The fine line between business and personal matters.

[KrisHorton]

Hey folks,

Without going into too many details (for now) I have a question that I will pose to the members of this board regarding how I handled a certain situation.

As some of you know, I just took a job in the Los Angeles area and have been preparing to move down there over the past 2 weeks while at the same time still trying to meet my customers' needs.

About a week and a half ago, a person from this board approached me about doing renderings of his project. He told me that he was in a hurry. I understood this and told him that it would probably take about a week to do this depending on the amount of modifications to the car. I never once committed a completion date in writing and he never asked me for a drop-dead date in the e-mails. After briefly speaking over the phone, we had agreed on a price and what the end product would be. I did not see any reasons why it would not be possible. He sent me a list of the modifications he wanted to see. The list showed what some would say is 3 completely different cars. I did not complain though and would still try to hold true to my statement.

During the week I found out I was going to have to make another trip to the LA area to further sort out business with my new employer and inspect the apartment I was going to be renting with my landlord. The trip was inconvenient and would interfere with my productivity, but it was not something I could put off. The day after I got back, I got an e-mail from the customer stating he would need the final renderings by that evening. I got back to work on the car immediately (I had already fleshed the car out and it was down to making the modifications) and sent him a quick update to make sure he liked where I was headed with it. Any of my customers on this site can vouch for me doing this as I don't like to work a project to completion without their input.

Not long after I sent off the first iteration of his project, I received a long e-mail expressing how disappointed he was with the fact he only had one rough rendering (so far) and how I was conducting business. I immediately replied to this e-mail with an apology and a brief explanation of what was going on. I went on to explain that despite the delay, I would work as hard as I could to get the project taken care of when I got back as I do not like to disappoint my customers.



At almost the same time (Sunday afternoon) I was informed that the apartment complex I was planning to move into was very low-rated and considered by the local police dept. to be "low-end." To avoid moving into a rat's nest, I quickly searched for one or two alternatives that I could go check out ASAP. I left for LA late Sunday evening and got back late Monday evening.

When I returned home, I found two new e-mails from this person waiting for me. The first one was not very friendly, but to the point. It included a statement saying that he did not care that I was moving and should have been a reason to not agree to do the project.

The second e-mail was very nasty telling me to tear up the check (which I did not receive until Monday's mail came) and further expressed his distaste in how I do business. It was very rude and unprofessional. I responded to both e-mails with a very long explanation and yet another apology. I offered to either finish the project or tear up the check as he suggested. Some of the statements I made in this e-mail must have come across in a sarcastic way, which I did not intend. I remained as professional and polite as humanly possible in this e-mail, but this person decided to look right past that and read into my 'sarcastic' statements. This was clear in his response to me in which he verbally attacked me several times and went on to say I owed him an apology (which I had been doing over several e-mails already.)

Finally I drafted what I hoped would be my last long e-mail to this person. I remained as professional and for lack of a better word, boring, in this e-mail to him. I explained that I was going to stop working on his project and return his check, no strings attached. I told him that the one image I did was his to keep and asked that he not try to publish it in any way (for copyright sake.)

To this he blew up at me once more in an e-mail, once again insulting me and 'letting me have it.' All I wrote in response to this was "The check is in the mail."

Cue yet another rude e-mail from this person. About 10 minutes after I get the last e-mail, my phone rings. I take the call and it's him. This was the most insulting, rude, and aggravating phone call I ever participated in. I won't go into the details of it, but it actually left me somewhat shaken.

So all that said, I want to ask whether or not taking care of my personal business was out of line. I keep my phone on 7 days a week and try to answer e-mail 7 days a week as well. Being a freelance artist I don't keep normal 9-5 hours 5 days a week, I refer to it as being 'on call' 24/7 and some of my customers can attest to that! With this particular person I was treated like an employee at a department store where he is the customer (who is, by policy, always right) and I am the employee that has to put up with it. This is understandable, but definitely not something I am used to.

This is the only instance since I have been doing business that I have been treated this way. Every single customer I have had up to this point has treated me with a great deal of politeness and I believe I have returned it. If anyone that I have worked with on this site (or any other) has felt otherwise, I openly invite them to tell me so, I will not take it personally. Up until this person, I have considered all of my customers to be, to some degree, my friends. That may not sound very "professional," but it has worked really well up to this point.

(Moderators, if I am out of line in this posting or this thread gets too out of hand, let me know. Feel free to lock it up or delete it if it does.)

Kris Horton

[Fuelie Fan]

He sounds like *****.

