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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Jul 2001
    Posts
    889

    WARNING to all about “Sonow” of Sonow.co.uk

    WARNING to all about “Sonow” of Sonow.co.uk

    I recently had the dubious pleasure of making a business deal with “Sonow.” Without getting into many details Sonow, or Reece, agreed to purchase my hosting business over a week ago. She emailed me her agreement to purchase the company, and I immediately closed the bidding process. Our deal was for her to send 50% of the payment first and following the transfer of items listed in our agreement, she was to send the final 50%. She did try to send the initial payment via PayPal, but I was not able to accept the payment on the account she sent it to (I told her this might happen, and that I would have another account ready). I gave her an alternate account, and she agreed to send the payment the following day due to an issue with her credit card and her bank.

    I agreed to let her access the client information so she could begin to update her records. I did this since she did show good faith and the initial failed transfer attempt was my fault and not hers. A day or two passed and she continued to tell me about “bank problems.” I informed her that I was going out of town for two days and told her that I would check in from time to time. I made it clear that I would provider her with complete access to transfer clients as soon as I saw that the initial 50% was received.

    Days passed, and she continued to complain about “bank problems.” Still, I was understanding and allowed her to have a few more days. Finally, I spoke to her on AIM Monday and she promised to have my payment the next day. That was the last I ever spoke to her. I found out yesterday that she blocked me on AIM and when I tried to contact her using a different AIM account, she ignored me. This happened twice. Today, she has not been on AIM all day. She lives in the UK, so the phoning her would not have been worth it.

    I know she’s not away from the computer since I see her account on the WHT “who’s online” list and I have logs of her accessing my server. She’s also continuing her attempts to acquire other companies (http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showth...01#post1958801). I found this odd considering her claims of having “bank problems.”

    I’ve been very patient and helpful throughout the whole process. I let her have early access to info and offered to help in any way necessary with the transition. I wanted to make the process as smooth as possible, but apparently, she doesn’t care much for this.

    She ignores my emails and PMs. I don’t think she intended for the deal to go this way, but her actions are very unprofessional and I will most certainly not have any further business dealings with her. I am writing this to warn you that you might want to think twice about doing any business with her or her company as well.

    I don’t know what she’s trying to pull but it’s either the lamest attempt I’ve ever seen to try to con another business or she’s one of the worst when it comes to doing business professionally.

    Either way, I warned her that I would write of my experiences dealing with her, and so here it is. I gave her numerous chances to tell her side of the story. Be forewarned and save yourself headaches by refusing to deal with her until she learns how to conduct a business transaction professionally.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Oct 2002
    Posts
    379
    Hi,
    Did you sign any kind of contract? I wouldn't give them access to anything before a contract has been signed. Also selling to someone in another country is risky as it would be harder to take them to court if the need arose.

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Jul 2003
    Location
    UK
    Posts
    1,887
    aragon -> If you require, I can phone her for you (as I am in the UK). Just contact me via PM and I'll let her know, plus if you need to contact any law enforcement (if she's stolen any infromation), then I'll be happy to contact them on your behalf.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Jul 2001
    Posts
    889
    Originally posted by LCHwebHost
    Hi,
    Did you sign any kind of contract? I wouldn't give them access to anything before a contract has been signed. Also selling to someone in another country is risky as it would be harder to take them to court if the need arose.
    I have her electronic agreement that lists everything she's agreed to purchase, as well as the purchase price. I'm probably not going to make a big deal out of it since she is out of the country.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Jul 2001
    Posts
    889
    Originally posted by Joseph_M
    aragon -> If you require, I can phone her for you (as I am in the UK). Just contact me via PM and I'll let her know, plus if you need to contact any law enforcement (if she's stolen any infromation), then I'll be happy to contact them on your behalf.
    Thanks for the offer. If I do find that she's using any of the privileged information that was given to her, then I will take you up on the offer. As of now, I've changed all of the passwords and locked her out of everything I've given her access to.

  6. #6
    I feel for you, we had someone try to pull a fast one on a huge design project, not knowing we don't do anything until a deposit (initial payment) has been paid.

    Just next time don't do anything until you see 50% of that money
    ServeYourSite
    Web hosting done right
    ██ Shared, Reseller and Dedicated web hosting
    An Easy Web Presence Company

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Jul 2001
    Posts
    889
    Yep. This is the last time I try to be nice when making a business deal.

