Stay AWAY from scriptinstallation.ca

[GoofyFrog]

That's an old response that has nothing to do with the current issue, which is mine and is still incomplete. I did, however, note that Paul has been making progress now, and that I'll be happy to report here once the integration has been completed.

 

yeah sorry about that, I didn't realise I was on page one of the thread.

[easyhosting]

Pauls not the only one to delay work is he GoofyFrog as per your own thread http://forum.whmcs.com/showthread.php?p=220414#post220414 so no good slating other threads to boost your thread count

[WebsiteIntegrations]

Pauls not the only one to delay work is he GoofyFrog as per your own thread http://forum.whmcs.com/showthread.php?p=220414#post220414 so no good slating other threads to boost your thread count

 

nah he's ok. Though durangod must be friends with Payton since that .com site gets 2 or 3 posts a week like that one here and on WHT and he doesn't have any comments for him

[GoofyFrog]

nah he's ok. Though durangod must be friends with Payton since that .com site gets 2 or 3 posts a week like that one here and on WHT and he doesn't have any comments for him

 

I'm waiting on Paul and Payton designs to complete at the moment. The one thing I will say about Paul is that communication is much better than Payton. And hopefully my issues will be rectified with Paul in the next day or so too

[durangod]

Paul i dont know who payton is. It is unfortunate that you have been so abused that you think that anyone that honestly makes a comment with nothing up their sleeves but what is the right thing to do has an ulterior motive. I simply saw someone that i thought was getting screwed over and commented, no ulterior motive about it. I dont know you and i dont know payton. I do know that whoever it was, no matter who it was, i would react the same way. My friends know i dont pull punches and i am a straight shooter wether i be dealing with friends or not. So again your wrong, i was just a concerned consumer, only motive was to try to correct the wrong doing, thats it.

Edited April 23, 2012 by durangod

[Troy]

So, here we are over a week since my first complaint on this thread, and I still don't have a completed integration.

 

Paul did make good progress--in fact the main menu seems to be working as expected at this point. After his last update to the ticket to have me check out his demo, I asked him to deliver the current files so I can check the interior pages against live data, as there were some issues with font spacing and drop down menus on interior pages (like the management drop down menu in domain details.) These are issues I cannot check from his demo because there of lack of live data there.

 

It has now been 2+ days and I've had no response. I thought maybe this public discussion was spurring him to action to get this project completed, but apparently not.

 

We are now at 8+ weeks since I ordered a 24 hour integration and paid more than twice what I was quoted, and still no completed integration.

[easyhosting]

Troy.

 

this is not like Paul. i will see if i can find what up

[Troy]

Thanks--I suddenly got a response, so either you contacted Paul or he saw my update here.

 

For what it's worth, I'm not going to hound Paul on the ticket--I figure if I update the ticket and the status is Customer-Reply, he should be answering it timely. He has now closed the ticket after responding with the latest files. Since he's never done that before--it suggests to me that maybe he thinks he's done with the project.

 

I've received a copy of the files, but interior pages are worse now than ever. Maybe at this point Paul is just desperately hoping I'll accept whatever he throws at me so he can get me off his back, and isn't checking his work?

 

Compare Paul's interior domain details page with the default theme:

 

Default vs Paul's

 

I believe Paul has re-done the interior page integration completely, as this is far worse than the previous version I received 7 weeks ago. There are so many problems:

 

1. The sidebar isn't supposed to be there. The template came with three page options, one of which was a full page width with no sidebar. All interior pages of this integration are supposed to be done without a sidebar. All interior pages of the files just delivered have the sidebar when they shouldn't. (The unfinished integration I initially received weeks ago did not contain the sidebar.)

 

2. The page menu (not the main menu bar but the menu options on the page) are not properly left aligned with the page content.

 

3. The last menu item (Management Tools) has wrapped around to a second line, probably because of the sidebar.

 

4. Instead of the domain details being to the right of the "Information" blurb as in the default template, it is below.

 

5. The hover color on the Manage Tools drop down menu renders the text impossible to read.

 

I just don't get how one would deliver something in such a state of obvious incompletion. Granted I'm sure Paul is scrambling to get rid of me, but when one is facing public criticism for failure to deliver, I would think one would be a little more careful to do a good job, to both mollify the disgruntled client and mitigate any further reputation damage.

