Web developer problems

[Possibility]

:evil:

Hi

I need help with some advice about my web developers and where I stand now. I am not an IT tech and my knowledge of web design is non existent. I know that this is a long story, but I would really appreciate all the advise that I could get. Thanks

Anyway, I did not have a very big budget when I first started, so although I got 3-4 quotes for my new website, when a friend said that he could do it for me at half the cost, I jumped at the chance. (He has a £45K job as a project manager for an IT company and says he has developed loads of sites.)

Anyway to cut a long story short, I was quoted a 3 month completion time - 6 months ago - and we are still not finished. In his initial quote (which I accepted in writing) he stated that "sample interface designs" would be included so that I could choose which one I would prefer.

One week before he was due to go away on honeymoon for a month and the week that the website was supposed to be finished, he quickly drafted the "look" of the website, so that his mate who he had "drafted" in to finish the site off could have a design to play with and finish off the coding.

As time was short and we were coming to the deadline for completion (and I was being left to fend for myself while he was away on honeymoon) I agreed to the look of the site, even though I had my doubts about it. Something wasn't right, but I couldn't put my fingure on it, if you know what I mean.....

Due to complications with the hosting company (I had to do all the chasing) the site did not go live, so that I could see it, until 20th August - over one month since he had gone away on honeymoon and four days after he got back. (Plus, when I did see it, there still needs a lot of work done to it.)

Within a week of his return, I made him aware that I did not like the look of the site and within two weeks he had agreed to work with a graphic designer friend of mine that had agreed to design the pages of the site for me.

Due to circumstances, I have not yet seen the new designs that the graphic designer has come up with, but am due to view them this week. However, now, my web designer wants to charge me £75.00 per hour with the deadline unspecified for changes and implementation of the new graphics. He says that changing the design now will cause problems and a lot of work due to the amount of coding that has already been done. (Although the graphic designer had a meeting with the web developer before hand regarding the site spec, both he and I do not yet know exactly what changes the graphic designer has come up with.)

Is this true? How do I stand with the fact that in his quote he specifically stated that "sample interface designs" will be provided and then I was left with a quick rush job before he left for a month?

Also, there are some pages and functions that I specified at the beginning of the project that I wanted included, including a discussion board, that he has not included and now wants to charge extra for. (These were in the original sitemap that I submitted to him before he priced the job.)

Please let me know your thoughts. Can any web developer take over now that it is this far gone, or should I try and stick it out with this one? Should I even be worrying about these things?

Please take a look at the site http://67.29.154.12/index.cfm and let me know what you think in general. Am I worrying about the look of the site for nothing? (I am quite a perfectionist) One of my friends said that I should just get the site up and running and then worry about it all. But will that mean a whole lot more work???

I have based my whole business on this and pumped a lot of money into it, so I have everything to loose.

Thanks for all your assistance. Phew... :shock:

[Proteus]

Hi moving etc!

I wouldn't even use that poor design that the guys did for you... don't talk even paying. Stick to what your contract says, don't accept a new one and cancel this one...

It's incredible how much those "techs" want to charge for a website... that's the reason why I've learned html by myself.

I designed the whole pinata site: http://www.the-pinata-maker.com and still keep it redesigning every day ...lol... if you knew how many times I've changing it you wouldn't believe it...

At this moment I'm working myself in another site (is in spanish)
http://www.tuguiaonline.com/ which I like it very much...

In conclusion, if you want a site just like you see it in your mind but don't want to pay tons of money, start learning html... specially if your have put your hope in that business...

Proteus.

[Possibility]

Thanks for your comments.

So in the meantime, do you think that I should just get them to finish it so that it works properly and worry about the graphics later? Or should the graphics be changed now adding more time onto the completion date and probably more money?

[Possibility]

P.S.

I told the web developer to enter the statcounter code into the HTML coding for the site and then realised that the code was not for the invisible counter.

After 1 month they have still not changed it.....

[webado]

P.S.

I told the web developer to enter the statcounter code into the HTML coding for the site and then realised that the code was not for the invisible counter.

After 1 month they have still not changed it.....
Just go to My projects here, access your particular project and make the counter invisible right in Configure Counter (instead of various digit colors and backgrounds and sizes). No change to the web pages will be needed then.

[Possibility]

Great

Thanks Christina!