The real lesson here: a business is a business. When the company I work at was first starting, we'd do a lot of things "off the cuff", hardly ever set things in stone or had contracts, thinking this was more pleasing to the customers, but it can cause more hassle than it saves. You're an artist, but you're also running a business, which means you have to get formal agreements for pricing and timeframe. Even if it's a verbal agreement it needs to happen. "Around a week" needs to be replaced with "no later than 10 days" (including terms for cost reduction/fees for every day past that deadline or for terminated contract on either end), and "about this much" Needs to be replaced with a fixed price, or a fixed, per-hour rate not exceed X amount.

I think you did as best as could be expected given the situation, and the other guy should probably experience a blunt-force trauma to the head, but an agreement at the outset would have removed a lot of possible points of argument.

[trapin]

Kris...it doesn't sound to me like you did anything wrong. What can you do? Life happens. Sounds to me like this guy should get one.

What the hell was he in such a hurry for anyway?

[KrisHorton]

To his credit, he was in a hurry for a wheel group purchase that is going on on this site, but I looked at the posting and he has several weeks to commit to it. Not sure whether he knows that or not, but at least he will have time to take his business elsewhere and not run out of time on the GP.

Kris

[mdprovee]

I agree with you Kris especially since you told him what had happenned, and kept in touch with him.

I hate when people don't get back to me, or at least keep in some kind of communication with me. As long as that happens, which it sounds like it did, I understand things in life happen.

What would he have done if something happened to your computor, you lost power due to flood. Would this person expect you to keep you times the same. I would hope not.

Mike

[Ralph LoGrasso]

Kris,

In order to protect yourself, and also avoid conflicts, if a tight deadline is impressed upon you, I would get something in writing, or atleast an email with the stated deadline, and a "grace period" to account for normal every day happenings that delay things. You sounded like you handled the situation very professionally, and an expressed "grace period" to your client may have possible diffused the situation. As one of your clients and friends, I've been very happy with the renderings and the process. I've had you change things several times, and re-do somethings and I never got a word of objection from you. I know others have done the same and it means a lot for someone to go out of their way to make their clientel happy.

[Travis B]

Judgeing by your work I would not worry about one person!! All of you renderings look good!

[KrisHorton]

I made it a point to stay in touch as best I could regarding the trips to LA. Like I said, they were very inconvenient for me, but necessary.

One of the "sarcastic" remarks I made, and I will admit it could have been worded better, stated that it basically came down to either living in my car for the next few weeks or getting his renderings done later than promised. What would any person in their right mind do in that situation?

Kris

[KrisHorton]

Judgeing by your work I would not worry about one person!! All of you renderings look good!

Thanks for the compliment, but seriously, I try to treat all of my customers well. Each one matters and I'm not famous or rich enough to write off any one person. Unless the business relationship degrades like this one has, that is.

Kris

[Travis B]

Thanks for the compliment, but seriously, I try to treat all of my customers well. Each one matters and I'm not famous or rich enough to write off any one person. Unless the business relationship degrades like this one has, that is.

Kris

None of us want to run customers off!!! But in that case if you did what you said you did, then there was nothing else you could do!!! :icon996:

[BADVELLE]

There comes a time in business when you unfortunately have to point a customer in the direction of the competition, this is one of those times. There are customers that you don't need to do business with, regardless of how hard it is to turn away business.

[Piet]

Kris,

Judging by my interaction with you, and the interaction that I have seen you have with others... I wouldn't sweat it. You do very good work, are well spoken and even tempered.

Cheers,

[Bill Howell]

Kris,
Without trying to step on either your or the customer's toes, I will make a few comments based on many years of being self employeed.
1) Having been on both sides of similar issues let me say that anytime
anyone is in that big of a hurry, I usually just pass on the deal from the start. It may be because I am getting older or maybe actually wiser but I have found this statement to be so very true- "A lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part". Anyone who frequents this forum knows you have been in the process of moving for a while now. If they were in that big of a hurry, why not just call someone else. It sounds to me like they thought they could bully you into finishing this regardless of what else you had going on.
2) That being said, you probably should have made it clear what you already had going on and when you could finish it, being sure you gave yourself some cushion for emergencys. This is much easier said than done though if you are self-employeed since you always hate to turn anyone away. Believe me, after twenty years, I still have the same problem sometimes. Just let this be a learning experiance.
3) Once the deal went south, the best thing you could have done was simply returned his check, gave him what you had completed as good faith and not got into a pissing contest whether by email or phone. The "check is in the mail" email was probably about 3 or 4 emails too late. Remember, it takes two to argue. It is impossible to argue by yourself. In the heat of the moment, we all say things we later regret, so I try(not always successful) to "sleep on" issues that upset me. More times than not I find that it really was not that big of a deal after a night's rest. If I am still pissed the next day then I know I have to deal with it or else I will really blow a gasket.
4) If you sent the guy his money back, gave him what you had done, and truely apolized, then you have done all you can. There are some in this world that for one reason or another you can not make happy. Usually, I have found they are the ones in such a hurry all the time. They are also usually the ones who complain about everyone and everything. You have just learned why maybe you were the only one he called. Maybe everyone else already knew better. This is not always the case and if he was just having a bad day or there was more to the issue that maybe even you did not understand or know, then sooner or later he will come around. Whether he does or not, let this be a leason learned and let it go. We all make mistakes,do not beat yourself up over it. In the grand scheme of things, getting the right apartment is way more important than the money you missed on this deal anyway.
I hope this helps both of you resolve this or at least understand where the other was coming from.
Bill

