I got scammed by member "ApocalypseXL"...What can I do to get my money back?

First I am sorry if it's not the right place to post. I do not know where to post.
to mod: Please move to the right place if you think this is not the right place to post. Thank you.

I wanted to build a website but finally I decided to hire someone to make website for me. The thread I posted is here. I got a pm from member "ApocalypseXL" to offer me a good price for full working website so I went for him.

However the website he had done looks like it's made by beginner web builder and he has not completed the website. I asked him to fix a few things but it seemed that he could not do it so he was disappear. So I decided to ask for the full refund(about $200). He said he could only give me half of the money because he has already taken time to do it. Then I agreed. But he did not have money to refund me and begged me to give refund for $49 on 15th march 2012 and $51 on 30th march 2012. He needed time to earn money first because he did not have enough to refund me at that time. I was ok because there is no choice I can do if he hasn't got the money and he told me he was admitted into hospital. That was the reason he was disappear. It was fair reason to me so I was ok. And on 15th March we were chated on skype to discuss the refund. He then sent me $49 but I had to paid the fee for the payment so the amounth I received was about $45.

However he was disappear again after that. I haven't heard anything back from you til 2nd April. I sent him skype messages but no reply. Sent him pm's on this forum but no respond although he had visted this website nearly everyday. I have to say that I did not flood him with messages or pm's because I do not want to harrass him. I sent him pm about once a month...never sent 10 message a day. I was disappointed and feel that I am being scammed since he was alive here in this forum but no respond to me at all.

Can anyone please suggest what I can do to get my refund back from him. I also want everyone to know how he treated me and decide if he is a liar and scammer or its me who is liar and scammer.

I post this thread because I responded to his post in one thread here and I got a very irresposible and lied reply in this thread...you can have a look here.

I don't think I need to provide a few evidences here since I posted on this thread already.

Thank you so much for reading my post and please give me some advice. i do not want to see scammer is still here to scam people further.

 

I m sorry to hear what happened to you. People like this guy make other web designers and programmers look bad. I don't think there is much DP can do for you. You may just want to call it a loss and learn from your mistake.

Sometimes spending so much energy on something that is not worth that much is not a good idea. At the same time although I m not accusing you of lying or anything like that, people have to hear this guy's argument too.

Maybe you two can come up with another way of solving this problem other than him giving you your money back. He may be able able to do some work for you in exchange of the money he owes you.

This is just my opinion, I may be wrong.

Good luck

 

I completely agree with you.

But I have a question for the OP, though. mazdaspring, you said that the website he made for you seemed to be made by a beginner. Before accepting to work with him, didn't you ask him for some work samples just so you know the quality of his work?

 

I actually seldomly post on other sections on DP other than the BST section (that's what I'm on DP for), but this thread kinda caught my attention. After scanning through those threads you linked to, I think both of you aren't "scammers". The problem was the guy isn't experienced enough and he took on a job he didn't realize he couldn't do. After realizing he couldn't finish the job and couldn't refund you, he decided to just not give a sh*t. I would say he's just irresponsible. And YOUR biggest mistake is you paid him FULL upfront. As someone offering services, I've never asked for full payment before the job is done. If i were a buyer looking to hire someone and someone asks me to pay FULL upfront, i would find somebody else for the job.

 

Thats Why It Doesnt mean A Designer/Developer Like Me wouldnt offer lowball quotes to get a job that others offer for cheaper prices yet wont get the job done. Thats a lesson learned now when choosing someone to work with.

First you need to see some work record, study the background of the person to see if they are legit, The DP points sometimes matter too, read feedbacks about them.

At this time, try to arrange it with him since you have already forwarded payment to him/her. However you can also run a dispute if you paid via paypal for example. At least if you cant get your money back you can have him blocked on paypal.

 

Thank you guys for your reply.

rhoula: ---- Money is not the main problem for me. I have paid him about $200 and he offered to refund me only $100. I agreed because he has done something for me.
I really appreciate if he come and talk to me but this will not be possible for him I guess. What I want is not the full refund of $200. What I want him to do is to refund last $51 ($49 was paid....so $51 left) to me as he promised. I cannot stand if he responded to me that he has already paid for all money (which is a lie) and threatenning me using the law. If he cannot refund $51 to me...he is the real scammer. can't be something else.

