A client wanted an e-commerce store designed.

Me: “Do you have a budget?”

Client: “No; it costs what it costs.”

My partner and I proposed a very reasonable price, and in the proposal, we stated that additional hours would be billed at $60 per hour. She refused to even look at the proposal, handing it off to one of the interns to “deal with it.”

The project wore on for about three months, and we still hadn’t been paid for our initial invoice. We called the client.

Client: “My intern is handling it. You’ll get a cheque in the mail.”

About a week later, we hadn’t heard from her, so we did what we usually do: halt work and send them a message. The client phoned me after receiving the message, basically screaming at me.

Client: “This is too expensive! Spend no more than ten hours designing and programming it; I don’t want to spend more than $600!”

We had spent ten hours in meetings alone.

Client: “Why would anyone have a hard time using a website? It’s all about clicking buttons. Make buttons big red squares, and maybe add some sound to each one, so when a user points to a button with the mouse, he’ll hear a ‘button voice’ yelling, ‘Click me! Click me!’ Now, this is what I call a user experience!”

Me: “…”

Client: “Listen, boy, I am not supposed to provide these kinds of solutions. I am paying you to do that! Listen… are you r*****ed or something?”

Client: “The draft looks great. However, since we are marketing this website to college-age students, it is important that the background changes all the time — at least once a week so that they don’t get bored. College students love the Internet, y’know? They expect something new every time they visit a website. It should switch to things like a blackboard, a laptop, a desk… things like that. I should also mention that we have no budget for this. Please find a way to do this for no money.”

A while ago, I was working on a freelance job, and I was in the design stage. I mocked up a few designs and sent them off to the client.

She called me the next day, a bit disturbed and seemingly offended.

Client: “Yeah, hi. I wanted to talk about the designs. I wanted to ask you about what these naked girls are doing on my website.”

Me: “Naked girls? Sorry, what?”

Client: “Well, I’ve opened the files that you sent me, and I scrolled down, and suddenly, I see three naked girls kissing. This is incredibly unprofessional; I’m disgusted that you would send me something like this.”

I had already figured out what was happening, but you can’t just say these things straight away.

Me: “Well, uhh… I’ve just sent you these three screenshots of the design I’ve made so—”

Client: “And now I see a picture of a camel and pictures of a desert. What is all this you’ve sent me?”

Me: “Ma’am, I don’t know how to say this, but I think that what you are seeing are files from your cache. So these are temporary images your computer saves when you go onto a website.”

Client: “What? Oh, no. That can’t be. I’ve never visited sites like that.”

At this point, her husband started to get involved in the telephone conversation. I heard him yelling in the background that what I was saying was “…bulls***! She’s f****** lying!”

I continued explaining about temporary files and how this had nothing to do with the files that I sent. She listened and then suddenly said:

Client: “Well, okay. But another thing, I wanted to say that I don’t speak Latin.”

Me: “Sorry, what do you mean?”

Client: “Well, all the text in the designs that you’ve made are in Latin. I can’t read them.”

And then I explained what Lorem Ipsum was.

Client: “I take it, since I haven’t heard from you, that you are not interested in building my website.”

Me: “I told you I wasn’t interested when I left your office. I can’t imagine why you expected to hear from me.”

Client: “Well, have you changed your mind about working on it?”

Me: “Have you changed your mind about wanting me to do it for free?”

Client: “You would get stock.”

Me: “You don’t have stock. It doesn’t work that way.”

Client: “Well, I am faxing you a non-disclosure agreement.”

Me: “Okay. Why?”

Client: “So you don’t steal my presentation materials and pass them off as your own.”

Me: “I never received any presentation materials.”

Client: “Yes, you did. I showed you the presentation in my office.”

Me: “Are you under the impression that I memorized and recreated your PowerPoint presentation?”

Client: “Well, just don’t.”