Alright, basically, I was scammed and now I need advice on what to do. First off, I want to say who I was scammed BY. On DP he goes by the name of darkar123. New to the forums, 0 iTrader, only 5 posts. I know, that should've been a sign that I shouldn't have started anything with him. He also goes by the name of Lecius. Anyway, here's how it went... I was browsing through the forum, and, as usual, I found myself in templates part of the forums, under Buy, Sell, and Trade. Clicking on a thread I found there was a user selling anime templates, along with a reply. The reply was that he would buy them if they were different, or something along those terms. Honestly, I have no clients up-to-date (probably because I have yet to set-up a portfolio), however, I jumped at the opportunity, hoping I would find things successful, ignoring the amount of posts the person had, and how new he was the forums itself. I PM'd him if he was interested, and, just a few moments later, he added me to MSN. I was ready to show him samples of my work, all from templates that I sold here on DP, but he didn't ask. He told me how he wanted it, and I said okay. A very good friend of mine, who could code, got into this as well, seeing as I can't code. Anyway, the deal was that the faster that we could put together the website, the more we would be paid. He said he needed it within 4 days maximum, and my friend and I assured him that we could get it done within one day, which, for the record, we did. At first, I wanted him to pay at least 25% of the payment upfront, but he told me how he was scammed earlier and, seeing as how he would actually be my first client (even though I went to him), I said fine. Waking up early the next day, I designed it the best I could, showed him how it looked to get it approved, and then sent it to my friend to code it. This would be her first client, too, so we tried to do things fast, but not so fast that we would actually ruin it in the end. At about 11:30 PM my time (EST), he said he would be back in about 30 minutes. We were basically done, and was just finishing up... He didn't come back in 30 minutes. In fact, he wasn't on for the most of the next day (today). At about 4:00 PM, I signed onto my second e-mail with the older version of MSN Messenger, and added him just in case something like this happened, so I would know if he was blocking us or not. At about 10:00 PM, he came on, saying how he was sleeping, and now, he had to go grab some food. Going offline, he would come back about an hour later, to simply tell me to wait yet ANOTHER 30 minutes, because he was at his friend's house and his paypal information was on a text file, on his computer. He signed off before I could say anything. I found this OUTRAGEOUS, and had a very strong feeling that we were being tricked. In fact, I was pretty sure we were, seeing as how when he came back on, he had changed the password to his FTP. I signed into my other e-mail with the older version of messenger, and found that he was in fact ONLINE. I immediately went to speak with him, but he simply ignored me. I didn't know what to do -- I brought it up with a real good friend of mine, and he told me I should come here to ask for the best piece of advice. I know it was my fault for not being cautious and being too desperate, but it's too late for that, now. Although I know what I should and shouldn't do next time, I was wondering if anyone had advice on what I should do with the current situation ? Thanks a lot in advance... Also, the url to the site is: http://www.narutoandfriends.info/
Ok, so you did send him the coded template (because you never mentioned that you did). It's a simple scam, but you fell for it. What you need to do is look his domain up on godaddy.com or something (wherever he purchased the domain I think...?) and you can find out where he lives (if he isn't WHOIS protected). From there, you can either get in touch with him or see if some authority can do anything about it. If not, you have lost your template and need to create a new one. Please report him in the scammer section (if there is one...lol?). I know that you can look up where people live (and what their phone number is) on some domain selling sites, godaddy has no WHOIS protection without paying extra so you may be able to find how to reach him from there... best of luck, Jack.
I would say that since they've scammed you, then they should not receive any professional treatment. At this point in time, all ethics should be dropped. They have a forum, get on there and spread word around to their members. Also, tell their affiliates about what they have done. Exploit every means possible to defame them. Redistribute their template to others so that other anime sites can copy their template. Last but not least, never give your services away before getting paid. Normally, I will say it before hand that I expect full payment after completion, but before they receive the files. Let the customer have a preview (encode it with javascript), but if he/she refuses to pay before hand, then just resell the work, it's better than losing everything.