[easyhosting]

yes i did contact paul and i agree it looks bad compared to default.

 

maybe Jack of Zomex can help

[Troy]

Good idea, and if Paul would refund the money I paid, I'd be happy to give this project to someone else. However, as long as he's refusing to refund, I'm refusing to let him get away with not fulfilling his end of the deal.

 

It's not about the money itself, but the principle involved. If you can't complete the project, you shouldn't be keeping the money. If you won't return the money, you'd better come through with the goods.

 

I would have gladly paid $500 for a job well done. I even tried to encourage Paul to charge me more.

[easyhosting]

i cant understand Paul on this as he has a "if not complete within 24 hours i will refund and give integration free"

 

i have used him many times for integrations without problems although my current one is from Jack at Zomex as i needed a new site design and Jack has it all in one package.

[WebsiteIntegrations]

excuse me, I don't see anywhere today i closed the ticket. I was working on the files to solve the issue with the sidebar appearing where it shouldn't so i could send you updated files (as you can see i have no issue https://scriptinstallation.ca/billing/index.php?systpl=test3 )

 

[GoofyFrog]

If It were me Id cut my loses and move on and pay someone else to do the integration, yes you might lose money but if like you say you were willing to pay more it might be worth just going with someone who can do the job properly. From reading this tread in it's entirety it would seem to me that Paul is struggling with this integration and maybe it's a bit to advance for him? It certainly seems that way.

 

I would cut my loses and consider opening a paypal dispute, although as it's digital goods you don't stand much chance and hire someone who is confident with completing this. Zomex would be a good choice, or even Payton if he's not too snowed under, he might take a while sometimes but his completed work is second to none.

[Troy]

Paul,

 

The ticket was closed when I responded to it this morning. (I logged into my account and the ticket was gone from the client area page, so I had to go find it in closed status and reply there.) The ticket had never been closed previously, so I wondered if you closing it was an indication that you thought the project was complete.

 

As per my last few ticket responses, I have found that your code is working as coded on my end, incorrectly, but is NOT working as coded on your end, so you've written code based on faulty behavior on your end, which is causing the theme to NOT work properly on my end.

 

I will use the modified files you've just provided and see how things look at this stage. Based on a quick glance at the code, I'm expecting it will be improved. I advised you early on that the code should not use a hard coded page title as originally delivered, and suggested you use a "hometitle" language element that was custom to my installation. You probably don't have the same language element on your end, so the code was malfunctioning there (but looking okay). Now you're using globalsystemname which should fix the problem, (provided of course I make sure that language element also matches my home page title.)

[Troy]

From reading this tread in it's entirety it would seem to me that Paul is struggling with this integration and maybe it's a bit to advance for him? It certainly seems that way.

 

I thought that might be the case early on when I wasn't getting responses for weeks, but at this point it's getting very close, and the major elements are working, so he can do the work. It's the extreme length of time and lack of communication that caused me to finally complain here.

[easyhosting]

I thought that might be the case early on when I wasn't getting responses for weeks, but at this point it's getting very close, and the major elements are working, so he can do the work. It's the extreme length of time and lack of communication that caused me to finally complain here.

 

yes Paul can be slow at communicating, it also depends if he has his kids over, but he usually posts on his site if he has his kids over

[Troy]

I'm happy to report that the integration has finally been completed! Except not by Paul. I finally got fed up and asked Jack @ Zomex to do it, and in a matter of a few days he delivered a very professionally done integration, with excellent communications along the way. He even re-sliced the graphics from the original template to make everything work better with WHMCS, rather than just take the template as is and use it.

 

I first complained about Paul on this thread over 2 weeks ago, and initially thought I was finally getting some positive movement toward completion. However, Paul *still* hasn't delivered. Further, he has attempted to deliver sub-standard work.

 

For example, on April 27th, when I pointed out that the interior drop down menus like the Management Tools drop down on the domain details or product details templates weren't looking like the default WHMCS drop downs, Paul sent me a new domain details template with some sort of inline fix. I didn't even bother to download the file--told Paul that since the default WHMCS theme controlled all of this by global CSS, I didn't want changes made to interior pages. (Would be a nightmare to have to keep track of them all as WHMCS updates come out).

