Complaints

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• Initial Complaint

  Date:11/14/2023

  Type:Service or Repair Issues
  Status:

  AnsweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  Verbal discussions commenced around March 12, 2023, and we solidified all working service agreements, as well as payment of services on April 17, 2023.
  
  Per our agreement, I was required to maintain bi-weekly communication minimally and provide all documents to aid you in completing your tasks. I provided all the necessary documents by uploading them to her secure portal. My records indicate that approximately 159 documents were available by the end of May 2023. Therefore, she had more than enough time to properly complete applications and write grants for funding consideration. The only thing we consistently did together was verbally communicate from April through mid-September. Nothing substantial was communicated and I got nothing but delays! More importantly, all the efforts to locate and secure a building fell by the wayside because the two realtors/brokers that we were working with never received the requested information to move forward from her as agreed upon. In addition, numerous funding opportunities, many that I identified and forwarded to her, including the ******* ***** collective, “* *** **** *** ***** *******” offering 20 grants ranging from $75,000 to $250,000 each, was my last straw. I would have easily qualified for that grant, and it was due on September 23, 2023, but she did nothing!
  
  I singularly managed this process, constantly asking for updates, and requesting reviews of grant applications and proposal documents. She was contracted to lead and guide this process, based on her assertion that she has done this many times before, with a success rate of 90%.
  
  I have lost the opportunity to obtain a grant until the next grant season because most deadlines have passed.

  Business Response

  Date: 12/01/2023

  Dear ******* ******* (“*****”)
  This is a demand letter for the full payment of $3,065.70 for not providing the consulting services you and your
  company outlined for Grant Development, in Exhibit A of the executed contract and on the invoice:
  “Document and Application Preparation Identify, research, compile funding opportunities (most likely
  sources in line w/your mission and goals)
  ? Developing “The Table” – This was just was completed in Oct 2023
  ? Grant Research – Done and a 6-month grant plan forwarded to you on Jul 23, 2023
  ? Federal, state, county, city – All a part of the grant/funding plan
  ? Private foundations - All a part of the grant/funding plan
  Program Development Assistance
  ? Defining program/activities – We had several consultations and built a strategy on what programs and educators would assist with this.
  ? Organizational structure/capacity building
  Proposal/Grant Application – Consulted upon and discussed- amending both Bylaws, mission, vision, and purpose statements, leading to
  Amendment of Articles of Incorporation and assigning a registered agent – this is a climb as we continue to build the organization and apply for
  funding from all sources. Not mention the breakdown of MASDA, age groups, classroom designs etc.
  ? Write – mock grants were started in late August
  ? Prepare forms, attachments. – consulted on consistently throughout from Board development through “Table”
  ? Budget development – final budget completed, submitted and approved June 11, 2023
  ? Submit.”
  
  Verbal discussions commenced around March 12, 2023, and we solidified all working service agreements, as well as
  payment of services on April 17, 2023. From May through June- you had several family/personal affairs to attend, the death of your good
  friend, covid and time away from home.
  Per our agreement, I was required to maintain bi-weekly communication minimally and provide all documents to aid you
  in completing your tasks (regarding the 26 item checklist known as the “The Table”). I provided all the necessary documents by uploading them
  to your secure portal. My records indicate that approximately 159 documents were available by the end of May 2023. (I was expected to read
  through these 159 documents and search out what was needed, what needed revising and so on) Therefore, you have had more than enough
  time to properly complete applications and write grants for funding consideration. (As described below, out of those documents, you yourself
  admitted that those docs were outdated, needed revising, and were not the qualifying docs requested to fulfil the 26-item checklist- therefore
  we needed to completed those before moving towards grants) The only thing we consistently did together was verbally communicate from
  April through mid-September (This is not true, as stated above, for the first two months, you expected me to read/review over 159 documents,
  revise and bring certain documentation current as they were dated 2010 etc then to create new supporting documents that were not a part of
  the 159 documents that you submitted). Nothing substantial was communicated and I got nothing but delays (unfortunately most of the delays
  were because you were not sure of the direction of the location, you got worried about address, then the amendments of the Articles, and you
  are leaving out the review of new documents that at times you had not completed)! More importantly, all the efforts to locate and secure a
  building fell by the wayside because the two realtors/brokers that we were working with never received the requested information to
  move forward from you (why are they waiting on docs from me – that was not what you paid me to do- and not was communicated by Kizzy,
  the realtor AND even after completing the letter you still asked her to not send it- stating that you were worried about the address on the SOS
  being a concern despite being told that it was not as big of a concern- you still insisted) as agreed upon. In addition, numerous funding
  opportunities, many that I identified and forwarded to you, including the ******* ***** collective, “* *** **** *** ***** *******” offering 20
  grants ranging from $75,000 to $250,000 each, was my last straw. I would have easily qualified for that grant, and it was due on September
  23, 2023, but you did nothing! See my response below
  
