Trent Studios LLC

(First off, I would be more than happen to share any emails and screenshots with the Revdex.com to bamy responseI responded to [redacted] yesterday and pointed-out that his claims are not correctI suspect [redacted] is really upset that [redacted] overlooked a few details in the initial proposal/estimate, and that he, ***, wasn't included in our initial conversationsI apologize for the length of my response, but I feel it's necessary.)I recommended [redacted] leave [redacted] /***Commerce because a lot of their requests could not be completed because the previous web developer had their website locked down so tight that the [redacted] software, and it's plug-ins, couldn't be upgradedI researched a few e-commerce platforms, for example [redacted] , [redacted] and [redacted] , and determined [redacted] was [redacted] ' best choice due to the amount of customizations they wanted to make, it's faster, more search engine friendly, etc.I gave [redacted] an estimate/proposal on April 13, It included line items of what I was going to do and a couple mock-ups/screenshots of how the new site was going to lookThey choose a mock-up [redacted] (of [redacted] ) and I ironed-out many details, including custom features and prices.On April 21, [redacted] asked for an exact date of completion and a discount if those tasks weren't completed by that exact dateI told him I couldn't do that as there are too many variables involved and that I hadn't even received their deposit yet, sometimes there are software glitches, unforeseen problems, etcI told him I could guarantee that certain tasks be completed by a certain date, for example products be entered, shipping configured, etc.On September 4, I received their deposit and I got to work.I don't know why they're saying the new website is a leap backwardsThey couldn't install software updates before, or export products, add new featuresThey literally couldn't do anything but process ordersThey were stuckNot only did I free them, so-to-speak, of those limitations by giving them a new state-of-the-art e-commerce site, but over time, between myself and another developer, we got their old [redacted] site off of [redacted] servers and onto my server so they could have all their old information.I don't know why [redacted] says they lost some features or programs, for example Refer a FriendIt's on the product pageIt's been there a long timeSee http:// [redacted] [redacted] .net/ [redacted] Regarding his claim that they lost the ability to get leads from customers: that, too, has been in placeCustomers could click the Live Chat button, call the number at the top or bot [redacted] of the website, click the email link at the bottom of the site, click the Contact Us button in the navigation bar(since [redacted] has pointed their domain name elsewhere, the live chat feature doesn't work anymore).Regarding newsletters: In the proposal, I listed that a checkbox would be added during checkout so customers could subscribe to their newsletterThis has been done.Regarding dynamic prices: as I was building the site, I directed them to ***'s training videos that shows them how to use coupons, sales, and other marketing featuresI emailed [redacted] this link on October 10th, 2015.Regarding [redacted] Analytics and selling on [redacted] : [redacted] Center module was installed, and I installed every tag and line of code [redacted] asked me toOn January 23rd, [redacted] said "New Analytic works very good”.Regarding ***'s "blunders": The Tell a Friend module was reporting an errorIt was fixed on November 18, This is the only blunder that I can find/recall.Regarding [redacted] inventory claim: [redacted] was reporting an inventory problemI asked if he was adjusting inventory while the site was live and I pointed-out that that was not recommended as the software was au***atically removing and adding items from inventory as shoppers added items and removed items from their basket [redacted] said not only that he was adjusting inventory while the site was live, but [redacted] was, tooI told him the correct way to adjust inventory (take the site off-line to adjust inventory).Regarding the blog: [redacted] and I discussed thisBecause the old site was still lockat [redacted] , he had two options: rebuild the blog from scratch or allow me to install a blog module into the [redacted] systemHe opted for the later and I installed itWhile I was installing the blog module, I was able to free his old [redacted] site from [redacted] servers [redacted] said he would copy the blog posts from [redacted] and paste them into the blog module(I can show you the email)Regarding ***'s comment on my inability to communicate: I've asked him to explain or point-out examples with me to back this claim upHe hasn't as of yetI believe I have responded quicklyWhen [redacted] initially emailed me when his old site was down, I put all my other work aside to help himI can show you the emails and time-lines.Regarding [redacted] : I'm not sure what ***'s talking about there, but that's the newsletter system, which is in placeThat's the checkbox during checkoutIt's done and tested to work.I've delivered everything that's in the proposal and moreI can show you the proposal and the website (that's still on my server).Regarding his comment that I asked for more money: when a new task was requested that wasn't in the proposal, I gave them an estimate, and I didn't proceed until I got their approval.Regarding late completion: I started working on their new site on September 27th, after I received their depositIn my proposal, I asked for months to compete the items outlined in the proposalOn October 4th, 2015, my work flow was interrupted by [redacted] requesting I help get their existing site, which was on [redacted] , back on-lineI stopped everything I was working on to help them in their new crisisI don't know why they don't understand that that interruption was going to affect the delivery date.When we launched the new site in October (ahead of schedule because their site on [redacted] was down), I warned [redacted] that some features were not completed, but he wanted to go live anyway so they could make some moneyPeople could order products and checkoutBasic functionality was working.Regarding hosting fees: It is unfortunate that [redacted] raised their hosting fees (March) after they told me they wouldn't (October)But 10-fold? That's not correctI was charging [redacted] $59/mo [redacted] increased their rate to $150/mo [redacted] didn't pay this, anyway, so I don't see why ***'s complaining about it.Regarding ***'s developer's rates: they charge $125/hrMost other non- [redacted] developers I work with also charge about this rate.I believe the dissatisfaction [redacted] is talking about is in regards to the fact they once I completed the items in the proposal, I asked for the balance, then [redacted] started pointing out items that he said weren't complete, but either wasn't in the proposal or was never requestedFor example, in the proposal, it states a newsletter checkbox during checkoutLater, [redacted] complained that the checkbox wasn't on every pageI pointed-out to [redacted] that the checkbox wasn't suppose to be on every pageAccording to the proposal, it's on the checkout pageIn other words, they complained about things that they never asked for.Regarding the 'power of stance', [redacted] is referring to: when they said they couldn't pay the balance, I disabled the exporting of products and other data, and I disabled FTP access so they couldn't take the work I had completed and move elsewhere and never pay the billI made sure that the limitations I put in place did not affect their ability to accept orders, and for their customers to place orders.I emailed the balance invoice on January 12, In that email, I mentioned a 10% per month late fee [redacted] said some tasks weren't completeI asked which tasksHe pointed-out minor alignment issues, which I fixed immediately (I can show you the emails and screenshots or the live site)On February 9th, I submitted the balance invoice, againAgain, pointing-out the 10% per month late fee(I hadn't charged a late fee to this point) [redacted] asked for another little change, which I addressedHe said they would send a payment in weeksOn March 9th, I still hadn't received a payment, so I reminded them of it and asked what their intentions were [redacted] said he would pay, but didn't know whenI asked if they wanted to arrange for paymentsOn March 11th, they said they could send $1000.On March 20th, 2016, I received a check for $1000, and was approved by [redacted] to charge their credit card $On April 1st [redacted] said I could charge their card for the balanceI did and enabled FTP and exporting of informationAlso on April 1st, I pointed-out that April hosting is dueHe said they couldn't pay for the entire monthI offered to let them pay for half the monthThey said they would send a check for half the monthI haven't received that yet.When [redacted] complained about something, such as image alignment, I fixed itWhen he complained about the layout of the checkout pages, we started talking about it (I can show you the emails) and was working on mock-ups.When [redacted] demanded a refund, I responded with much of the aboveI don't see that a refund is warrantedAgain, I've completed everything in the proposal and moreIf anything, they owe me for my time working on the mock-ups for the redesigned checkout pagesBut that's my fault for not getting a deposit on that project.Again, let me know if you would like to see emails or screenshotsContrary to what [redacted] said, the site isn't dismantledIt's at http:// [redacted] [redacted] .net/I hope you disregard ***'s submission and leave my A+ ratingPlease let me know if you have any questions.Thank you!Cameron