 

I also pointed out some button alignment problems in various lists such as the domain list, product list, ticket list, etc. Paul delivered a new template that fixed only some of those, and fixed them in-line in individual interior templates, after I had specifically asked him to not modify those templates! The whole point is I wanted all page interiors to look and work exactly as the WHMCS v5 default template. Going forward I only want to worry about header.tpl, footer.tpl and homepage.tpl when new WHMCS releases come out. Putting fixes in other templates for something that should be corrected in global CSS would have made a mess of things.

 

Though I shouldn't have had to do this, I set about proving to myself that the button alignment problems were a global CSS issue by replacing Paul's modified bootstrap.css with the WHMCS default, and removing all of the in-line styling Paul had done in individual interior page templates, and viola! button alignment problems were gone. But then of course elements from the new template which I wanted to keep in the final product were gone, so it wasn't like I could just replace Paul's bootstrap.css and be done with it.

 

I pointed this out to Paul over two days ago and haven't heard anything since. It seems Paul just isn't capable of doing this kind of work.

 

So now I have a perfectly coded integration from Jack @ Zomex that took less than 1/10th of the 9 weeks I've been waiting for Paul to deliver something useful.

 

Paul, now is the time to do the right thing and refund my money. You can do that and we'll call it square, and I'll let BBB Canada know I consider my complaint resolved.

[Justine]

It's a very beautiful website design and an equally beautiful integration. Very different to most of the others I've seen.

[Troy]

Justine, you may be looking at our primary site from my signature. I actually did that integration myself. This one is for a new brand and looks much different. I hired this job out due to constraints on my time--but you can see how well that worked out for me

 

Assuming your comment is about our primary site--thank you and I'm glad you like it!

[WebsiteIntegrations]

Oh please, give it a rest already.

 

Everything you complained to me about i went and resolved. Everytime i redid something then you would complain about something else. I think you were just looking for any excuse as nothing was ever good enough or when it was then you'd come up suddenly with another issue. But I won't rant on as i don't do my business on other companies forums.

 

Thanks

[Troy]

I waited 7 weeks for you to complete the integration before I took to these forums in an attempt to put pressure on you to do your job. I waited two weeks at one point during that time to even hear anything at all from you. There were major problems with EVERY iteration you showed me. Some of the participants in the thread even witnessed the poor quality of some of those iterations during these last two weeks.

 

Never have you delivered a properly completed integration to me--NEVER! It is well documented in the entire ticket history of this project. Every time you attempted to fix something, you broke something else.

 

The project was very straightforward--take the outer portion of a new template and merge it with the inner portion of the WHMCS v5 default template--putting the WHMCS drop down menus into the new theme and leaving all of the interior page content exactly the way it works in the v5 default template. Really, how hard can that be? Why was Jack able to easily do a stand-up job where you couldn't? Perhaps Jack can comment here whether he felt any of my interaction with him was anything but completely accommodating, or whether he felt I was looking for excuses to criticize his work?

 

Would the type of person who is "just looking for any excuse" pay you more than twice your quote for the work, and then wait patiently for 7 weeks for you to deliver? I truly thought that once I got a reaction from you by complaining here in this thread, that you would finally come through--but sadly that wasn't to be. I've waited another two weeks patiently without getting a complete integration.

 

And you want to tell me to give it a rest already!? I would never, ever treat a client that way. If I were you I would have been unable to sleep at night until I resolved the issue.

 

You are amazing--completely and totally amazing. I can't fathom how you can even begin to think you've done a proper job here. Please show me any point in our ticket where you delivered a satisfactorily working integration???

 

You could have refunded my money two weeks ago and shut me up, and salvaged more of your reputation. You could have come through with a working integration and shut me up. Now you've done nothing but make me that much more determined to ensure that this story is told anywhere you advertise your services.

[WebsiteIntegrations]

Please show me any point in our ticket where you delivered a satisfactorily working integration???

 

You have the url to it, or did i miss something as I believe I touched on all the points you brought up.

[Troy]

Here's a history of the project compiled from the support ticket where we communicated. Have I missed something?