3dy.ro: ---- Yes I did ask him for his previous work. I admit that I did not like his web design on his works at first but that is not important for me. I just wanted someone to create the website for me whatever the design is....but the most important thing is to make system on the website work. i do not know how to explain it. Something like...upload information+upload images+customer choose templates ---then--> gather all information+image+selected template and show a sample of completed auction template in the final page...then customers copy HTML code to use on ebay or other auction templates.

What I was planning is to change the design myself after the website is completed. So I don't mind about the bad design. at that time in my opinion and from his words, I thought this guy must be very good at coding so I picked him. also it's my first time hiring someone to do website so it was also my fault not to be careful.

a few months ago I hired someone else to make the same type of website for a few more 100 dollars (after gave up on the first guy). He is the member here as well and his work is brillion!!! perfect...website looks very professional. So let's say it was my bad experience. next time I will be more careful because i have learned from this already.


yakusokutebayo:-----Yes he is not experienced enough or experience but not good enough. I do not mind at all that he could not complete the website. if you can't do it, you can't do it....nothing else he can do to complete the website. and i cannot force him tocomplete it if he doesn't know how to do. But I just want him to do what he said what he has promised to me. keep his words. not being a liar. not playing the trick on me or losing communication because he has no money to refund me. I always send him pm that..."you can pay me anytime you have money....i can wait..even it will be the end of the year. but please keep letting me know." I never rush him at all. i was very kind to him and flexible about this.

what i am not happy now is that he never reply to my pm or email or skype although i see him posting in this forum nearly everyday. furthermore he lied that he has already given me all $100...but that's not true!!! as you can see from the evidences. threaten me that by the law he doesn't need to give me any money backbecause it's more than 2 weeks.....of course...if he got money to refund me within those 2 weeks i won't need to be here today. and if i was harsh to him not to give him a time to make money to be able to refund me back, then I won't need to try to contacting him.

also i did not pay him all money before work done. he separated his work into 4 steps. step 1 design (4 days) $150, step 2 front end programming (3 days) $100, step 3 back end programming (3 days) $250, step 4 installation (1 day) no cost...

I paid $200 for first 2 steps because I bargain with him to pay 100/100/300 instead....
after 2 steps has done for over 2 months instead of 7 days (also step 2 has not completely done...a lot of errors...)so he is trying to fix before do step 3. he also offered me $50 off for the delay...unfortunately, i was told not to be able to pay him only $50 instead of $100 when he has done step 2...he asked me he will deduct in the last payment ..
I had to pay him $100 before the work is done because i was stupid. i was convinced by him that everything is done. or it's mainly done...just let him know what to fix if i saw any error.... so i trusted him....after i found many errors and told him to fix it, he was disappear. he told me later that he was admitted into hospital. but during that time i saw the change on the website. and i can guess he was trying to fix but he could not do it. ..I was ok about the delay...he can take month instead of 3 days in each step. i do not mind at all..i was very flexible to him...but i admit that i was hesitating to pay him $100 on second payment because things seem to be worse...in term of website work...not his behaviour...but finally i did because i was still hoping he could do it

but at least i am not paying another $300 for non working website....

............

ok..i am more than welcome if ApocalypseXL comes to discuss with me here and explain to me why he lied that he has already refunded me $100 but in fact $49 was only been refunded so far not including the paypal fee that i had to pay for him...and we agreed that next $51 refund he will cover the fee too.

if he tells me the truth that he is a teenager who hasn't worked for money yet or a guy who has no job so it's very hard for him to find $51 to refund me...then, I will be not bothered...but he has to admit that he lied and act as if he didn't do anything wrong. and the fact that $51 is not yet been refunded as he promised.

but if he is irreposible for this...i just want to let you all here know that you are warned not to hire him to do website for you. otherwise you will pay monney for nothing + wasting your time.

 

Thank you for your advice. I will take it as my experience and learn from it. As a lot of people here said....you get what you pay for, espectially for website building.

 

He sounds like a complete douche to me according to your long post there.. If he's really on DP "every single day", then maybe you should just understand that he might not refund you your money anymore. How can he make any money if he's just here all day reading and posting on the forum? I feel sorry for what happened to you. I'm not proficient with Magento, but in the future if you need some wordpress sites, you can always contact me.

