What being ripped off taught me

for_i_in_range

Who are they?

BowBun

All this for a $35K contract, that sucks.

gnfargbl

> A contract is toilet paper It isn't, but you can't get blood from a stone and squeezing costs money. It sounds like the entity that the contract is with has no real assets and/or is based in a jurisdiction which is hard to enforce judgements in. That's a case where you need to get paid up-front, which is the real lesson in this article.

hyperhello

> They were carpetbaggers and dilettantes convinced by their own inexperience and the advice of a onetime VJ that they could pull off something I’d twice helped quote to be brought home by a cadre of hardened killers with shitloads of math and know-how at eye-watering prices. They were way way way over their heads and were in no way interested in updating their priors in light of the shit they were swimming in. And yet, somehow, you gave them the most important time you had for their promises.

dragonsenseiguy

Who are they?

condensedcrab

Contract terms can vary greatly depending on the situation and the company you’re working with. Early/frequent payment terms are always good to have but you may not always have the leverage for it depending on where you’re at as a contractor. Takes getting ripped off a times before insisting on better terms I guess. It’s like bombing your first job interview… you can prepare but it just needs to happen.

fontain

“A contract is toilet paper” A little hyperbolic, but more accurate than not when laypeople think about contracts. A contract isn’t a magic spell, it is a declaration of shared understanding that can be used for clarity and in legal proceedings. If you think of a contract as a way to ensure you get what you agreed, yes, it is toilet paper, because a contract doesn’t remove counterparty risk.

wewewedxfgdf

Be paid or don't work. I am so deadly serious - do not continue working if your invoices are late. You don't have to be a jerk about it, just explain to your primary contact that you need to be paid and you pick up tools again when the money has arrived. BUT it is on YOU to properly negotiate reasonable payment terms. And if you don;t know or don't trust the client then require payment in advance until a stronger commercial relationship can be settled in. Do not be a baby - go research business contracts and payment terms. Do not be afraid to lose business from companies that are squeamish about paying you - in fact actively avoid such companies.

rwmj

What's an "AR bus"? How can augmented reality windows work on a bus unless you are (a) tracking the passenger's head and (b) there's only one passenger?

rglover

Never do anything on faith or as a handshake deal. Always ensure you get paid (hint: escrow is kryptonite for weasels). Trust everyone, just not the devil inside them. Also, mandatory: https://creativemornings.com/talks/mike-monteiro--2/1

InMice

> I missed the month of May with my 2-year-old kid. My wife cared for a 2-year-old alone. The weirdest part to me, receive a call and just get up and go? Priorities? Did you write this blog post from the doghouse?

fred_is_fred

He says "trust your gut" about 12 times, but the whole lead up has 0 mention that he was worried he would not get paid. His only gut feelings seemed to be around tech issues.

balbladsaf1231

> A contract is toilet paper no it isn't. why you did not sue them? success rate of international arbitrage (New York Convention) proces into China is 90% success rate. USA/EU companies who sue Chineses companies in China for breach of contract seem to be winning rates. Enforcement of USA curt orders do not need to go thorugh Chinese courts again, and are enforced by local authorities (local sharks) with success rate of 80% for foreign firms suing chinese firms. fees are also fairly low. case is straightfoward. if author went and sue, likely he would get his money back.

eckesicle

We’ve also learned this lesson the hard way. These are now the clauses we require in every project we do: - Payment is due X days after receipt of invoice, or immediately after the consultant has addressed any quality issues, whichever is sooner - Late payment shall incur interest at 8% above the BoE base rate and a late fee of 100 GBP as per the UK Late Payment Legislation. Partial payments on invoices shall apply to late fees, interest, and then principal, in that order. - In the event of a late payment the invoice for the next deliverable shall immediately fall due. - The consultant shall be entitled to shift deadlines on deliverables in the event of a late payment as a result of any work disruption, without incurring any liability. - Payment shall be made in X currency, or an exchange rate at X date on Oanda.com shall apply. - The client is responsible for any bank fees incurred by their, or any intermediary bank. In the event of a SWIFT transaction it shall be made with the OUR payment code. - The jurisdiction in the event of a conflict shall be England and Wales. Neither party shall be bound by arbitration. - The client and consultant shall both indemnify the other up to the total value of the contract and shall not under any circumstance be liable beyond X GBP. We also no longer share downloadable links of our deliverables until they are paid up. They get a view/comment only link for reports/data etc. We’ve found that clients that aren’t willing to accept these terms won’t pay you either way. We determine the net days on the invoice based on the credit rating of the client. Ironically, the good clients pay within 2-3 days normally, and the difficult ones are very “long tail”. About 1% of contracts tend to fully or partially default on their payments. We’re in a particularly credit poor industry but our average delay due to late payment is 23 days. Those clients where we stop delivery pay on average 11 days sooner than those contracts where we don’t stop delivery. This is based on around 2,000 invoices sent over the last 5 years.

bob1029

I've started operating in really granular units of work. Like less than $1000 per. Cash on delivery. This won't work with all clients and all jobs, but there are places where it does work very well. Advantages include being able to avoid paper contracts altogether. Verbal agreements and a 4 column xlsx that is reviewed monthly are all that seem to be required with some of my clients. If I don't get paid for one day of work, I will probably get over it in a few hours. If I don't get paid for six months of work, we will have a serious problem. The tighter and more incremental we can make the delivery process, the less likely anyone gets screwed. If a party is pushing hard for long-term contracts or large up-front sums of payment, I would walk away from that transaction unless there was a literal golden goose sitting in their lap.

carlosjobim

There's no such thing as a company temporarily being in dire straits. These kind of companies are always in dire straits and crisis - it's a business tactic to not deliver and not pay. Just stay away, whether you're a customer, a contractor, an employee or if they want to be your customer.

xyzelement

The fact that this is so many words makes me worry the author underappreciated the main lesson: risk exposure. When you go out of pocket - you are out of pocket and the risk is all yours. If that one thing was different then all the remaining risk is on the client - they don't want to do version contr - ok cool you still get paid. Usually when you have to pay in to get paid out (outside of a direct investment scenario) it's a scam. The people who fall for the Nigeria Prince thing are operating the same way.

jfrbfbreudh

No longer a contractor but I used to offer a 10-15% discount for paying upfront. Almost every client took this deal. Earned a little less but never lost sleep over payments.

throwaway98797

> End clients can’t tell the difference between these bozos and me. I don’t know what to do with that information but it feels bad. this is only getting worse with ai. all the artifacts of good work are there but none of the depth.

ChrisMarshallNY

That doesn’t really sound like “being ripped off,” as opposed to “betting on a lame horse.” The people behind this were irresponsible, childish, and exemplars of the Dunning-Kruger effect. They weren’t really hardline crooks. Crooks are probably a lot more organized. I have gotten myself invested with similar crowds. There’s usually a charismatic spokesperson, leading the chaos. They likely didn’t plan to rip him off, but paying him wasn’t really something they thought about. Real crooks put lots of planning into taking money. > Multiple very junior developers were touching (binary, TouchDesigner) code and deploying straight to production via thumb drive, with zero version control. In fact, they didn’t know what version control was. I suspect many startups fit that description. If they survive, then they usually pull themselves up by the bootstraps, eventually. Many of them collapse, taking everything with them.