted with them.
Yes Cottonwood,they're in Darlington so likely the same company, their name starts with a W if thats any help. Please let me know anything that might be useful, PM if you dont want to put it on the forum.
Thanks Flynnwood, much appreciated, I will keep you updated
 
Max Power":3r8y7off said:
MMUK I will PM you their details, I don't want to start slating them on the internet until I've got sorted with them.
Yes Cottonwood,they're in Darlington so likely the same company, their name starts with a W if thats any help. Please let me know anything that might be useful, PM if you dont want to put it on the forum.
Thanks Flynnwood, much appreciated, I will keep you updated

Since my previous post I went online and did some research. The firm we did screen-prinitng work for (C H) went into administration 18 months ago after their main national client went pear shaped. Since rebranded as J T, so evidently not the same firm. Any way, I hope you can get it fixed soon.
 
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