[graham35]

I would contact my Lawyer and see what he says about the contract and how valid it is - or is not........ and then imply that you are going to sue them for the delay if they don't complete within say 7 days. Or on the Lawyers advice - throw out the contract and ask for any money back that you have paid them.
A good web designer could complete a web site like yours in a few hours from scratch

[motorwatchercounter]

Hi Movingetc,

I agree with graham35. The http://67.29.154.12/index.cfm site is a retrospective move on the www.movingetc.co.uk you seem to have running at the moment.

:shock:

[ScottyDM]

Movingetc;

I think your first mistake was to hire a friend who is not a professional web designer -- what I mean by that is that he has a "day job" and therefore is not really motivated enough to give your project the attention it deserves. A professional web designer, even an individual working out of a home office, would have a lot to lose with a dissatisfied customer, so they will try harder.

Actually, I like both site designs. Probably the old design has too much fine print on the home page. On the new design, the text on the steps does not line up very well. That should not have happened with the technique they used to code the steps -- that was just sloppiness on someone's part.

As for you being a perfectionist: The display of live (fluid) content on a computer screen is an inexact science. There are so many things that are out of your control (unlike a print brochure). Screen size, color depth, which browser is used, etc. What you should strive for is to get it to look just so for 95% of your site visitors, and workable for the rest. Both sites use CSS, a technology that can help you reach that goal.

Ideally, you should find one web developer (individual or business) whom you can work with on the long term. But then what they deliver to you should be "transparent" (easy for anyone versed in the art) enough to understand. If you have to, you'd then be able to transfer your project to another web design firm without having to start over.


What to do about the current project:

Tough one. You are unhappy with the state and timing of the project. I would suspect they are unhappy with the scope of the project (they underestimated how long it would take them). What you do not want is a war -- even if you win you'll end up losing.

If you feel you cannot work with these people anymore, perhaps talk to them and see if you cannot buy your way out. What I mean is -- you agree to pay them something for all work done up to a certain point. And they agree to work with your new web site design firm to gracefully pass the project over so you don't lose what's been accomplished. How you might sell this idea to them is you pay them a flat rate (less than the original agreement) for all work up to this point -- if they stop work now. Then you pay them additional (maybe hourly) to pass the project cleanly to your new firm.

If they have underestimated the scope of the project, they may welcome the chance to drop it without repercussions -- and they may also be open to making a little more if there is a graceful exit.

Good luck.

Scotty

[candle]

Geez - your web developer isn't "Daryl" is it? Sounds like a guy I fired when he didn't meet deadline. You'll never be happy with it if you can't get it changed when needed. I don't allow incomplete pages to be posted.
He should be able to give you the 'code' to get behind the website to see what he is developing without it being live.

VERY IMPORTANT - Before you fire him, make certain that if he registered the domain name for you - that he did so in your name. After I fired 'Daryl" he threatend to take down my site. Turns out that while he billed me $200 for various versions of the domain names I asked him to register- he actually registered the domains to himself! And this was for a non-profit organization to boot! Good thing I saved the e-mail that I required him to send when I hired him - it stated that he was buying the domains in my name on that date. His e-mail that he must have forgotten about, made a nice printout for the state police to take with them when they interviewed old Daryl!

New webmaster is awesome, but still requires vigilance on the timeline I expect.

[candle]

Geez - your web developer isn't "Daryl" is it? Sounds like a guy I fired when he didn't meet deadline. You'll never be happy with it if you can't get it changed when needed. I don't allow incomplete pages to be posted.
He should be able to give you the 'code' to get behind the website to see what he is developing without it being live.

VERY IMPORTANT - Before you fire him, make certain that if he registered the domain name for you - that he did so in your name. After I fired 'Daryl" he threatend to take down my site. Turns out that while he billed me $200 for various versions of the domain names I asked him to register- he actually registered the domains to himself! And this was for a non-profit organization to boot! Good thing I saved the e-mail that I required him to send when I hired him - it stated that he was buying the domains in my name on that date. His e-mail that he must have forgotten about, made a nice printout for the state police to take with them when they interviewed old Daryl!

New webmaster is awesome, but still requires vigilance on the timeline I expect.