Revdex.com:I would like my complaint ID [redacted] , to be handled through an Arbitration hearing with Revdex.com.Regards,

Complaint: [redacted] I am rejecting this response because:I would like to address the points that MrW [redacted] made within his response as they are many and each point requires a detailed address I will start from the top Yes I do agree that we required a new site, but saying our ***Commerce site was so crippled that it didn't work is far from the truth Our ***Commerce platform was well capable of taking orders, making discounts, sending out and rewarding an incentivized customer referral, receiving leads from a newsletter sign up form and many other functions We chose to start a new web platform because we felt it was time to upgrade to something better and not because we couldn't do business The lockout that MrW [redacted] talks about occurred under his supervision and it occurred when we were well into the construction of the [redacted] platform Yes MrW [redacted] gave us his professional opinion on why to use [redacted] and we spent an extensive amount of time considering the matter, but many points that he even talks about here came to be not true But the reason we agreed with MrW [redacted] is because we had to give him the benefit of the doubt as a professional, which he ended up showing otherwise time and time againFor example he states how it is search engine friendly, yet we were plagued with customer service calls from customers who had trouble using our site on [redacted] and even on mobile devices This is a profound problem which was never addressed.The talk of the leap backwards can be addressed under this evidence and will cover the points addressed by MrW** The referral program that we had on our ***Commerce site was an incentivized system for our current customers to send an invite to their friends or family Most importantly it was au***ated and it would reward both the referred and the referrer My entering their information and their friend's information the system would create an automatic coupon and send it to the friend The friend would receive $off their first order, and once they used that coupon the referring party would receive $off as a reward as well This was highly incentivized and we gained many customers from it The system that MrW [redacted] built on [redacted] is as close to SPAM mailing as anything can get There was no incentive for the customer or the individual that they wanted to refer Sending the referral would get them an email which would get blocked by every SPAM filter known to man or ignored as SPAM It was small, had no catch and quite frankly looked like a scam Needless to say we gained no traffic through this.MrW [redacted] speaks about the "Live Chat" as a source to get leads I would like to state that it was never the intention or the purpose of the Live Chat to gain new leads nor did it ever do so The Live Chat was there to answer small questions or concerns that customers had It had no way of adding customers to any kind of mailing list, incentivized or not, for the purpose of re-marketing to them and creating a way to send content and bonuses to gain the customer's trust As a matter of fact, by Anti-Spam laws we had no right to send them any promotional content past the topic of question they had sent us to begin with That contact would begin and end with their needs for customer services and was not appropriate for the use of marketing.I am glad that MrW [redacted] chose to note the newsletter section with [redacted] next because it ties directly into the previous paragraph We had an app on ***Commerce that would allow customers to leave their email and contact information with the permission to market to them further We would add these lists to our email system to send out weekly newsletters This is used because sometimes a potential customer may find our site and services intriguing, but for some reason like having to go and pick up the kids from school or other reasons, they cannot make a purchase right then This would allow us to then keep a long term communication with them and remind them about us in the hopes that they will make a purchase in the future The [redacted] site did not have this at all and it is an absolutely vital part of e-commerce When we knew we were going to switch sites in early we began looking for new programs to help give us an edge and we were shown [redacted] This program would turn the manual labor of emailing potential customers into an automated powerhouse of information that customers could benefit from and then use to make their purchase We created a custom box for the [redacted] site that was supposed to take the necessary customer information prior to their purchase and then market to them according to the specific categories they chose from It would then send them a programmed email campaign that would give them free content and build a relationship with potential clients MrW [redacted] talks about the checkbox at the end of the checkout process, which was asked for, but it was not the full extent of the integration of [redacted] The focus of the checkbox was to abide by certain Anti-Spam laws that dictates a purchase is not enough to sign up for a mailing campaign, but a customer must specifically agree to receive further promotional emails That was the sole purpose of that checkbox Yet MrW [redacted] decided to create a redundant system, out of our $investment into [redacted] We already received customer information when they purchased and it went to a different campaign We needed [redacted] for potential customers who had not purchased yet Yet when MrW [redacted] exclaimed to us that after a long and exhaustive effort the checkbox was installed we were taken aback We told him that it was not set up how we discussed and he stated that it was not his interpretation of the work and any further work on it required further payment He refused to discuss the matter further and cited a clause in the work contract that is reminding of the Anti-Spam compliance as being the extent of the [redacted] integration As assumed, we have not received a single bit of contact information from potential clients since [redacted] was launched in request of further marketing information A system that previously brought in hundreds of interested individuals every month no long existed and those leads were lost.In reference to the dynamic pricing the program was installed completely wrong The purpose was to give customers a bulk discount depending on how much they purchased of a single product at one time This gave incentive for larger order tickets, which helped drive our sales up It was a very simple system in ***Commerce that took only a couple clicks of the keyboard to work The system that was built up by MrW [redacted] did not work properly, did not manage those bulk discounts correctly, gave no information to customers on the existence of those bulk discounts and was extremely complicated to set up We had it up only for a week and had to turn it off because it only confused our employees and customers As expected our sales ticket sizes dropped[redacted] Analytics did work, but only in the most basic ways and even that did not work properly With ***Commerce we could not only see where customers are going and from where, but we could see how much time they spent on each specific page, how much each entry cost us in ads and most importantly how much money each link and doorway created for us in sales In [redacted] MrW [redacted] was only able top get the very basics set up We never had the Commerce details up in [redacted] so we were flying blind as to ROI and many other important points about our site That being said even the basic points did not work properly and MrW [redacted] was made aware of them, yet he was not able to fix the issue Every single page on the site was made to be unique depending on who was on the page So instead of seeing that people were on king crab, were on caviar and etc; we saw a plethora of highly unique Urls that told us absolutely no information because they were so unique In the end we lost the ability to see further than what landing page customers used to enter our site Past that it became unique and unintelligible.The inventory was a complete disaster 99% of all online stores consider a unit of inventory to be claimed when the purchase has actually been made That way it is permanently out of the inventory count [redacted] considers the online store to be like a brick and mortar store, which made business extremely difficult and more time consuming than needed to manage If a customer added a product into the shopping cart it would be considered to be “sold” and not available to add to another customer’s shopping cart If that cart was abandoned it would require hours for it to register and abandoned so that we could delete it and place the items within it back into stock, just like the shelf of a store Problem is that if we had some rare items or items that are running low in stock, it would take exponentially longer to sell them because of this We would have to monitor the inventory constantly to make sure that abandoned carts didn’t run a lot dry in the inventory For a popular item it should not take more than one day on average to sell it off once it hits a count below units But with [redacted] it would take weeks and cost us countless sales We addressed this