Web Developer - unhappy with service

Nell_R

Hi all,

I was wondering if you could help.

I’ve had a website built for my business and unfortunately there has been a litany of mistakes and problems and now I’m not sure what my rights are.

From the beginning there were issues such as poor logo design (I ended up doing it myself) the copy writers efforts were poor, littered with mistakes and an inappropriate tone for my site (again I ended up doing this myself).
The site is a specific build and they tacked on an additional cost of almost 50% the original quote when I realised it wouldn’t function in the way that I originally requested. However I paid this as I wanted the site to be finished.

The main issue however comes with the site being signed off. I was explicitly told to only view the site on a desktop and have this in e-mail form, I was then asked to sign off the site weeks later which I did (there were still some small mistakes with the copy but I figured rather than hold up my business launch I could do these myself).

When I signed it off however, they then said I’d signed off the mobile view which I hadn’t seen and was explicitly told not to view.

Having viewed it, it looks clunky and is not something I would have agreed to.

I have tried resolving the issue and asked for amendments to be made but they refused and even though I have gone back with a compromise have now ceased contact for over a week.

I am now left with a site that is unfinished, has multiple errors, and does not have the sales function enabled.

I will have to move it to another developer to improve and to host and don’t know what my rights are in terms of money back.

I have multiple e-mails highlighting mistakes and errors which failed to be corrected, in addition to the e-mail telling me explicitly to only view the desktop site.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Nell

bris

Although you are not a consumer you still have breach of contract.


You will need to show the developer breached that contract. Might not be easy now you have signed off on it.


You can write to them giving them X amount of days to put the problems right or take them to court for the cost to put it right elsewhere.


The terms of your contract go a long way to determine your rights as the whether there is a breach or not.

denk15

This sounds like a business to business contract. So consumer rights are not applicable.

I would also imagine there is a lot of money involved here if it is a website build. If that's the case, you may want to think about seeking legal advice. They will be able to advise you on contract law and the type of breach that has occurred.

dj1471

If you've signed the project off then your contract is concluded, any further work would need to be paid for.

It will come down to exactly what the contract says about sign off, but it sounds like you've put yourself in a fairly weak position to now complain about outstanding issues or argue breach of contract. I've spent a lot of time supervising external developers, if you're signing something off you need to be very clear what you're signing off especially if there are outstanding issues - it sounds like you weren't.