Peeves

[sharie]

Anyone ever have a client you wanted to fire lol. This is a client you can never please but they continue to come back to you for jobs.

I had client, he paid well and paid for revisions. I worked on an elk illustration for this client for almost 5 months. I kid you not there was a total of 89 revisions, he paid for evey one of the revisions and it still wasn't done to what he wanted. This client then came up with a new project, a few characters for a childrens book, I did 3 characters and a total of 46 revisions again he paidbut still not done with revisions, ths client then has another project design a website. I told client I do not do website design, I can do the graphics and layouts but coding, no I can't, Client wants me to go ahead and make the graphics layouts in psd files along with a new logo.

The logo had 42 revisions and still not done, the web page layouts are now numbering 36 revisions

Has anyone ever experienced a client like this? Working on my own as a freelancer it is hard to turn down a client thay pays well but enough is a enough I would have thought with all the revisions the client has paid for that client would just go to a better designer nope, keeps comming back like a yo-yo does. wishy washy and never ever finish a project.

How do any of you politely tell a client NO. I have even tried to price the client out hoping client would go elsewhere. The client is also a hothead and I don't want to make the client mad, unsure what he will do I have several emails he sent to me not being very nice at all, very nasty, then sends another email saying sorry.

I am at the moment blocking the emails and phone calls. Some of my buddies think I should be happy with a paying customer

There I feel better just writing this!

Sharie

[resurepus]

yeah, this is a very weird situation. To be honest it sounds quite like a nightmare, a real nightmare, not just a figure of speach nightmare, a kafkanian sort, the one where you are looking for an exit and you know it should be somewhere near, but you never get to find it.
But at the same time the client pays and normally, a designer would only be happy to a paying client I guess you can't get a definit answer to this problem, it's up to each of us what he or she can tolerate...

me I haven't had anything quite like this. And I know that at some point I would stop working with such a client, but I can't say exactly when.

[resurepus]

on the bright side, now you have a whole bunch of elk illustrations that you can use in other projects or maybe you can't since they were paid for But at least you are an elk drawing expert now!

[Coy]

sharie I understand about not wanting to turn down a paying client. But if he's sending hatefull emails I'd just tell him NO and No again. Doesn't matter if he's nice and says sorry. It reminds me of the "wife beaters" they beat them then buy them a new car or something.
It also sounds like he's not communicating what exactly he wants causing you to do an excessive amount of revissions. It should be 3 sketches or concepts then no more than 5-10 revisions. Any thing over that is a NEW image and should be charged the origonal cost. kinda like you have a logo that you will charge $200 for, plus $25 for X amount of revisions(just an example not sure what you charge). after that it's another $200+.. Base the new costs for client unable to explain what they want. lol

But if your done your done and let them know you are not willing to do anymore work for them.
dang 36 revisions on a webpage layout. hope your sticking the costs to them at least.

Good luck and if worse comes to worse let the cops know that your affraid of his actions, supply emails to them..

[tsmith]

I have no problems dropping a client if it will be more stress than the work is worth. I have had to do it a couple times.

[MizBlinx]

I don't tend to advertise my skills in traditional formats so I tend to just get whatever loonies want work done. I've experienced a customer trying to pay me in honey (for well over 15 projects), been made to read scripture and then been yelled at for not thinking gays were gonna burn for eternity, had to endlessly revise a portrait because first I was flattering them and then I made them too ugly (too pretty then too ugly, too pretty, then too ugly. I finally just had to stop), been threatened by a client's husband for imaginary deadlines, etc.
You guys are so much more patient than I am. It's bad business, but after enough crap, I tell them where to stick it.

[sharie]

This client has just been a nightmare. It is nice to get the opinions experience from all here at DC.

I Have blocked all email, then the client decided to send money with messages in it. I returned the money back through paypal, A designer stalker. Emotional and design wise I feel so much better not working for this guy, A full yr of nightmare with him and now I don't have to design with a monkey on back. I have learned a very important thing dealing all this. When the design hairs on your neck start sticking out and get itchy I better listen to myself and remember this nightmare!

[fusion-girl]

HA! Tell me about it. An artist's work is never done? Well at some point even WE have to cap ourselves. I actually wrote a blog about "how to work well with your designer". It all comes down to that person's sensitivity level, your relationship with him and how diplomatic you are.

I would haved just laughed with him and said, "okay, next time is the last time! So make a good decision!" Be a support system for him... some clients tend to be very attached to their projects to the point that they no longer see clearly and need guidance and positive affirmation. That being said - perhaps he was a little emotionally unstable lol

I once had a client email me some photos and asked me to scan them for him. Duh.

[gdeetan]

Most important thing here is to have everything in black and white. Have it all written. We often fail to do that, and that where the problem starts. Some clients are really hard to work with, very demanding to the very last detail, which is specially hard with designing websites, since different browsers will behave differently, specially to complex designs. I had one client who really insisted that every pixel be aligned to one another, I tried to explain that we have to have some compromise to this since it will behave differently in explorer, but she insisted. Oh well... we have to make a living.

[Brixtonian]

Clients are 99% difficult to work with. i had one i was designing a logo for who asked for a final tweak - a colour change and a small graphic element to be removed and then it would be perfect. lo and behold when i'd made those changes it wasnt what they wanted! some clients are just impossible to please.