issue with MrW**, who gave us a solution of being more vigilant about keeping tabs on it This is not an automated system At least ***Commerce could properly count our inventory.The blog is an interesting topic which MrW [redacted] has failed to understand We created the blog to boost our SEO (Search Engine Optimization), which helps get us higher on the search results in places like [redacted] Unfortunately the blog was built in such a manner that it registered in [redacted] as a separate website, which gave absolutely no constructive results with our store As a result it has become much harder for us to boost our search engine results and has cost us significant organic sales (sales from new customers not derived from paid advertisements).When we talk about the hosting fees we saw on December 11th, that [redacted] had a variable pricing for monthly fees depending on how much revenue we made in a calendar year We asked Cameron about this and he assured us that because we were on his company server that we would never have an increase I will attach snippets of our email conversation where he begins denying any kind of price increase plan That being said he originally charges us $per month, but on March 11, he told us that he will disregard the promise he made before and every month charge us an increased rate until we hit that revenue based rate We would have been paying between $to $per month with this new rate I will attach the email where he says this as well As we all know basic math, 59x10=590, so yes, he would have increased our rate fold.In regards to the rates, I can show that MrW [redacted] previous to having us stuck on [redacted] charged us a completely different rate than after We began speaking to him of editing some aesthetics and a couple points of functionality to the checkout page MrW [redacted] made a point that it was not in the agreement so we asked him to quote us All it was requesting was to add a few apps and to change the organization of the page To this MrW [redacted] invoiced us $3000.00, just for one section to be edited When we asked [redacted] to do the same thing they quoted us $13, Let me make something very clear We spent around $on this site and we expected that this fee would take us to where we wanted So charging more than 1/of the price of a full site to edit one section is preposterous When working on our ***Commerce site MrW [redacted] would charge us only a few hundred dollars for work of a similar extent Why such a huge difference? I will attach the invoices and quotes I want to be perfectly clear that we had more than one task to ask for the [redacted] site at this point and with that kind of rate we would have been able to build a brand new site with the functions we wanted and still have change left, and lo and behold we did just that We built a brand new site for around $with every function that MrW [redacted] wanted to heavily charge us and much more, and still had change left compared to his invoices for work outside the original plan.I do not know what MrW [redacted] considers as a late fee, since we began receiving requests for final payment long before the site was done I have emails that I will attach where MrW [redacted] is asking for that payment before [redacted] is complete or before we even had a blog So there is no actual date to compare from in order to charge late fees As far as we are concerned the late fees were chosen from a random date of completion that MrW [redacted] came up with in his own head Where he got January 12th from is beyond me as he didn’t even set the blog up by then These are not “minor” tasks as he states but vital sections of the site If he truly believes that they are minor then he is either delusional or has no concept of what a successful and modern ecommerce site is.MrW [redacted] states that he locked our data in a way that did not affect our business I can tell you that it is very untrueI asked him for information on how to export customer information because we were planning on launching a specialized marketing campaign and compare the customer data from customers who had created accounts with us, to customers who had not We wanted to give the unregistered customers a deal to sign up and have an account with us This is important because a customer who has an account is more likely to make frequent purchases MrW [redacted] responded with stating that I will not receive any such data until we paid him As a result we were not able to create that detailed campaign at that time So yes, his actions did keep us from making sales, because it kept us from being able to use important data to analyze customer actions and make effective marketing plans in accordance It is not only vital for us to be able to accept and ship orders, but it is absolutely vital for a business to be able to accurately and efficiently market to their current and potential customers; and MrW [redacted] intentionally sabotaged that It is completely regardless to the fact whether he meant to cause harm or not, but his actions had a negative impact and restrained us from accomplishing basic and vital business tasks.With all of the failures stated above we decided in January of that we needed to find a new developer We attempted to find credible developers that worked on ***, but we could not find any that were well reviewed We ended up hiring a team to build us a completely new site from scratch on a [redacted] platform, which now is live and running very well It should be of note that we launched the [redacted] platform in October of 2015, and by January of we felt like we had hit a brick wall with working with Trent Studios and [redacted] and were so unsatisfied with the work they had done that we felt that it was truly necessary for the sake of our business to spend the money to build a new site away from [redacted] and Trent Studios We want nothing to do with [redacted] or that site anymore MrW [redacted] claims that he kept the site up which brings another concern to the table When we told him that we were no longer working with him, MrW [redacted] told us that he will “delete the account immediately” I will attach the email where he says so But now he send links to it like nothing was ever deleted It is blatant lies like this that keep us from trusting him or his word MrW [redacted] states that he was afraid that we were going to leave the platform If he was really that convinced of the quality of his work then why did he think we were so unhappy that we were leaving him without pay? I think that MrW [redacted] realized the shoddy job he did on this site and I believe that he expected at that point for us to make some kind of move to leave him Of course we did not want to pay him for the last bit of the invoices We felt like the work was undone and unsatisfactory and we were convinced at that point that is was never going to be finished We were almost done with creating a [redacted] site so that we could escape from this disaster and try to create a strong ecommerce site like we had originally sought out to do We expected that MrW [redacted] was going to create a site that would carry us into success in our business for years, or even decades But instead we were forced to dump the project and replace it not even months after launch because of its lack of functionality and future MrW [redacted] talks about how [redacted] is so great and how it is coming out with programs such a rewards But this is something that everyone else has had for almost a decade! We expected a site that would get us to the front of the heard, not playing catch up Regards, [redacted]

Complaint: [redacted] I am rejecting this response because:The following is a response to MrW**We need to diverge from concentrating on the ***commerce site too much The main focus is on the [redacted] platform built by Trent Studios Yes we know we had issues with the [redacted] site and that is not the question at hand What matters about the word press site is that it had many functions that greatly aided in our business that were completely overlooked and ignored by Trent Studios The important idea is we wanted to take what we had in word press that worked and improve on it Not completely reinvent it without any of the old, yet very vital features The example MrW [redacted] gives of the error code in not an example of the lockout It was an error in communicating between ***commerce and [redacted] .net Not only was it an issue that occurred less than 0.5% of the time, but it was fixed How that is an example of how poorly off we were is a complete mystery to me.As for what MrW [redacted] keeps saying was never in the initial proposal I would like to use a metaphor to make a point We had a car that was not working properly and we had a list of new things we wanted, like gps, or cruise control We expected that in the new car we bought we would at have the old features that we were used to But we didn’t We got the car with the gps and cruise control, but they didn’t add the suspension or a steering wheel Trent studios was supposed to upgrade us, so that we could take advantage of the current features we had, and at the same time have a better system that was easier to use and had the new features we wanted Instead we received a shoddy version of the upgrades, a very difficult system, and nearly none of the previous features we had beforeWhat MrW [redacted] states about the inventory is a complete and utter falsification He is either lying or is so dense that he isn’t able to understand the problem Closing our online store and adding inventory is not the issue The issue is