 

oh man that sucks, hope i dont have a similar experience.. use paypal next time

 

His Posts Per Day is 8.27 So I don't need to say more how often he is online here. When I sent him pm in the past and not get any respond back, I came to see if he is online here and reply me yet. What I saw on his profile is -> "Last Activity is Today ....." It shows like this everyday I came to check. Even though he was online when I was here, he still did not respond. That's when I started to feel I am being scammed.

And this is the last message I sent him. I replied to his last message he sent me in early April saying he hasn't got money yet.

Wel, may be I am too kind to him. But it shows that I am not such bad debt collecter who threatens you to pay the money you owed them. I gave him much time enough before I cannot stand and come to complain here. Hope you guys don't get me wrong.
So I decided to reply to his latest post. And this is the answer I got from him as show in the cap picture below. (he told me before that he doesn't want to have bad reputation here. So he begged me to delete my post about refund)


and this is the feedback I got from him. Can you imagine how you would feel if you are very kind to someone and you are being cheated by him/her. I feel I am being cheated. but nevermind... Now I just want everyone here to know if you should hire this guy to do your work. He is irreposible person.

To persons : .... I paid him by paypal but it's more than 3 months ago. So I do not think I can raise a dispute.

 

and thisis what he responded in the other thread

 

WARNING :Very long post

mazdaspring a.k.a. Mark Enfy on Skype a.k.a. Mac Enfy (i guess he couldn't decide on what his fake identity should be) received some advice from me on the public forum after exchanging some PMs we started talking on Skype .

The client wanted a copy of the website biggerbids.com so he could create and sell eBay templates that he would design and code . Later during the contract he admitted that he personally ripped and stolen all the templates belonging to biggerbids.com

The client lives in the U.K. but is from Thailand so at the time his English was quite terrible , he even declined to hold audio meetings because his spoken English was very poor .

You can still see that by lines like this :

It took two days of explaining just to help him to purchase a domain name . It took a lot of patience and fair amount of screenshots just to get him trough a simple process that even kids perform within minutes . I even went the extra mile and got him a 90% discount code so he could save some money .

For him money was an issue , during the contract the client asked me on how he could force the hand of a e-commerce website so he would get a very large discount for a new laptop . If my memory serves me well he intended to force them to accept a laptop that didn't worked or something among those lines . The money he would have saved by forcing their hand would have been somewhere around 60$ . So money has been important from the start .

The client claimed to be a electrical engineered but somehow lacked computer skills having numerous issues on his machines . I remember recommending a few programs and even using TeamViewer to remotely log in his computer to help him fix some issues and perform maintenance and optimization . This was once again done free of charge when it would cost somewhere around 100 $ to fix the problems he was having .

Despite assistance the client ignored some of the advice and continued to experience problems . In the image he posted here http://forums.digitalpoint.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=86265&d=1341752952 . You can see that his Skype is still failing ,either that or he doctored the picture .

He even reported the same visual bug that appeared on Firefox 4 despite being recommended the use of version 7 . While the website provided support for earlier version of Internet Explorer I only offered support for only the latest version of Firefox .

Furthermore the client claimed that he had hosting service but then he pointed out to a website that barely had anything on it . As a courtesy and to safeguard me from a potential ripoff I offered to demo the website on my own hosting account .

mazdaspring claims that he since then hired someone and had the website completed . This couldn't be further a way from the truth as the domain name still points to the name servers that i used to host demo websites on .

Now on to the contract . He claims that he didn't liked the design but still he accepted it despite being entitled to two full redesigns of the website .
He "loved" the logo and appreciated the design at the time . I almost forgot to mention that he first asked me to rippoff biggerbids.com's design and he decided against it only when I explained him that copyright laws .

The front end coding (html/css/flash) was completed in perfect time with the public section , member section and admin section being approved by the client . There was 1 visual bug that plagued the website and 1 change of detail . Both of these were taken care off only to be followed by more change requests , requests that where executed .

The back end coding was done in PHP/MySQL , i did most of the coding myself and then enlisted the help of a professional programmer to help me finish the template generator and the admin interface . Together we finished and tested the website to its limits . It all worked fine and the website was ready for installation .

