Web design scam?

[Stefano]

Got a quote for £800 for a website I need designing from a web design company, apparantly based in London. The girl I was speaking to (online messenger) appeared to be foreign by the way she was typing and spelling.

Anyway they offer a free home page design before you part with any cash, so I said ok go for it, told them what I wanted and they said they will do it to spec. They emailed me this evening with an image of the home page, it was a this template with my logo on it. They claim to have made it from scrath for me.

Is this illegal or just bad practice? I haven't responded yet.

 

[GBDG1]

It just seems like a sales tactic rather than a scam. £800 isn't a vast amount of money to build a website and so you would expect a designer to use some shortcuts.

I'd probably avoid the company if you're getting a bad impression of them. It's not like there's a shortage of web designers so I'd walk away.

 

[Stefano]

It just seems like a sales tactic rather than a scam. £800 isn't a vast amount of money to build a website and so you would expect a designer to use some shortcuts.

I'd probably avoid the company if you're getting a bad impression of them. It's not like there's a shortage of web designers so I'd walk away.

They are claiming they have built the website bespoke for me, when really they have just found a free template and are passing it off as their own work. Surely that's more than a sales tactic? Or is it not?

 

[GBDG1]

They are claiming they have built the website bespoke for me, when really they have just found a free template and are passing it off as their own work. Surely that's more than a sales tactic? Or is it not?

Hmm.. I know what you're saying, but it's similar to when companies send you a 'bespoke' quote and 98% of it is copy and pasted. If they're sending you a sample of something pre-sale then they can clearly only spend a small amount of time on it - only a smallish % of people will go on to purchase. It's just designed to give you some assurance. A lot of people require 'physical' proof before committing, but when you're designing something the work is in designing it - which you clearly can't do before they buy.

As I said, I strongly doubt it is a scam. Even if they do use a template, it would be a better job than a lot of the crappy web designers out there. Some of the flash/frame based abominations I have seen defy belief. Some people are working as 'professional web designers' and they don't know what SEO is.

If you're unhappy with what they are offering then I would suggest walking away. If you want to continue then ask to view some of their portfolio and speak to some previous clients. This should be a better method of ascertaining if they are a legit company,

 

[jdevil]

Try use Weebly, very good for creating a (basic) website.

 

[Stefano]

Try use Weebly, very good for creating a (basic) website.

It's not a basic site i'm after. It's closer to studentbeans in terms of content and features. I can't seem to find any web designer who has similar work in their portfolio. Is this a specific type of web design?

 

[Abraxas2040]

It's not a basic site i'm after. It's closer to studentbeans in terms of content and features. I can't seem to find any web designer who has similar work in their portfolio. Is this a specific type of web design?

Having a brief look at the site, I'd say you could achieve something very close with a self hosted wordpress site with a decent theme and a few select plugins. If I were you I would look around some of the premium wordpress theme websites most of the premium ones can be customized with your own colours, styles and logos and as far as layout goes it's basically dragging and dropping widgets.

 

[Stefano]

Having a brief look at the site, I'd say you could achieve something very close with a self hosted wordpress site with a decent theme and a few select plugins. If I were you I would look around some of the premium wordpress theme websites most of the premium ones can be customized with your own colours, styles and logos and as far as layout goes it's basically dragging and dropping widgets.

I think I must have search through every single Wordpress theme site going. Can't seem to find anything similar, they all seem to be fairly minimalist or with just 5 - 6 home page sections.

Is the type of site given in the example above particularly difficult to create? I can't seem to find any designer (and I've searched through hundreds) with anything similar in their portfolio. They all seem to be online shops.

 

[jdevil]

Having just looked at student bean I could tell you those sites aren't easy to create. I've seen web designers charge as low as £200 for some very simple 5 page HTML.

 

[Stefano]

Having just looked at student bean I could tell you those sites aren't easy to create. I've seen web designers charge as low as £200 for some very simple 5 page HTML.

Are you a web designer? Have you any idea how much I should be looking to pay for a site like beans?

 

[brumhee]

It's not a basic site i'm after. It's closer to studentbeans in terms of content and features. I can't seem to find any web designer who has similar work in their portfolio. Is this a specific type of web design?

What do you mean similar work? As in content or style?

 

[bbK]

I'd stay clear, not only have they said they have designed that from scratch when clearly they haven't but they have probably downloaded that off of some blackhat website. If you wanted a CMS site such as Wordpress or Joomla then just buy a template and create the site yourself, it isn't hard at all.

 

[Stefano]

What do you mean similar work? As in content or style?

content in terms of a news/entertainment/offers portal

 

[jdevil]

Have you looked here Stefano? Web Design Forum | Web Design CSS Design Forum SEO WDF - (Web Design Forum)

Very good forum, try PM'ing a few of the members with your proposal.