that if we had lets say items in our inventory and someone came in and decided to add into the shopping cart, then our inventory would remove those and we would only have available for sale If that person then decided against the purchase it would take at least an hour for the site to verify the cart as abandoned and then we would have to go in and manually delete that cart to return the products to the digital shelf If that that time a customer comes in and wants units and sees that only out of the available are available to them, then we lost a sale of one unit This is a completely unusual system Stating that our [redacted] platform does the same thing is completely untrue What the article that MrW [redacted] shows is completely misrepresented What [redacted] does is that when someone is actually paying for their order (plugging in credit card information, paypal logins or [redacted] pay) it takes the products on hold so that two people cannot place an order for the same product which may be low on inventory at the same time because at that point the customer is over 90% likely to actually purchase the product and permanently take it out of stock The system then releases the products almost immediately and automatically if lets say the customer’s credit card declines or they did not pay for it With [redacted] it would take the item out of stock just for being added to the cart, regardless of whether the customer would go on to place a purchase or if they would leave the site right after adding the product to the cart, and then you would have to wait over an hour and have to manually go in and delete the cart These are completely different situations.With the hosting fees at least MrW [redacted] admits to skyrocketing our rates But the fact that he lied about us being on his server thus being immune to [redacted] rates is only the tip of the iceberg As you can see in his previous response he states that he never deleted the website, and now he is doubling back with an excuse for why he lied about it How can we do business with someone who constantly has a hidden agenda? MrW [redacted] complains that we didn’t tell him about many of these problems like [redacted] not working properly, but that is because it got to the point that we were tired of having to argue with him How many times do we have to hear the same story with him before we can give up? I have better things to do than to be talking to a parrot whose only response to every claim and complaint is exactly the same Why should I waste my time with raising new concerns when I am most likely going to be told that having [redacted] work properly with our site was not in the agreement? MrW [redacted] is even agreeing that his work was not done until around February Then why are we still talking about January and late fees? How is that even ethical business when he is not even done with completing basic functions and he is already calling in the bills and talking about late fees The complete product is not even delivered! How can we be late at paying when he isn’t even finished working!? MrW [redacted] has only been concerned about receiving a payday and putting us behind him rather than making sure that we were left with a working and complete project His responses here highlight that exact attitude as he has been far more concerned about keeping his A+ rating than finding a solution to this issueImagine if your dentist didn’t even finish cleaning your teeth and demands that you pay him and when you ask about finishing the work he keeps reluctantly continuing on, all the way until throwing a fit and demanding pay or seeing some kind of repercussion How is throwing a wrench in the gears of our business pending payment ethic business practices? He takes away our access to our data that we amassed through our own work and keeps us from properly doing our jobs in an productive manner He may as well have removed our fuel pump from a car and argued that the engine still works.I at this point request that a member of the Revdex.com looks over this as I do not believe this constant back and forward conversation is going to go anywhere and anything that will be said, has been said.Regards, [redacted]

I didn't say the previous site was crippled and didn't workI said my hands were tied a lot of times and couldn't perform tasksFor example, among the first things I tried to do was make a baof the *** siteI couldn't install a baplvia the dashboard, nor could I FTP one into placeThe lock-out was already in place when I showin January See January 12, email with Subject: website, backupThe ***/***Commerce site apparently was not well capable of taking ordersSee email January with Subject: Fwd: [*** ***] New customer order (#***) - January 10, 2015*** stated "Error ***If a customer places an order or fails to place the correct information and it is declined they get stuck in eternal limbo where the system believes any future order is a copy and declines it."Even *** complained about the previous ***/***Commerce siteOn January 8th, he said "We currently have a very weak landing page..." and "We have had an issue in the past of automating the site. Quite allot of our functions still are done manually..." and "We can currently automate sales and discounts on our site, but the result is very botched and broken. If we put a end date on a sale, then they always end on a random time the day before, resulting with annoyed customers and us manually working the ups and downs of the sale anyways." and "We will need to change how people opt in. The current button doesn't really work as we get almost no interested parties opting in."No one mentioned problems with customers using *** *** until now.Regarding the Refer a Friend feature: the rewarding part of the friend referral was not in the initial proposal (April 2015)*** didn't mention it until October, See email with Subject Re: subject for our callWhich was just a couple days before he pulled me off track again with another crisis - SSL expirationAnd I warned him that this was going to push-back the completion dateNeither *** or *** said they wanted the customer to have an incentive to refer someone else.The live chat was put in place to see live shoppers and help them with their order, per ***'s instructionsSee email from April 3, with Subject: *** estimate.Regarding 'app that would allow customers to leave their email and contact information with the permission to market to them further.': Sounds like an email newsletter featureThe proposal says a checkbox during checkoutIf *** wanted something more, all they had to do was askWe (Trent Studios and ***) integrated *** with *** *** by adding a checkbox during checkout what was checked by defaultWhen this tasks was finished on January and I emailed both *** and *** letting them know it finishedSee emails with Subject: *** integration complete.I did what was askedNow, *** complains about things they didn't get, but never asked for.Regarding dynamic pricing: On October 13, 2015, *** asked "is there an option for dynamic pricing in ***?" See emails with Subject: dynamic pricingOn October 14, 2015, I replied "Volume Pricing? The more you buy of a particular product, the greater a discount you get on it?http://www.***.com/videos/store_owners/volume-pricing/149"*** replied: "Yes"That was the last I heard about itIf anyone had questions about it or was confused, they didn't tell meAgain, all they had to do was ask.Regarding *** Analytics: I installed every *** tag *** asked me toThen he asked me to remove someAgain, he said on January 23rd, "New Analytic works very good"If it didn't work properly, why did he say it 'works very good'?If inventory was a disaster it was because they (*** and ***) didn't do as I recommended, which was to take the store off-line to make inventory adjustments.Regarding ***'s comment "99% of all online stores consider a unit of inventory to be claimed when the purchase has actually been made" - Even ***, the system *** is using as of April 21, 2016, takes items out of inventory before the consumer has actually checked-outSee https://docs.***.com/manual/products/inventory/why-does-checkout-think-a-product...⇄ : "When a customer proceeds to checkout all of the items in their cart are put on hold for minutes to give the customer a chance to complete the checkout without another customer purchasing the items and overselling themOnce you're at that stage in the checkout, it's on holdThis issue will resolve itself after minutes have expired."Regarding the blog: once I moved their blog onto my server, they could have used itAgain, all they had to do was askI recommended they keep their blogs as part of ***, but they didn't have to.Regarding hosting fees: I don't deny a price increaseIt is unfortunate that *** told me they wouldn't increase their hosting fees, but a few months later they didI can't do anything about that.This was what I sent *** regarding hosting increase:April hosting fee: $150May hosting fee: $250After May: (revenue-based)$- $100K - Seat: $80$100K - $200K - Seats: $150$200K - $500K - Seats: $200$500K - $1.5M - Seats: $500$1.5M + - Seats: $1250Regarding rates:The $*** is referring to is the customization of the checkout pagesIt involved:Checkout steps at the top of the checkout pagesCart Summary with product Name, Total, and any discounts appliedCheckout Step 1: Show Billing information and not Shipping informationHave 'I Agree to Terms' checkbox at bot*** of Step page with link to TermsCustomer Fields in one column and ta2/of pagePopulate City and State au***atically when zip code is enteredFor both Shipping and Billing