In order for me to test the template generator you provided me with the code of two templates . The code is probably the most mangled thing I've ever seen making no of anything else but inline CSS . You never provided the images for the templates as you still keep biggerbidscom's linked images.
The admin interface required that you would place 5 PHP variable for images (i.e. $image1) and 6-7 PHP variables for text (i.e. $title,$description).

You never figured it out how to use those despite having the procedure explained to you multiple times . In fact you had problems making use of a simple username and password to log in the website . At one point I even removed your password so you can log in . I did that because you believed that the system was broken.

You managed at some point to use the template generator and you claimed that you will contact me in a few days to have the last payment done . You only contacted me to tell me that the generator wasn't working . More visual changes where classified as bugs .

In good faith I've believed that I did something wrong and performed the visual changes and looked to fix any bugs improve the generator so that you could use it easier . I knew you were not experienced with this things but I did tried to help you out . I'm not sure if you were trying to get the code from me before paying (like you did with biggerbids.com) or you really couldn't learn where to copy/past a few variables . But the website was working .

This bug charade continued for a loooong time . You then went off radar for family issues and only returned 2 months after saying that you don't need the website anymore and that you would like a refund . At that time I had some issues of my own and was unable too respond . One month later we talked again I agreed to refund you part of the money if you would transfer me ownership of the domain name . I wasn't obliged in any shape or form to provide you with a refund since you since the law says i must do that only in 2 weeks time , not almost half a year since the cyber service was provided . I hate to have unhappy customers so I'd rather loose some money and then sleep sound at night .

You happily agreed , got almost half the sum on the agreed date . When the date came for the transfer and the rest of the money you only sent me PM with a copied Skype message asking for the money but ignoring the domain name issue . You never contacted me on Skype since the 15th of March 2012 .

Speaking of money , you never used a PayPal that had your name on it , you claimed to have used your sister's . When you asked for the refund you provided a very different PayPal account . Your name wasn't on any of them and when I've looked them up there were zero details on the net . This is usually a sign that the accounts where highjacked . Is that something you're into as well ?

Now you try to blackmailing me into sending you more money even though you never showed up to pick up the second part of your courtesy refund . You are an uneducated thief , a liar and blackmailer .

 

Wait, first of all, his lack of English skills, where he lives, where he came from, have nothing to do with all this, agree?

Second of all, cloning other website's design is a common practice here on DP and pretty much everywhere else. Nothing so surprising in that. Look at DP's very own BST section, people don't only copy "designs", people even copy the whole functions of a website. You see fiverr, and you see fiverr clones with the exact same design everywhere, you see 9gags and you see 9gags clones with the exact same design everywhere. I'm not saying it's ok to do it, I wouldn't like my website's design copied, BUT i'm saying that as long as you're around IM'ers and on IM forums, it's a common practice in this circle. Plus, if you're so against it, you wouldn't have agreed to take on the job in the first place.

For a record, I'm NOT siding with anyone here. But the way i see it, the buyer (mazdaspring) could sound like someone difficult to work with. But Apocalypse, you PROMISED to refund mazdaspring his $100. If in the beginning you felt like you weren't being paid enough and didn't like to refund him, say so firmly. Now that you've promised to refund, it'd make you sound like a dishonest man when you avoid and ignore him just like that.

That is all i have to say. Just my opinion and what i think... No offense to everyone involved. Now i'm getting off this thread...

 

Thank you so much to be fair on both of us. I don't think I need to say more because your post said it all. He just take advantage of my "poor english" and repeat this a lot of times. I can say that most information he gave was a full of "lies". I never asked him to exactly copy whole website from biggerbids because I KNOW it's illegal although as you said many people do that. I don't want to risk if they want to sue me. And you said I am very difficult to work with....take 2 whole days to explain how to get domain????wow 2 whole days....It sounds like I am extremely stupid....Do you think if I don't even know how to get a domain, will I be able to bother running the website??