 

Day 0 (03/01/2012): I approach you about integrating a template I've purchased with WHMCS, indicating I want to have the look of the new template with the guts of WHMCS. The new template has a horizontal menu bar at the top of the page which I want replaced with the WHMCS v5 default template menu bar.

 

Day 1: You quote the job and I pay you over twice that amount because I think you've underquoted it, and I'm not a cheapskate!

 

Day 3: You indicate you're having some issues with the menu and want to keep me updated. That's fine--good communication.

 

Day 5: You deliver a first attempt. This would have been a really quick turnaround if it was complete. However, there are immediate problems observed. One of them is that the home page on your demo looks fine, but is scrambled on mine. It turns out to be because you've hardcoded "Portal Home" into header.tpl as a way to determine if the current page is the home page. That's a poor choice--a language element should have been used, as obviously not everyone would keep "Portal Home" as the home page title. I fix this myself on my end using a language variable, and ask you to update your end.

 

Day 6: You deliver a new footer.tpl and header.tpl, and I point out a handful of design problems with the main menu--things like the drop down caret being so far to the right of the main menu items it looks more like it belongs to the next menu item over, hover backgrounds having no margin (i.e. menu text butted up against the left side of the hover background looking very odd and unprofessional compared to the WHMCS default template, drop down menus not having the rounded bottom corners of the WHMCS drop down menus which looked ridiculous considering the menu bar has rounded corners, the drop down menus not being top-aligned with the bottom of the main menu bar, and more. I also observed problems with font spacing on interior page content (kerning so tight that letters were overlapping each other), and problems with the interior drop down menus such as the Management Tools menus. I allude to these issues, but indicate they can wait unit the main menu bar is looking good.

 

Day 12: Nearly a week has gone by so I update the ticket and ask about progress.

 

Day 19: Another week has gone by with no response, but I notice you've been advertising on WHT. So basically you have time to market your services, but can't provide a simple progress update to a client who has already paid you for work which hasn't been completed. I ask again for a status update.

 

Day 20: You ask for ftp access to the template on our end, and apologize for the delayed communications by saying you were off a bit the last week for your kid's march break. Never mind that it has been TWO weeks since you've bothered to update me, and in that time you managed to find time to advertising your services.

 

Day 21: I give you ftp access to the template.

 

Day 27: Another six days have passed and you finally update the ticket again saying "this menu is a headache! lol. don't suppose you'd want a different style?"

 

Day 28: I reply explaining that this is the template I need integrated, and ask you if you'll provide a refund if you can't complete it.

 

Day 35: Another week has gone by with no response, so I tell you I'm going to go another direction and ask for a refund.

 

Day 39: You update the ticket with "So the only issue i see reported was with the dropdown menu correct?" What??? That's far from the only issue, as I explain in my response to the ticket. You haven't even addressed your lack of communication, nor my request for a refund--completely ignored.

 

Day 49: Yes, 10 days later and I have not heard a response, so I ask for my money back AGAIN!! I finally complain here on the WHMCS forum too.

 

Day 50: You offer a partial refund saying that a full refund for a minor issue with the menu (and then your response is truncated, but basically you were saying you wouldn't be refunding the entire amount over a minor issue with the menu.) The problem is there was not just a minor issue with the menu! We hadn't even gotten to all the problems with the interior pages yet--you still had half a dozen problems with JUST THE MAIN MENU!!!

 

Day 51: You update the ticket asking me to look at the menu on your demo. I respond that it's a little better, but still far from looking like the WHMCS v5 default theme menu. You respond with "Well i can use the whmcs menu if you'd like"? This flabbergasts me since that what I asked for at the very beginning--the WHMCS v5 default theme menu integrated into this theme, retaining the typography, color and dimensions of the new theme's menu bar, but otherwise being exactly like the WHMCS menu. You're just now suggesting that you could do what I've asked from the beginning?!

 

Later this same day you ask me to look at the demo again, and while things are improving, there are still problems with the main menu, which I detail. I also state that I'm glad to see some positive progress happen.

 

Day 52: Another iteration and the main menu is still showing improvements, but not where it should be.

 

Day 53: I provide some clarification on one of the issues documented on day 52, and you provide another iteration to review. Still a couple problems with the drop down menu having a gab between the top of the drop down and the main menu bar, and some of the menu items wrap around to a second line when they should be on a single line.