[paulzon]

Dear Jane,
Usually, I do not like to disrespect my professional fellows, but this site design doesn't look very "professional" at all! ... If your situation is as you described, with a 9month+ development time then someone is REALLY pulling your leg here bearing in mind the results!!!! ... A professional ColdFusion developer charging £75 per hour should have been able to knock this effort up in very little time, and with a much better graphic design too! this one is just a standard template with one or two customized images, and the dynamic applications are very simple, unless there is alot to come.

"Candle" may be right about the domain name registration thing, so if you have left the registration to them, be careful! ... www.easily.co.uk are usually the best people to register with in the UK.

You probably know this already, but "Cold Fusion" is a server side language and development environment for developing dynamic web applications. It requires some technical knowledge, and a special webserver environment, so if you are not technically inclined at all, then you are going to need some ongoing support from your designer ... If it is this one, my advice is "GET OUT NOW!", otherwise you may end up being stuck with these needless problems for years ... All the problems you have encountered over an implementation as simple as this would be a complete joke, were it not for the fact that this project is obviously very important to you.

The www.movingetc.co.uk looks a little better from a design point of view, although this is a simple template based design too ... It looks like you are trying to build quite a substantial business, so it is crucial that you get the right developer in at this stage, the one you are using is definately not it, so I would advise you to get a professional one now, before it is too late!

Good Luck! Paul www.zonicweb.net

[paulzon]

However, now, my web designer wants to charge me £75.00 per hour with the deadline unspecified for changes and implementation of the new graphics. He says that changing the design now will cause problems and a lot of work due to the amount of coding that has already been done. (Although the graphic designer had a meeting with the web developer before hand regarding the site spec, both he and I do not yet know exactly what changes the graphic designer has come up with.)

Is this true?

Erm, not really! ... in development environments such as "ColdFusion" and also the various PHP cms's that are around, the interface design and the backend code are fairly discrete incorporating stuff such as CSS (Creative Style Sheets), so that changes to the "look and feel" of the user interface are simple, and universally implemented throughout the site ... so this is pure hogwash!

regards from Paul

Paul www.zonicweb.net

[iamback]

graham35 wrote:
A good web designer could complete a web site like yours in a few hours from scratch

From scratch? With many pages and even a forum? In a few hours??

No way. Using a couple of templates and ready-made code (which appears to be what the developers did), yes. Doing all of that really from scratch (design, programming, graphics) will take a developer a month or two though, and a designer couldn't do it.

(This is an experienced web developer speaking.)

[iamback]

paulzon wrote:
CSS (Creative Style Sheets)

CSS stands for Cascading style sheets. See http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS1 and its successors.

[graham35]

iamback wrote
From scratch? With many pages and even a forum? In a few hours??

No way. Using a couple of templates and ready-made code (which appears to be what the developers did), yes. Doing all of that really from scratch (design, programming, graphics) will take a developer a month or two though, and a designer couldn't do it.

I stand by what I said A good web designer could complete a web site like yours in a few hours from scratch

"a web site like yours" means like yours, which was a few pages, most with very little content, no forum, not at all fancy, infact quite simple - yep a few hours.... for a good web designer (web site builder)

[paulzon]

paulzon wrote:
CSS (Creative Style Sheets)

CSS stands for Cascading style sheets.
You are right, of course. I don't know why I wrote "creative"!

Paul www.zonicweb.net

[iamback]

graham35 wrote:
"a web site like yours" means like yours, which was a few pages, most with very little content, no forum, not at all fancy, infact quite simple - yep a few hours.... for a good web designer (web site builder)

I assumed you were referring to Movingetc's web site, and not mine. :)

What I looked at was www.movingetc.co.uk which does have a forum; if I look at http://67.29.154.12/index.cfm though I don't see a forum - but just the graphics would take more than a few hours to do from scratch. (But they probably weren't - take an existing picture, and you could do it in an hour. But that's still only the graphc - not the whole site.)

Even for a small site like this, you need a design, you need the graphics to go with the design, and you need the programming to put it all together. With a template and an existing photograph you could do it in a few hours, maybe. But from scratch? No way.

But looking at the code, it's obvious the developers have used ready-made code, so if they also used an existing image, the "few hours" would come into reach.

[graham35]

So we agree on that then - great :lol:

Maybe what I should have said on the 12th October: "you have already paid too much for a poor job and service that you are receiving"

But then thats what I said - sort of...