[consulting] Failed Outsourcing Job

[Ryan Cross]

Hi Fred,

obligatory disclaimer: IANAL

Based on your agreement of 100% payment on delivery, that would generally
follow that you aren't able to use any of the work until its paid for in
full. Often times there is specific clauses in a contract about if and when
IP transfers in a work-for-hire situation.

The short answer is that you shouldn't use his work unless you negotiate
some form of partial payment.

I'm sure its tempting to use the work and you probably feel like his
failure to deliver has cost you time, even if you don't have to pay him
now, but I have been on both sides and I think it would be unethical
regardless of what your contractual obligations are. The fairest path
forward is to negotiate a partial payment with him for the work to date and
then proceed as you wish.

Cheers,
Ryan

On Fri, Mar 1, 2013 at 12:25 AM, Fred Jones <fredthejonester at gmail.com>wrote:

> A question of legality and ethics: I hired an outsourcer (from
> freelancer.com) to make a D7 theme. The deal was crystal clear that he
> has until the deadline to finish it 100% or I pay nothing and he
> agreed to that.
>
> He has done about 80-85% of it but no more than that. So I will not
> pay him and that's that.
>
> But he put in download links on the Appearance page and so I
> downloaded his work and I have it. I could now finish it myself and
> hire another person to finish it and pay them $100 instead of the $500
> that he was supposed to get.
>
> Question is should I just take it and run because we never clarified
> who owns anything and he *did* make it downloadable. Or perhaps I
> should tell him that I will pay him $100 and take his code and if he
> accepts, then OK.
>
> I don't want to continue with him because he clearly can not finish
> the job--he keeps asking me to review it and the dropdown menus are
> wrong each time plus 30 other details that he just can't get right.
>
> Thanks for any thoughts.
>
> Fred
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