  
  In response,
  
  I honestly hadn’t officially stopped working for you; our contract is for 12 months due to commence April 17, 2024. I have been extremely ill
  most of November.
  
  I had continued to work and communicate with the Secretary of State on behalf of your Amended Articles of Organization, which was finally
  approved on Oct 3, 2023 – this was a continual effort from mid-August 2023.
  
  On August 8, the realtor asked you for the following documents:
  Business Plan
  Website (if she has one)
  Tenant Bio/Business Bio
  Articles of Organization or Incorporation
  P&L for last time period in operation
  A letter explaining the lapse in operation
  
  This is asking me to do things out of the scope of the contract. I was not obligated to assist with this.
  
  In July 2023, I visited you in ******* on my dime, this was the second meeting that I had flew in, again to no additional cost to you. I explained
  then that I would be out of the office, out of the country between spending time with family and attending conferences and speaking
  engagements, it was all explained to provide an understanding that our “usual” communication would not be the same until I returned to my
  office in *** ***** in mid-September. I had already completed several items for you in preparation for grant funding prior to the end of July, in
  fact completing the table - as was told several times over that you were not grant eligible until documentation (the Table) which serves as 80%
  of the grant writing process is fully completed. I also reviewed a strategy for us to begin building a funding history. This was stated early on and
  reiterated several times over the months prior. It was scheduled that the only thing lingering was to complete the mock grants and begin
  applying – since you were not an operable nonprofit, had no location, nor not determined which county you would be operating in…. you were
  not eligible for many “school” grants.
  
  Grant preparation is a process, it takes time to finalize the steps needed to become grant eligible and we did in fact complete those steps.
  
  After reviewing your 159 outdated documents from 2010- 2014, I consulted with you regarding best practices, how we needed to move the
  organization along and I assisted you in updating majority of the most pertinent of those existing documentations including mission, vision and
  purpose statements, Bylaws, budget, Diversity statement, Evaluation Statement etc… in lieu of the 26 items of the “table”. In the finalizing of
  this checklist, I completed amended articles of incorporation (at no additional cost to you - which was not something written in the proposal
  but necessary to update and coordinate with the newly written purpose, mission statements, plus we needed to renew board and titles, and to
  include a registered Agent – these were all at a cost that I endured. In addition, I completed a grant plan to move forward with grants and
  worked on your mock grant and funding plan. This is technically where we left off.
  
  Due to the uncomfortable tone used in our last text, I have been searching for a way to communicate with you where it would be understood
  and not be a back-and-forth struggle. I rather not deal with hostile, confrontational situations especially when I know I have not done any
  wrong doings and my intent is to complete what I start. You got upset about a drop of communication when the truth is service never stopped,
  and I visited you prior to explain my schedule over the next two months. I continued working even when I was out of the country spending time
  with my son, visiting family, traveling for speaking engagements and attending scheduled conferences that you were made aware of. What I
  didn’t anticipate is my phone breaking but as soon as I got it fixed, I called you and explained that. Although you said you understood- you
  pushed for calls that were not necessary or emergent. Not once did you schedule a meeting in the client portal or send an email regarding a
  particular matter.
  