 

Day 54: You ask for a screenshot showing the gap.

 

Day 55: I go to grab a screenshot and notice the gap is no longer present, and say so. I feel the main menu is probably looking as good as it's going to get, and ask for the files so I can test the page interiors against live data.

 

Day 57: You provide the files. The interior pages are worse than they have ever been at this point. The sidebar which shouldn't be there except for the home page is on all pages, the individual interior page content does not align vertically on the left, The tabs/menus on interior pages wrap around to a second line and look terrible, there are major div problems that make the pages look COMPLETELY different than the WHMCS v5 default template, and when you drop down an interior drop down menu such as the Management Tools menu, the highlight as you hover over individual menu items makes the text impossible to read.

 

The problem with if statements is back--where things look okay on your end but are scrambled on mine. The issue turns out to go back to Day 5 when I fixed the problem of hard coding "Portal Home" into if statements. I told you I had corrected that and was using a "hometitle" language element rather than hardcoding the value. The hometitle element was unique to my installation--i.e. it was a custom language element I had added. That element didn't exist on your end, so you wrote code that was basically performed exactly opposite to the way it should. I'll accept 50% of the blame for that one, but a good WHMCS developer would know they should use globalsystemname or at least add the custom entry to his side to ensure proper code execution.

 

So, I go through each if statement and document that the if statements are executing properly on my end, but garbling the data, and show that they are executing improperly on your end, but resulting in a proper display.

 

Later this same day you give me a new clientareadomaindetails.tpl to adjust Management Tools drop down menu on that page. I don't even bother to download it, because it's obvious that the fix should be in global CSS, not in the interior template file. I'm trying to avoid having to track changes to every single template. I update the ticket and let you know that this should be fixed in CSS and not in the clientareadomaindetails.tpl template.

 

I also point out that there are many buttons in lists within the interior pages which are misaligned. Maybe you think this is asking too much, but the WHMCS default template didn't have button alignment problems, so I expect that your integration won't either.

 

Day 59: Despite my asking you to fix these problems in CSS, you deliver a new integration that STILL HAS INLINE adjustments in interior templates to fix various problems, rather than fixing them in the CSS!! This means I'll have to track all of these individual template chagnes everything I updated WHMCS--something that I began this project trying to avoid. I reply that things are looking better, but it's not acceptable to make these adjustments in interior templates when the problems are obviously not there in the WHMCS default template.

 

To prove this, I replace your modified bootstrap.css with the stock WHMCS bootstrap.css, remove all the inline adjustments from interior templates, and viola! the alignment issues and drop down menu issues are all gone! Obviously you've done a very poor job at merging the CSS from the new template and WHMCS. I update the ticket with the results of my experiment and ask you to make the fixes properly in CSS, and say that if you can do that, we may have finally have a completed project.

 

Day 64: Four days later and you update the ticket asking why I can just use the WHMCS bootstrap.css. I update the ticket and mention that all of the other properties of the new template are overwritten if you just simply replace the bootstrap.css with the original I suggest that you either 1) Merge the appropriate CSS from WHMCS's bootstrap.css into your bootstrap.css to fix the remaining issues, or 2) replace the bootstrap.css with WHMCS's and then merge in the changes necessary to retain the features of the new template that I need to preserve. Either would have been fine.

 

Day 66: No response, but in the meantime I've asked jack at Zomex to do the integration. I'm worried that even if you manage to complete the project, I won't be able to trust the quality of the code. I figure if you do complete it, no biggie--I'll let you keep the money and have paid twice for the integration. However, Jack delivers a completed integration after just a few days of work, and it's exactly what I asked for, and is very well coded. At this point I figure Jack has proved your incompetence to handle this project, and you should return my money. I update this thread, and you respond that I "give it a rest already". Unbelievable.

[merlinpa1969]

I honestly do not think that this is the place for you two to have at each other,

You have each made your point, at this time there really is nothing pertinent that can be added by either side.

 

Please either continue this in private or better yet agree to disagree and let it be.

[WebsiteIntegrations]

I suggest that you 2) replace the bootstrap.css with WHMCS's and then merge in the changes necessary to retain the features of the new template that I need to preserve. Either would have been fine.

 

which is what i did do.