[ProdigyCustoms]

I think Bill is dead on in every way. I am interested to see if the other party has something to say since he is a member here?

[KrisHorton]

Bill,

As always, you're a wealth of knowledge and I appreciate your input. You made a lot of great points and I'll take those to heart. I'm young and have a LOT to learn about running a business, there's no doubt about it, but rather than being told I need to learn more, actual input is what I need. So again, thanks!

Kris

[KrisHorton]

Frank,

I think the other member has a lot to say on the matter. Out of respect for his privacy and consideration that he's a member here, I didn't mention who it was. I don't want to point someone out as a bad person since this is an isolated incident. Hopefully this is the end of it. He got his money back and several apologies from me, so I think (and hope) I've done my part.

Kris

[Jagarang]

No complaints from me either Kris. You've been receptive to my nit picking on little details regarding changes, have keep me updated with "installment" images for my viewing and critical pleasure, emergencies are unplanned, unexpected, and can't be controlled.

[BRIAN]

Kris, You are just more unbeleivable than I thought trying to post this to make you look like the good guy. I am the person he is referring to. If anybody wants to see the actual emails I will gladly email them to you so you can actually see how Kris conducted himself.
As far as the deadline it was the 1st thing I explained to him I needed. You can clearly see in Kris' email to me that he expressed he could could knock it out in a few days, this was 10 days before the deadline. I offered to Fed Ex payment and he declined. In no way did he ever explain that it was a tight deadline or something that was even a concern. I had even emailed him 2x after with no reply as to maybe he couldn't get it done. The deadline was do to me needing to choose out of 3 designs. Yes the wheel purchase was part of it, the other was purchasing other parts before car was moved to paint shop. I emailed Kris on Saturday the daybefore he was to have the renderings done as I had not heard from him. When he emailed me back he explained his personal problems and honestly I was somewhat undertsanding until he just became outright rude. You can read in the emails that he explains basically "So what you missed the GP that is not the only place you can buy wheels" Beleive me that was the nice part. He finally emailed a rough draft of only one of the 3 renderings. Once again apologizing like he explained but after every apology came a sarcastic remark. I will clearly state that yes my emails became a lot stronger as I had about had it with him . Even after all of that I called him (knowing he is a young guy and maybe he just was coming across bad) thinking this would still work and he was just as rude on the phone. He once again stated "What do you want me to do I had to move and I couldn't get it done sometimes customers just have to wait" I tried to explain that he had a commitment and should have at least called me or emailed me with a explanation before the day of the deadline. I hung up after I knew I was about to explode. I am no tuff guy by any means and never talk to anybody the way he did to me without sizing them up first.
Kris as my last offer was; either come up with the drawings (which according to your email on Monday that they would be done today) or return my check. I would have to say if you had them done I would have them and you would be keeping the check. This post was just a way Kris figured he could beat me to posting something bad about him. I have no intention of starting any post. I will also only forward the emails with Kris' permission as I feel he is making a huge mistake if I let everbody read them. I have nothing to hide and really would love to post them but Kris I would seriously think about that. I attempted to explain to him, he has a lot to learn about treating his customers.
I would also think just close this thread because if I feel in ANY way I am being made to look bad I will sure to email them to anybody. KRIS As I explained before if you are willing to apologize without a wise crack after it and forward the drawings kep the check and all is over.
I pride myself on being an upfront no bs guy. As a matter of fact ask the guy running the GP I even offered to buy wheels for something else that I wasn't sure I needed just because I didn't want to be the one ruining the deal.
The ball is in your court young man.

[Larry Callahan]

o.k., Kris, I will give you the chance to reply if you wish then, I WILL close this thread.

[KrisHorton]

Thanks for giving me a chance to make one more post Larry. I thought long and hard while writing my first post and said everything I needed to say. I stand by what I wrote.

Right now the best thing I can say is nothing at all. Go ahead and close the thread.

Thanks,
Kris