You know what? I got another professional guy from here to help me out doing exactly everything I requested you to do...He charged me a few more hundred...His plan was to finish within 1 month and a half. He could finish everything within 2 months which is only 2 weeks delayed and I even give him 3 whole months to finish it because from my experience with you...such website seems to take years to be completed!! And you know what? the website he has done to me is not a copy cat from biggerbids....ok...most functions are similar to biggerbid but the design is totally different. So do you think I asked him to copy everything from that website as you said?? Please don't lie to make yourself look good!!!

Even if I asked you to copy everything from that website....if you don't agree why you started the contract. Isn't it because you want EASY MONEY by scamming novices for making crap website so you took the job?? Oh man...I can do such crap website myself (with my no knowledge about web builder??) and take less than a month to finish. No need to hire anyone to do it for me. But my design will look more advance than yours. So I think you should consider yourself if you want to scam people's money further. At least try to do a bit more advance job. Not the one that primary school student can do it. the website you did isn't worth any penny to be frank. Anyone could go to "building website tutorial short course" on youtube and create better website than the one you did...trust me!...If your work is reasonable good, why didn't I let you continue working on step 3??? I am not that harsh to just stop at half way. But even step2 you could not complete it with fair standard. Not working AT ALL!!! but lied to me that it's nearly done so I can pay you another $300 ???? you took advantage because you think I am novice?? isn't it true?? That's why I decided to ask for refund instead of letting you working further because the result will be no different than the first step you did to me. Including life time support ...lol...if the website got some problem later, do you think you can come to fix it within 24 hours? or I have to wait until you feel well to fix it. Also please DO NOT claim that you worked with your team workers...Please admit you did it by yourself!!! Once I show the website to everyone, they can tell straight away if it's a group work or beginner personal work!!!

Don't trust me? ApocalypseXL can show you his "MASTERPIECE" to you guys. ApocalypseXL, you should show the work to people to see so they will be so surprised how professional it looks. Please show them by yourself before I will show it myself We will see you or me will be embarrassed!!! If you work looks good enough, I am sure I will be the person who feel embarrassed. But if your work look like beginner did it, then people can tell what all you have said above are all lies or the truth...You told me you worked in the company and got a lot of customers, didn't you??? but why you could not afford $51 to send me?

"You never contacted me on Skype since the 15th of March 2012".....As if I am running away from money
what about...

"Originally Posted by ApocalypseXL
I don't have any money at this moment , the best i can do is @20th of april"

What is that??

I showed a few captured messages to prove everything I said is right and you just lied to make yourself look good. You got my email. you can pm me here as you did many times before, didn't you?....why you only give an excuse that I never went online so you could not contact me???? what about email and pm to me here? any single tried? Or you have sent so many emails but I ignored to respond back? can you answer this question???? I don't know what to say...I am sure above explanation will show that what you said is only an excuse not to refund me money... but I understand mate...you still haven't got enough money.

Next time, if you want to give reasons not to give me refund as you promised...please try to find something that is relevant why the refund could not be sent. Please don't never ever try "he has poor english", "he knows nothing about the web design", "he used different paypal", "he has no real id" never every again!!!

you can try....."My work is excellent but he scammed me"(and show your masterpiece to people)...
or "I could not get hold of him at all"....this one is reasonable.....Unfortunately it's not the truth

Oh and if you are confident you are right, why did you report my posts to the admin that I harrassed you??? common...if you are right, prove it!!!! people will then ban me...

I promise I will never harrass you....but I will make sure everyone here know your great reputation on making website and being dishonest. Then they can decide if they will hire you in the future. Hmmm....to be easy....Showing your work without a single word might explain everything actually

 

Just to clear things up, the ABOVE post is NOT directed toward ME (yakusokutebayo), it's directed toward ApocalypseXL.
Well, just in case my potential client got confused.

OK, now i REALLY need to get OFF this thread, this is none of business to begin with!!

 

I have also experienced this situation in DP, but not a website theme, it was a content writing service. What I did was opened a dispute case right away in Paypal, I remember it was after 2 weeks that he didn't reply me.
I took all the screenshot of our conversation especially what he had promised me but couldn't have done it. and I got my money back after 7~10days
Just remember one thing, always take screenshoots whenever you have a conversation with someone over the internet, because you don't know who they are and where they are. These screenshoots are like your proves to Paypal that you both have agreement but he scams you at the end.

I hope this help.