cus***er fields, remove Other State/ProvinceRemove CountryCheckout Step 2: Show Shipping information onlyAt the top of page, have: Same as Billing Information? When checked, automatically populate fieldsOn checkout Step 2, have "Our products are perishable - let them know it's coming! Send shipping notification by: checkbox Phone (landline only) - checkbox Email - checkbox No Notification" (this won't be au***atedIt will be up to you to call or email the customer)Checkout Step 3, on left 2/of page have Ship via, Pay with, and Redeem Gift Certificate, Billing and Shipping address confirmation below thatCart Summary on the right 1/of pageCheckout Step 4: Invoice and show the customers a link that will take them to the create account page and pre-fill all of the account information involved with their order.I don't know *** was quotingIf they didn't like ***'s quote, they could get another estimate from another *** DeveloperA *** search for '*** developer' brinseveral.Regarding "When working on our ***Commerce site MrW** would charge us only a few hundred dollars for work of a similar extent.": For a few hundred dollars, I displayed a message during checkout when certain states are selected for shipping toBig difference between this ***Commerce task and the customization of the checkout pages.Regarding late fees and ***/*** Integration:The proposal states: *** Integration $800-$(adds checkbox during checkout)I charged $1,On January 8th 2016, this feature was completed.On January 12th, 2016, I sent an invoice for the balance of the work and pointed-out that it carries a 10% per month late fee*** said some tasks weren't doneI asked whatHe never responded.On February 9th, 2016, I reminded *** about the open invoiceI hadn't addany late fees, yetThen he responds "We will pay within weeksAt the same time please finish page with fish (make then online and pictures open very slow due to high latency)." I completed these tasks on February 10th, and submitted another invoiceThe pictures were loading slowly because someone at *** uploaded very large picturesFor example, one of the fish sub-category images was pixels wide at dpiI told *** they were too large and to resize themHe did not do as I recommended.On March 6, 2016, I still hadn't heard from ***, so I sent another email:"Hi, ***, ***, and ***.I'm wondering what your intentions are with respect to the final paymentYou mentioned on February 9th that you would have that payment to me within weeksIt's been over weeks.Thank you!Cameron"***'s response was: "We will pay, but hard to say whenWe have the worst season ever in Alaska and cash is very tites *** ***"I asked if they would like to arrange paymentsThey didn't respond.On March 11th, I sent:"Hi, Guys.A few things:I haven't heard from you regarding your open invoiceYour 2nd payment is past due as of February 12thThe attached invoice now includes that 10% per month late feeThat invoice also includes hosting feesIf you're not going to pay for the work I've completed or pay for hosting, I have to take your website downIf I don't have a payment by this time next week, I will have to suspend your websiteAlthough *** told me last October that your hosting fees would not increase, as of last night that has changedAs a result I must start increasing your monthly hosting fees to catch-upYour April hosting fee will be $Your May hosting fee will be, $After May, I will adopt a similar annual *** revenue structure to ***'s:$- $100K - Seat: $80$100K - $200K - Seats: $150$200K - $500K - Seats: $200$500K - $1.5M - Seats: $500$1.5M + - Seats: $1250"On March 11, 2016, *** said he'd mail a check for $1,000.On March 17, 2016, *** asked "is it possible to export the customer log in and password data from our site?"On March 19, 2016, I responded: "Hi, ***.That's been disabled, along with exporting of anything else except ***'s batch reports, until your account has been brought currentI've also disabled FTP and taken the *** site off-line.The payment I was suppose to receive last week didn't comeIf you're not going to pay for hosting, I have to take the entire website off-lineI will take the website down at the end of the day, Friday, March 25th, if I do not receive a payment by then.Cameron"Again, on January 12, 2016, work was completeBut let's say work wasn't complete until after I aligned the images and resized the fish images - February 9thI didn't get a payment until March 28th, I warned them of late fees back in January, 2016.Yes, I did suspend (delete) their websiteThen I activated it again because I thought something like this would happen, and I thought I might need it to point-out ***' lies.If *** was planning on leaving ***/me in January, why ask for customer's usernames and passwords for a marketing campaign? I suspected they were trying to leave without paying their bill

(First off, I would be more than happen to share any emails and screenshots with the Revdex.com to back-up my response. I responded to [redacted] yesterday and pointed-out that his claims are not correct. I suspect [redacted] is really upset that [redacted] overlooked a few details in the...

initial proposal/estimate, and that he, [redacted], wasn't included in our initial conversations. I apologize for the length of my response, but I feel it's necessary.)I recommended [redacted] leave [redacted]Commerce because a lot of their requests could not be completed because the previous web developer had their website locked down so tight that the [redacted] software, and it's plug-ins, couldn't be upgraded. I researched a few e-commerce platforms, for example [redacted], [redacted] and [redacted], and determined [redacted] was [redacted]' best choice due to the amount of customizations they wanted to make, it's faster, more search engine friendly, etc.I gave [redacted] an estimate/proposal on April 13, 2015. It included line items of what I was going to do and a couple mock-ups/screenshots of how the new site was going to look. They choose a mock-up. [redacted] (of [redacted]) and I ironed-out many details, including custom features and prices.On April 21, 2015 [redacted] asked for an exact date of completion and a discount if those tasks weren't completed by that exact date. I told him I couldn't do that as there are too many variables involved and that I hadn't even received their deposit yet, sometimes there are software glitches, unforeseen problems, etc. I told him I could guarantee that certain tasks be completed by a certain date, for example 40 products be entered, shipping configured, etc.On September 4, 2015 I received their deposit and I got to work.I don't know why they're saying the new website is a leap backwards. They couldn't install software updates before, or export products, add new features. They literally couldn't do anything but process orders. They were stuck. Not only did I free them, so-to-speak, of those limitations by giving them a new state-of-the-art e-commerce site, but over time, between myself and another developer, we got their old [redacted] site off of [redacted] servers and onto my server so they could have all their old information.I don't know why [redacted] says they lost some features or programs, for example Refer a Friend. It's on the product page. It's been there a long time. See http://[redacted].[redacted].net/[redacted]
Regarding his claim that they lost the ability to get leads from customers: that, too, has been in place. Customers could click the Live Chat button, call the number at the top or bot[redacted] of the website, click the email link at the bottom of the site, click the Contact Us button in the navigation bar. (since [redacted] has pointed their domain name elsewhere, the live chat feature doesn't work anymore).Regarding newsletters: In the proposal, I listed that a checkbox would be added during checkout so customers could subscribe to their newsletter. This has been done.Regarding dynamic prices: as I was building the site, I directed them to [redacted]'s training videos that shows them how to use coupons, sales, and other marketing features. I emailed [redacted] this link on October 10th, 2015.Regarding [redacted] Analytics and selling on [redacted]: [redacted] Center module was installed, and I installed every tag and line of code [redacted] asked me to. On January 23rd, 2016 [redacted] said "New Analytic works very good”.Regarding [redacted]'s "blunders": The Tell a Friend module was reporting an error. It was fixed on November 18, 2015. This is the only blunder that I can find/recall.Regarding [redacted] inventory claim: [redacted] was reporting an inventory problem. I asked if he was adjusting inventory while the site was live and I pointed-out that that was not recommended as the software was au[redacted]atically removing and adding items from inventory as shoppers added items and removed items from their basket. [redacted] said not only that he was adjusting inventory while the site was live, but [redacted] was, too. I told him the correct way to adjust inventory (take the site off-line to adjust inventory).Regarding the blog: [redacted] and I discussed this. Because the old site was still locked-up at [redacted], he had two options: rebuild the blog from scratch or allow me to install a blog module into the [redacted] system. He opted for the later and I installed it. While I was installing the blog module, I was able to free his old [redacted] site from [redacted] servers. [redacted] said he would copy the blog posts from [redacted] and paste them into the blog module. (I can show you the email)Regarding [redacted]'s comment on my inability to communicate: I've asked