    There's always the minority that ruins it for the majority. Although in the case of this industy, maybe just WHT in general, it seems the majority are the ones we don't like :/

  8. #8
    Yea, it's a shame, nice signature by the way
    ServeYourSite
    Web hosting done right
    ██ Shared, Reseller and Dedicated web hosting
    An Easy Web Presence Company

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Aug 2002
    Location
    East Coast
    Posts
    277
    Wow, I would suggest that you check over everything to make sure she didn't take anything.
    - 7de5igns

  10. #10
    Join Date
    Jul 2001
    Posts
    889
    I have a signed NDA from her, so hopefully she realizes she can't use anything she might have taken. Basically, she knows all of our plans and client email addresses.

    I doubt she'll be dumb enough to try and steal clients. I've built up relationships with most of the clients, so it's not going to work

  11. #11
    Join Date
    Mar 2002
    Location
    Orlando, FL
    Posts
    12,207
    aragon, seems like a deal gone sour to me with the other party not having the decency to say that they are not interested anymore.

    However, your sig is not appropriate.

  12. #12
    Join Date
    Jul 2001
    Posts
    889
    Originally posted by timechange.com
    However, your sig is not appropriate.
    Why is it not appropriate? I consulted the signature section on the rules before making the sig. I'm pretty sure mods have seen it already and they haven't changed it or told me to change it as of yet. (great, now you just jinxed me )

  13. #13
    Join Date
    Mar 2002
    Location
    Orlando, FL
    Posts
    12,207
    Because it appears to be a failure on their part to conduct business with you; even though you are obviously pissed there does not seem to be a scam involved.

  14. #14
    Join Date
    Jul 2001
    Posts
    889
    I know, and I already stated that I'm pretty sure she didn't intend for things to go this way.

    I agree, it may be a bit harsh or it may seem that i'm compromising my own integrity by having what i have in my sig. If that's what you mean when you say "inappropriate", then I can see your point.

    However, this whole episode might end up costing me a few hundred dollars. I'm not going to sit back and let someone get the best of me by just letting them off the hook. There are a few things that I left out - trust me, her actions have cost me more problems that the ones I've listed. For various reasons, i'm not going to list these problems. Legal action would be far too expensive and not worth the trouble to simply collect a few hundred dollars.

    It's not "revenge"... it's just that she really messed up my schedule and I don't think she needs to get away it so easily.

    Until she contacts me and explains what she was thinking (and it sounds reasonable), I'm not changing my sig.

  15. #15
    Join Date
    Aug 2002
    Location
    East Coast
    Posts
    277
    She signed a contract and then a couple days later no money for aragon, and the lady is gone.. Sounds like a scam to me.

    Why did she block him? Couldn't she just say I don't want to do the deal instead of trying to ignore him? Sounds a little inappropriate by herself.
    - 7de5igns

  16. #16
    Join Date
    Jul 2001
    Posts
    889
    Originally posted by 7de5igns
    She signed a contract and then a couple days later no money for aragon, and the lady is gone.. Sounds like a scam to me.

    Why did she block him? Couldn't she just say I don't want to do the deal instead of trying to ignore him? Sounds a little inappropriate by herself.
    Exactly. I would have been a little mad, but i'd blame myself for not making her put down a non-refundable deposit and take this as a lesson learned and moved on.

    The way this whole situation played out, I have no clue what she's thinking and i've wasted almost 2 weeks. I had people helping me and I let them all go so i've been doing everything for the past 2 weeks.

  17. #17

    Email Contact

    I work with potential investors to Sonow Webhosting who were very concerned to read about the events you descibe here.
    We would like to get a better understanding of what happened, and when, so that we can decide what to do next.

    I appreciate that you may feel that you have wasted enough time on this already but would very much appreciate a brief email exchange so that we can get to the bottom of it and close the issue at this end.

    Please contact me on my personal email address:
    malcolm.warden@virgin.net

    Thank you

  18. #18
    Join Date
    Feb 2004
    Location
    Australia (Crikey)
    Posts
    2,271
    sorry to hear about you bad luck, thanks for the heads up

    Bub

  19. #19
    Join Date
    Jul 2001
    Posts
    889

    Re: Email Contact

    Originally posted by malcolmw
    I work with potential investors to Sonow Webhosting who were very concerned to read about the events you descibe here.
    We would like to get a better understanding of what happened, and when, so that we can decide what to do next.

    I appreciate that you may feel that you have wasted enough time on this already but would very much appreciate a brief email exchange so that we can get to the bottom of it and close the issue at this end.

    Please contact me on my personal email address:
    malcolm.warden@virgin.net

    Thank you
    Sorry, I haven't checked this thread in a long time...

    if you still want to discuss this, PM me.

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