So, I’ve recently been struggling with one of our middle-sized clients, Client X, over a missing retainer. Client X engaged us to perform a meaningless piece of work a few months ago without getting the budget internally approved, and subsequently bailed out of development. Going in, I knew this might happen as I had previously done business with the client’s project lead and had a fair gauge of her level of incompetence. I structured the deal so that we would have to receive a retainer prior to commencing any work in order to avoid getting our shit pushed in come decision time.

Unfortunately, it fell to the Rid to obtain these monies. He gave me go-ahead without ever actually invoicing for or receiving the money. So, when the dust cleared from the rampant cluster-fuck that ensued, the client had bailed and we had no cash to cover our expenses. The Rid abdicated all responsibility for the project and it has fallen to me to get the cash.

So I’ve sent three emails and left two voicemail messages to date. All of these were ignored until today, when I told Client X we were just going to invoice them. This got things moving, and the predictable hilarity ensued.

Client X first denied having received any voicemails or emails, then put together a highly spurious email that purported to communicate some parameters weeks ago…except we never received said email.

Must have got lost in the mail.

After I covered all of this and had Client X’s CFO pulled in to handle the mess on their end, the Rid decided to step in without telling me and emailed Client X’s president. I found out about this at 5:30 pm. Happily, he appears to have directly contradicted some of the information I’ve given to the CFO.

In the midst of this, a larger client decided to join the fray. Client Y, a health care institution, has appointed someone with no experience to step into a development deal that is half complete. This someone is Wormtongue’s lackey-in-training. She is hopelessly lost on a number of levels.

She decided, apparently out of the blue, to put together a plan for the next phase of project development the day before the next phase’s kick-off meeting…and based this plan on a table of contents that is three years old which had been put together before the project began. Luckily, she picked someone who had never worked on the project to help her out. The resulting turd is tinged with an odour of shit and vague amusement, as she has been involved in showcasing the product and knows the existing content…and has no explanation why she’s using a ToC that doesn’t have anything to do with the project.

She has also neglected to tell the project’s medical lead about what she’s doing, and has formed the plan without consulting the design/development team to determine what is already in place. When questioned on any of this, or why she was bothering, no answer was forthcoming.

It is also unclear why Wormtongue has put her in charge of the project on Client Y’s end, as she was previously charged with stocking shelves at Client Y’s library. I dealt with this as quickly as I could, but not as directly as I wanted…which would have been more along the lines of telling Wormtongue to sedate his retarded monkey butler before it began flinging poo at our medical contributors.

And of course, the day wouldn’t have been complete without Client Z stepping in right at 5 o’clock to tell me that they are changing their project’s concept for the third time after finishing production. They require a re-re-re-requote on the piece of work that currently opens with a 30 second video clip of the client lead lathered in sweat, covered in stubble, stammering at the ceiling about the benefits of his educational program.

My experiences today forced some serious thought on whether humans are generally meant to do anything other than fuck, piss, hunt with spears and pay homage to the little people inside our televisions.