him to explain or point-out examples with me to back this claim up. He hasn't as of yet. I believe I have responded quickly. When [redacted] initially emailed me when his old site was down, I put all my other work aside to help him. I can show you the emails and time-lines.Regarding [redacted]: I'm not sure what [redacted]'s talking about there, but that's the newsletter system, which is in place. That's the checkbox during checkout. It's done and tested to work.I've delivered everything that's in the proposal and more. I can show you the proposal and the website (that's still on my server).Regarding his comment that I asked for more money: when a new task was requested that wasn't in the proposal, I gave them an estimate, and I didn't proceed until I got their approval.Regarding late completion: I started working on their new site on September 27th, after I received their deposit. In my proposal, I asked for 3 months to compete the items outlined in the proposal. On October 4th, 2015, my work flow was interrupted by [redacted] requesting I help get their existing site, which was on [redacted], back on-line. I stopped everything I was working on to help them in their new crisis. I don't know why they don't understand that that interruption was going to affect the delivery date.When we launched the new site in October (ahead of schedule because their site on [redacted] was down), I warned [redacted] that some features were not completed, but he wanted to go live anyway so they could make some money. People could order products and checkout. Basic functionality was working.Regarding hosting fees: It is unfortunate that [redacted] raised their hosting fees (March) after they told me they wouldn't (October). But 10-fold? That's not correct. I was charging [redacted] $59/mo. [redacted] increased their rate to $150/mo. [redacted] didn't pay this, anyway, so I don't see why [redacted]'s complaining about it.Regarding [redacted]'s developer's rates: they charge $125/hr. Most other non-[redacted] developers I work with also charge about this rate.I believe the dissatisfaction [redacted] is talking about is in regards to the fact they once I completed the items in the proposal, I asked for the balance, then [redacted] started pointing out items that he said weren't complete, but either wasn't in the proposal or was never requested. For example, in the proposal, it states a newsletter checkbox during checkout. Later, [redacted] complained that the checkbox wasn't on every page. I pointed-out to [redacted] that the checkbox wasn't suppose to be on every page. According to the proposal, it's on the checkout page. In other words, they complained about things that they never asked for.Regarding the 'power of stance', [redacted] is referring to: when they said they couldn't pay the balance, I disabled the exporting of products and other data, and I disabled FTP access so they couldn't take the work I had completed and move elsewhere and never pay the bill. I made sure that the limitations I put in place did not affect their ability to accept orders, and for their customers to place orders.I emailed the balance invoice on January 12, 2016. In that email, I mentioned a 10% per month late fee. [redacted] said some tasks weren't complete. I asked which tasks. He pointed-out minor alignment issues, which I fixed immediately (I can show you the emails and screenshots or the live site). On February 9th, I submitted the balance invoice, again. Again, pointing-out the 10% per month late fee. (I hadn't charged a late fee to this point). [redacted] asked for another little change, which I addressed. He said they would send a payment in 3 weeks. On March 9th, I still hadn't received a payment, so I reminded them of it and asked what their intentions were. [redacted] said he would pay, but didn't know when. I asked if they wanted to arrange for payments. On March 11th, 2016 they said they could send $1000.On March 20th, 2016, I received a check for $1000, and was approved by [redacted] to charge their credit card $1000. On April 1st 2016 [redacted] said I could charge their card for the balance. I did and enabled FTP and exporting of information. Also on April 1st, I pointed-out that April hosting is due. He said they couldn't pay for the entire month. I offered to let them pay for half the month. They said they would send a check for half the month. I haven't received that yet.When [redacted] complained about something, such as image alignment, I fixed it. When he complained about the layout of the checkout pages, we started talking about it (I can show you the emails) and was working on mock-ups.When [redacted] demanded a refund, I responded with much of the above. I don't see that a refund is warranted. Again, I've completed everything in the proposal and more. If anything, they owe me for my time working on the mock-ups for the redesigned checkout pages. But that's my fault for not getting a deposit on that project.Again, let me know if you would like to see emails or screenshots. Contrary to what [redacted] said, the site isn't dismantled. It's at http://[redacted].[redacted].net/I hope you disregard [redacted]'s submission and leave my A+ rating. Please let me know if you have any questions.Thank you!Cameron

Revdex.com:I would like my complaint ID [redacted], to be handled through an Arbitration hearing with Revdex.com.Regards,

On Mon, May 23, 2016 at 12:41 PM, Cameron W** <[redacted]> wrote:Ok. Let’s arbitrate. What’s next?

Complaint: [redacted]
I am rejecting this response because:The following is a response to Mr. W**. We need to diverge from concentrating on the [redacted]commerce site too much.  The main focus is on the [redacted] platform built by Trent Studios.  Yes we know we had issues with the [redacted] site and that is not the question at hand.  What matters about the word press site is that it had many functions that greatly aided in our business that were completely overlooked and ignored by Trent Studios.  The important idea is we wanted to take what we had in word press that worked and improve on it.  Not completely reinvent it without any of the old, yet very vital features.   The example Mr. W** gives of the error code in not an example of the lockout.  It was an error in communicating between [redacted]commerce and [redacted].net.  Not only was it an issue that occurred less than 0.5% of the time, but it was fixed.  How that is an example of how poorly off we were is a complete mystery to me.As for what Mr. W** keeps saying was never in the initial proposal.  I would like to use a metaphor to make a point.  We had a car that was not working properly and we had a list of new things we wanted, like gps, or cruise control.  We expected that in the new car we bought we would at have the old features that we were used to.  But we didn’t.  We got the car with the gps and cruise control, but they didn’t add the suspension or a steering wheel.  Trent studios was supposed to upgrade us, so that we could take advantage of the current features we had, and at the same time have a better system that was easier to use and had the new features we wanted.  Instead we received a shoddy version of the upgrades, a very difficult system, and nearly none of the previous features we had before. What Mr. W** states about the inventory is a complete and utter falsification.  He is either lying or is so dense that he isn’t able to understand the problem.  Closing our online store and adding inventory is not the issue.  The issue is that if we had lets say 8 items in our inventory and someone came in and decided to add 5 into the shopping cart, then our inventory would remove those 5 and we would only have 3 available for sale.  If that person then decided against the purchase it would take at least an hour for the site to verify the cart as abandoned and then we would have to go in and manually delete that cart to return the products to the digital shelf.  If that that time a customer comes in and wants 4 units and sees that only 3 out of the available 8 are available to them, then we lost a sale of one unit.  This is a completely unusual system.  Stating that our [redacted] platform does the same thing is completely untrue.  What the article that Mr. W** shows is completely misrepresented.  What [redacted] does is that when someone is actually paying for their order (plugging in credit card information, paypal logins or [redacted] pay) it takes the products on hold so that two people cannot place an order for the same product which may be low on inventory at the same time because at that point the customer is over 90% likely to actually purchase the product and permanently take it out of stock.  The system then releases the products almost immediately and automatically if lets say the customer’s credit card declines or they did not pay for it.  With [redacted] it would take the item out of stock just for being added to the cart, regardless of whether the customer would go on to place a purchase or if they would leave the site right after adding the product to the cart, and then you would have to wait over an hour and have to manually go in and delete the cart.  These are completely different situations.With the hosting fees at least Mr. W** admits to skyrocketing our rates.  But the fact that he lied about us being on his server thus being immune to [redacted] rates is only the tip of the iceberg.  As you can see in his previous response he states that he never deleted the website, and now he is doubling back with an excuse for why he lied about it.  How can we do business with someone who constantly has a hidden agenda?  