COMPANY HIRED FREELANCER THEN REFUSED TO PAY HIM FOR HIS WORK, DRAG & DRAG PAYMENT

Small business owners/managers and their egos

I’m not sure if this is a common experience for freelancers but just want to rant on 2 recent experiences I had:

Service-based business, middle manager reached out to my cold call for help with his “complicated accounting system” (it’s Microsoft Excel VBA and each retail shop has its own Excel file). Work was done, but the fella kept dragging payment. Only when I gave him deadline before I file for Small Claims Court then he paid up, but not before asking for a discount.

Retail shop owner looking for help with his broken website (it’s WordPress, namoamitabha), we met up at a McDonald’s. I told him I was in an SIM tee, and he spent 5 minutes pretending not to see me despite me being the only guy with that tee in the restaurant.

Called him on mobile and he finally acknowledged the reality. First thing he asked was “oh you from SIM?”, and I explained to him I graduated from university more than a decade ago, and it was a free t-shirt. End up after discussion, he went to DIY fix his site with Wix.

No hard feelings on the meetup since no work was agreed on and it was just a preliminary discussion, but it was certainly really weird.

That said though, I have had positive work experiences with other people. Just find a certain demographic of people being really weird/egoistic with their business plans. I wonder if this is a common thing in SG?

Netizens’ comments

1. I mean go for biz meeting probably don’t wear you SIM tee would be best especially if you are no longer a student there. It’s all about image, your client probably don’t take you seriously that’s why jerk you around.
   Imagine someone show up for job interview in SAF t-shirt, similar feeling.
   Just my opinion do what you like.
2. I think it’s about creating respect and boundaries while being professional. Of course you need to be good in your work and provide a service they need.
   If you lower the customer qualification criteria just to get more jobs then eventually all you get are those customers.
   This kind of ego and behaviour happened even in MNC or with “educated” folks it’s an individual behaviour thing not a company thing. But when you qualify them then you are less likely to deal with such folks and also can produce better quality of work since the client also knows what they want.