Company director tried to underpay me, I maliciously comply watching him lose $60k.
This company we tried working with tried to pull a shady deal on us, but we maliciously complied and watched them lose $60k.
prioriority writes:
We were engaged to set up a small R&D lab in a manufacturing plant. It included renovation works and an analytical instrument. The total project is around $200,000. Everything was going fine. The instrument was purchased, the renovation details and specifics were ironed out, and work was to commence.
At this point, one of the company directors of the client company was brought into discussions. According to our contact person at the company, this director, whom I shall call Adam, has experience in renovations. They even said Adam has a stake in a renovation company.
Adam took our specifications for the renovations and decided to get another quote from another renovation company. You can probably guess where this is going. The other quote came from the renovation company he has a stake in, which is significantly cheaper than ours.
By his calculations, he would have helped the client company save $10,000 (and profit from this project). What he doesn't realize is that this isn't any regular renovation. It requires using specific materials for corrosion resistance. The ducting has to go through a scrubber, etc.
He has significant power because he's also the client company's director. 'We got a quote from another company for the renovations, and it's $10k cheaper than yours. Give us a lower quote, or let this other company handle all the renovations.'
We asked him if he had included costs for specific materials, scrubbers, and other expensive parts. 'Yes, yes. All in.' Adam says. We don't know how he can get it done that cheap, but we definitely can't meet his price. And since he has the power, he isn't going to back down, so cue MC. 'Well... Ok then. We can't match the price. Let the other company do it.'
Almost immediately, the project started to fall apart. Our project initially had a government grant helping our client cover some expenses, but it came with a tight deadline. Adam is a lifelong procrastinator, and weeks go by without renovation work.
Two weeks before the grant expires, our liaison starts chasing Adam increasingly frustratedly (in the WhatsApp chat with us present because we are awaiting the work completion to set up the instrument). It turns out Adam was unaware of the grant deadline altogether, and missing it means not getting over $30k in grants.
He starts in a mad rush to get it all set up, but to nobody's surprise, it is an extremely shoddy job, with low-quality materials and no scrubber.
'Adam, we can't commission the instrument till the exhaust systems meet specifications. It's that material lining, and it needs the scrubber with those specs,' we tell him and the client. 'But you never said it's needed!' he says, to which we point to our specifications which HE COPIED to pass over to the other company.
Adam had to take down some of the renovations, making the client miss the grant deadline. The renovation company spent even more money than our quote to purchase all the right materials at specs while the instrument was unusable. They spend $10k monthly sending their samples to a third-party testing center.
So in his ploy to save the client $10k on renovations, they paid at least $60k more. Plus, Adam's renovation company made a loss on this project, but he deserves it!
Here are some of the top comments from the post:
-dublin- says:
Excellent result; I hope you get further work from the client company.
Hector-LLG says:
The compliance person for that company could have a field day with that fustercluck.
RunningPirate says:
$200K included the scrubber? Regardless, folks often get into projects thinking they’ll ‘trim the fat’ when cutting out critical components.
Was this a satisfying outcome? Do you think OP could've done something else to get back at Adam?