Mr. W** complains that we didn’t tell him about many of these problems like [redacted] not working properly, but that is because it got to the point that we were tired of having to argue with him.  How many times do we have to hear the same story with him before we can give up?  I have better things to do than to be talking to a parrot whose only response to every claim and complaint is exactly the same.  Why should I waste my time with raising new concerns when I am most likely going to be told that having [redacted] work properly with our site was not in the agreement? Mr. W** is even agreeing that his work was not done until around February.  Then why are we still talking about January and late fees?  How is that even ethical business when he is not even done with completing basic functions and he is already calling in the bills and talking about late fees.  The complete product is not even delivered!  How can we be late at paying when he isn’t even finished working!?  Mr. W** has only been concerned about receiving a payday and putting us behind him rather than making sure that we were left with a working and complete project.  His responses here highlight that exact attitude as he has been far more concerned about keeping his A+ rating than finding a solution to this issue. Imagine if your dentist didn’t even finish cleaning your teeth and demands that you pay him and when you ask about finishing the work he keeps reluctantly continuing on, all the way until throwing a fit and demanding pay or seeing some kind of repercussion.  How is throwing a wrench in the gears of our business pending payment ethic business practices?  He takes away our access to our data that we amassed through our own work and keeps us from properly doing our jobs in an productive manner.  He may as well have removed our fuel pump from a car and argued that the engine still works.I at this point request that a member of the Revdex.com looks over this as I do not believe this constant back and forward conversation is going to go anywhere and anything that will be said, has been said.Regards,
[redacted]

Complaint: [redacted]
I am rejecting this response because:I would like to address the points that Mr. W** made within his response as they are many and each point requires a detailed address.  I will start from the top.  Yes I do agree that we required a new site, but saying our [redacted]Commerce site was so crippled that it didn't work is far from the truth.  Our [redacted]Commerce platform was well capable of taking orders, making discounts, sending out and rewarding an incentivized customer referral, receiving leads from a newsletter sign up form and many other functions.  We chose to start a new web platform because we felt it was time to upgrade to something better and not because we couldn't do business.  The lockout that Mr. W** talks about occurred under his supervision and it occurred when we were well into the construction of the [redacted] platform.  Yes Mr. W** gave us his professional opinion on why to use [redacted] and we spent an extensive amount of time considering the matter, but many points that he even talks about here came to be not true.  But the reason we agreed with Mr. W** is because we had to give him the benefit of the doubt as a professional, which he ended up showing otherwise time and time again. For example he states how it is search engine friendly, yet we were plagued with customer service calls from customers who had trouble using our site on [redacted] and even on mobile devices.  This is a profound problem which was never addressed.The talk of the leap backwards can be addressed under this evidence and will cover the points addressed by Mr. W**.  The referral program that we had on our [redacted]Commerce site was an incentivized system for our current customers to send an invite to their friends or family.  Most importantly it was au[redacted]ated and it would reward both the referred and the referrer.  My entering their information and their friend's information the system would create an automatic coupon and send it to the friend.  The friend would receive $10 off their first order, and once they used that coupon the referring party would receive $10 off as a reward as well.  This was highly incentivized and we gained many customers from it.  The system that Mr. W** built on [redacted] is as close to SPAM mailing as anything can get.  There was no incentive for the customer or the individual that they wanted to refer.  Sending the referral would get them an email which would get blocked by every SPAM filter known to man or ignored as SPAM.  It was small, had no catch and quite frankly looked like a scam.  Needless to say we gained no traffic through this.Mr. W** speaks about the "Live Chat" as a source to get leads.  I would like to state that it was never the intention or the purpose of the Live Chat to gain new leads nor did it ever do so.  The Live Chat was there to answer small questions or concerns that customers had.  It had no way of adding customers to any kind of mailing list, incentivized or not, for the purpose of re-marketing to them and creating a way to send content and bonuses to gain the customer's trust.  As a matter of fact, by Anti-Spam laws we had no right to send them any promotional content past the topic of question they had sent us to begin with.  That contact would begin and end with their needs for customer services and was not appropriate for the use of marketing.I am glad that Mr. W** chose to note the newsletter section with [redacted] next because it ties directly into the previous paragraph.  We had an app on [redacted]Commerce that would allow customers to leave their email and contact information with the permission to market to them further.  We would add these lists to our email system to send out weekly newsletters.  This is used because sometimes a potential customer may find our site and services intriguing, but for some reason like having to go and pick up the kids from school or other reasons, they cannot make a purchase right then.  This would allow us to then keep a long term communication with them and remind them about us in the hopes that they will make a purchase in the future.  The [redacted] site did not have this at all and it is an absolutely vital part of e-commerce.   When we knew we were going to switch sites in early 2015 we began looking for new programs to help give us an edge and we were shown [redacted].  This program would turn the manual labor of emailing potential customers into an automated powerhouse of information that customers could benefit from and then use to make their purchase.  We created a custom box for the [redacted] site that was supposed to take the necessary customer information prior to their purchase and then market to them according to the specific categories they chose from.  It would then send them a programmed email campaign that would give them free content and build a relationship with potential clients.  Mr. W** talks about the checkbox at the end of the checkout process, which was asked for, but it was not the full extent of the integration of [redacted].  The focus of the checkbox was to abide by certain Anti-Spam laws that dictates a purchase is not enough to sign up for a mailing campaign, but a customer must specifically agree to receive further promotional emails.  That was the sole purpose of that checkbox.  Yet Mr. W** decided to create a redundant system, out of our $4000 investment into [redacted].  We already received customer information when they purchased and it went to a different campaign.  We needed [redacted] for potential customers who had not purchased yet.  Yet when Mr. W** exclaimed to us that after a long and exhaustive effort the checkbox was installed we were taken aback.  We told him that it was not set up how we discussed and he stated that it was not his interpretation of the work and any further work on it required further payment.  He refused to discuss the matter further and cited a clause in the work contract that is reminding of the Anti-Spam compliance as being the extent of the [redacted] integration.  As assumed, we have not received a single bit of contact information from potential clients since [redacted] was launched in request of further marketing information.  A system that previously brought in hundreds of interested individuals every month no long existed and those leads were lost.In reference to the dynamic pricing the program was installed completely wrong.  The purpose was to give customers a bulk discount depending on how much they purchased of a single product at one time.  This gave incentive for larger order tickets, which helped drive our sales up.  It was a very simple system in [redacted]Commerce that took only a couple clicks of the keyboard to work.  The system that was built up by Mr. W** did not work properly, did not manage those bulk discounts correctly, gave no information to customers on the existence of those bulk discounts and was extremely complicated to set up.  We had it up only for a week and had to turn it off because it only confused our employees and customers.  As expected our sales ticket sizes dropped.[redacted] Analytics did work, but only in the most basic ways and even that did not work properly.  With [redacted]Commerce we could not only see where customers are going and from where, but we could see how much time they spent on each specific page, how much each entry cost us in ads and most importantly how much money each link and doorway created for us in sales.  