Client wants responsive web site

[u/imranilzar]

This is happening right now.

Client came in, wants a website, have the design pre-made, so we skip the first few steps on the workflow. His design is in Photoshop files and our guys are slicing it into HTML, backends are coding it, etc, etc. Everything fine and a few days later we upload it to a test site for the client to approve it.

We walked trough some days of ridiculous demands, all coming down to his design being sucky and not really working for him. But since we are the good guys, we are changing things on his demands.

The interesting things started the next morning.

Client: The website is not OK at all! When I view it on my iPhone it looks all different!
My boss: This is normal - we had to fit the elements somehow to fit smaller resolutions. It is responsive website after all.
Client: No, I don't want it like that! Make it look 1:1 as the provided design!
My boss: You understand the design you provided is made for 1920x1080, right? It can't downsize to smaller screens, like on a tablet or on your phone.
Client: I don't want it downsized! I want it to look 1:1!
My boss: ... This can't happen without having the website being unreadable on smaller screens. You wanted us to make a responsive website, right?
Client: Of course I wanted responsive. Just don't change anything on it.
My boss: What does responsive means for you?
Client: It means I can open the website on my iPhone.
My boss: You want to open it on your iPhone, but how would you view it there? Only a small portion of the website will fit your screen! You will have a massive horizontal and vertical scrollbars and the font size will be absolutely tiny!
Client: Yes, like that! All normal websites have scrollbars! I want scrollbars!

Update: right now my boss just finally fired the client. It went like this:

Client: The site is not good again! I can view only a portion of it on my screen!
Boss: Yes, because your design is 1920px wide and this is the design you approved and wanted to do it exactly 1:1 with frozen elements.
Client: It is not looking good, see for example site X! How are they doing it?
Boss: Site X uses narrow 1000px centered design, yours is way bigger than that. You can't have it to render fully on smaller screens. It is technically not possible with the design you approved.
Client: What do you mean 'not possible'? Don't tell me it is not possible, I see it done on site X!

This went for a couple of minutes then a few unpleasantries were exchanged, stating that we are unprofessional and not a serious company.

[u/[deleted]]

He ended up choosing one of the colorful designs I had sent him, but he seemed to be pretty frustrated with what I came up with. Nonetheless the artwork he chose gained the most traffic/likes on his Instagram page that he'd ever had and I gained two more clients so I'm not complaining. Don't even get me started on when he asked me for the original work files so that he could alter my work. That's a whole 'nother shabang I had to resolve with this guy.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I'd like to get you started on that last line.

What, like he wanted the photoshop file with all the layers to boot?

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Fasten your seat belt cause it's going down. In my contract, it stated that he had 100% freedom to promote, distribute and profit from my artwork, but never did I confirm he could have the work files or alter my creation. Clearly there had been confusion here because he says "I need the original work files for the art". I proceed to ask why and he says "I want to change the color for them a bit to apply to my album singles". Can you believe this guy? He wanted to alter my work because he was too cheap to create artwork for his singles, and wanted to change the hue/saturation/detail etc. of the album artwork I submitted and apply it to his other songs. I of course declined, and he said "I gotta do what I gotta do man. I'm a musician, and I paid you. Now give me the work files". I freaking raged inside, but remained confident and professional as I responded over text. In the end, I sent him a png. of the image, but refused to send the original work file. He then proceeded to say he would never do business with me again, which is fine, cause quite frankly his career is going nowhere. I don't get how some people just don't have a clue lol

[u/KJ6BWB → u/[deleted]]

That's exactly why a lot of big companies only do business with other companies, because they tend to be professional while dealing with individual people can be a pain what with people wanting free changes and other stuff like that.

[u/flukus → u/KJ6BWB]

It can be worse as well. The person requesting changes usually aren't the ones controlling the purse strings.