In [redacted] Mr. W** was only able top get the very basics set up.  We never had the Commerce details up in [redacted] so we were flying blind as to ROI and many other important points about our site.  That being said even the basic points did not work properly and Mr. W** was made aware of them, yet he was not able to fix the issue.  Every single page on the site was made to be unique depending on who was on the page.  So instead of seeing that 30 people were on king crab, 40 were on caviar and etc; we saw a plethora of highly unique Urls that told us absolutely no information because they were so unique.  In the end we lost the ability to see further than what landing page customers used to enter our site.  Past that it became unique and unintelligible.The inventory was a complete disaster.  99% of all online stores consider a unit of inventory to be claimed when the purchase has actually been made.  That way it is permanently out of the inventory count.  [redacted] considers the online store to be like a brick and mortar store, which made business extremely difficult and more time consuming than needed to manage.  If a customer added a product into the shopping cart it would be considered to be “sold” and not available to add to another customer’s shopping cart.  If that cart was abandoned it would require hours for it to register and abandoned so that we could delete it and place the items within it back into stock, just like the shelf of a store.  Problem is that if we had some rare items or items that are running low in stock, it would take exponentially longer to sell them because of this.  We would have to monitor the inventory constantly to make sure that abandoned carts didn’t run a lot dry in the inventory.  For a popular item it should not take more than one day on average to sell it off once it hits a count below 20 units.  But with [redacted] it would take weeks and cost us countless sales.  We addressed this issue with Mr. W**, who gave us a solution of being more vigilant about keeping tabs on it.  This is not an automated system.  At least [redacted]Commerce could properly count our inventory.The blog is an interesting topic which Mr. W** has failed to understand.  We created the blog to boost our SEO (Search Engine Optimization), which helps get us higher on the search results in places like [redacted].  Unfortunately the blog was built in such a manner that it registered in [redacted] as a separate website, which gave absolutely no constructive results with our store.  As a result it has become much harder for us to boost our search engine results and has cost us significant organic sales (sales from new customers not derived from paid advertisements).When we talk about the hosting fees we saw on December 11th, 2015 that [redacted] had a variable pricing for monthly fees depending on how much revenue we made in a calendar year.    We asked Cameron about this and he assured us that because we were on his company server that we would never have an increase.  I will attach snippets of our email conversation where he begins denying any kind of price increase plan.  That being said he originally charges us $59 per month, but on March 11, 2016 he told us that he will disregard the promise he made before and every month charge us an increased rate until we hit that revenue based rate.  We would have been paying between $500 to $1250 per month with this new rate.  I will attach the email where he says this as well.  As we all know basic math, 59x10=590, so yes, he would have increased our rate 10 fold.In regards to the rates, I can show that Mr. W** previous to having us stuck on [redacted] charged us a completely different rate than after.  We began speaking to him of editing some aesthetics and a couple points of functionality to the checkout page.  Mr. W** made a point that it was not in the agreement so we asked him to quote us.  All it was requesting was to add a few apps and to change the organization of the page.  To this Mr. W** invoiced us $3000.00, just for one section to be edited.  When we asked [redacted] to do the same thing they quoted us $13,000.  Let me make something very clear.  We spent around $8000 on this site and we expected that this fee would take us to where we wanted.  So charging more than 1/3 of the price of a full site to edit one section is preposterous.  When working on our [redacted]Commerce site Mr. W** would charge us only a few hundred dollars for work of a similar extent.  Why such a huge difference?  I will attach the invoices and quotes.  I want to be perfectly clear that we had more than one task to ask for the [redacted] site at this point and with that kind of rate we would have been able to build a brand new site with the functions we wanted and still have change left, and lo and behold we did just that.  We built a brand new site for around $7500 with every function that Mr. W** wanted to heavily charge us and much more, and still had change left compared to his invoices for work outside the original plan.I do not know what Mr. W** considers as a late fee, since we began receiving requests for final payment long before the site was done.  I have emails that I will attach where Mr. W** is asking for that payment before [redacted] is complete or before we even had a blog.  So there is no actual date to compare from in order to charge late fees.  As far as we are concerned the late fees were chosen from a random date of completion that Mr. W** came up with in his own head.  Where he got January 12th from is beyond me as he didn’t even set the blog up by then.  These are not “minor” tasks as he states but vital sections of the site.  If he truly believes that they are minor then he is either delusional or has no concept of what a successful and modern ecommerce site is.Mr. W** states that he locked our data in a way that did not affect our business.  I can tell you that it is very untrue. I asked him for information on how to export customer information because we were planning on launching a specialized marketing campaign and compare the customer data from customers who had created accounts with us, to customers who had not.  We wanted to give the unregistered customers a deal to sign up and have an account with us.  This is important because a customer who has an account is more likely to make frequent purchases.  Mr. W** responded with stating that I will not receive any such data until we paid him.  As a result we were not able to create that detailed campaign at that time.  So yes, his actions did keep us from making sales, because it kept us from being able to use important data to analyze customer actions and make effective marketing plans in accordance.  It is not only vital for us to be able to accept and ship orders, but it is absolutely vital for a business to be able to accurately and efficiently market to their current and potential customers; and Mr. W** intentionally sabotaged that.  It is completely regardless to the fact whether he meant to cause harm or not, but his actions had a negative impact and restrained us from accomplishing basic and vital business tasks.With all of the failures stated above we decided in January of 2016 that we needed to find a new developer.  We attempted to find credible developers that worked on [redacted], but we could not find any that were well reviewed.  We ended up hiring a team to build us a completely new site from scratch on a [redacted] platform, which now is live and running very well.  It should be of note that we launched the [redacted] platform in October of 2015, and by January of 2016 we felt like we had hit a brick wall with working with Trent Studios and [redacted] and were so unsatisfied with the work they had done that we felt that it was truly necessary for the sake of our business to spend the money to build a new site away from [redacted] and Trent Studios.  We want nothing to do with [redacted] or that site anymore.  Mr. W** claims that he kept the site up which brings another concern to the table.  When we told him that we were no longer working with him, Mr. W** told us that he will “delete the account immediately”.  I will attach the email where he says so.  But now he send links to it like nothing was ever deleted.  It is blatant lies like this that keep us from trusting him or his word.  Mr. W** states that he was afraid that we were going to leave the platform.  If he was really that convinced of the quality of his work then why did he think we were so unhappy that we were leaving him without pay?  I think that Mr. W** realized the shoddy job he did on this site and I believe that he expected at that point for us to make some kind of move to leave him.  Of course we did not want to pay him for the last bit of the invoices.  We felt like the work was undone and unsatisfactory and we were convinced at that point that is was never going to be finished.  We were almost done with creating a [redacted] site so that we could escape from this disaster and try to create a strong ecommerce site like we had originally sought out to do.  We expected that Mr. W** was going to create a site that would carry us into success in our business for years, or even decades.  But instead we were forced to dump the project and replace it not even 6 months after launch because of its lack of functionality and future.  Mr. W** talks about how [redacted] is so great and how it is coming out with programs such a rewards.  But this is something that everyone else has had for almost a decade!  We expected a site that would get us to the front of the heard, not playing catch up.
Regards,
[redacted]