  …..
  During the tenure of several months, I had been offering consulting (at no additional cost to you) to you regarding your business because I was
  equally excited to be of service to you – beyond grant writing, and beyond the scope of what I was hired to do because I believed in your vision.
  I worked on improving your grant eligibility, I was waiting for you to make moves towards finding a location and I consulted with you regarding
  making other decisions unrelated to my services. I referred someone to assist you with locating a building because this was a very important
  part of researching and explaining your demographics. With you being non-operable, I took my time to explain how important it was for you to
  have your ducks in order. I was and had become more than someone you just “hired to write grants.”
  
  To conclude, the dependency to communicate beyond what you hired me to do was taken for granted and out of context. This contributed to
  you getting upset about a temporary drop of frequent communication that was explained and that was not affecting me servicing you. The
  exchange of texts is where things really got out of control. I realized that your demands for communication were overwhelming, and it made
  me question your value and respect for the work I was delivering to you. This is confirmed by the context of your above statements. Had you
  got your way, to call and talk to me while I was away from my office (off-duty technically) we would not be here today….
  
  Even after the text messages, I continued to fulfill my duties and I stayed on top of the communication with the secretary of state until I
  received the final approval. The few times, that I did reach out; I tried several times to change the dialogue, yet you stayed with a disgruntle
  tone through your texts and emails. In fairness, I know you wanted to continue to go back and forth, and still do. I do not. I’d rather fulfill the
  proposal and work towards seeing you become a success.
  
  Lastly, anyone can easily apply for a grant but that does not mean it will be awarded, especially if they are not grant eligible. If we missed a
  grant, it is because we were not ready to apply. The probability to win a grant was too low. Applying for a grant that is only offering 20 grants
  and you not being operable (in nearly 10 years) was not a part of our strategy. As a professional grant writer and business consultant for over
  20 years, I do not favor putting my clients in a situation that I am not sure or confident enough about the success of the outcome. Your
  organization has not been operable, nor does it have a funding history. Furthermore, your amended articles did not get approved until October;
  applying for a grant in September would not have been wise.
  
  I am open to fulfilling my obligations under the contract; as I mentioned above, I do want to see you win! I worked on your business even
  during time of personal development and time spent with my family, if that does not indicate my commitment to your success, your growth
  and seeing you win, I do not know what does to you.

  Customer Answer

  Date: 12/10/2023

  Dear ******* ******* ("*****")
  
  You stated that you hadn't officially stopped working for me, but you would have been officially notified to STOP WORK had you accepted and read the four (4) certified letters sent to four different addresses on November 8, 2023.  A return receipt has been received by the USPS because they were unable to successfully deliver the letters.  It appears you have only responded to this BBB claim.
  
  Your BBB response was lengthy and had a lot of detail; which is more writing than I have ever gotten in the several months we were contracted to work together.  I'm not sure who you were trying to convince, the BBB or me?  If you had put the same amount of effort into writing the grants, as you did in responding to the BBB, we wouldn't be at this impasse. 
  
  The only completed item that I am aware of you finishing was the Amended Articles of Organization that took months.  Your excuse for the delay was that you had to wait until they were approved by the ******* Secretary of State.  However, that is not true.  The process to amend Articles is simple and pretty straight forward.  The amendment just needs to be submitted, with the fee and the SOS will expeditiously post it.  There is no review or approval process required by the SOS as you stated was the delay on multiple occasions. Additionally, your SOS amendment submissions are very minimal.  Therefore, it should not have taken this long to finalize Board members' information and some details related to the purpose statement. Your Amendment states in Article II that my Board voted and approved all the changes on July 19, 2023. Then, you electronically signed my name on this amended submission, unbeknownst to me, on August 19, 2023 (one month later).  Lastly, it wasn't filed until September 7, 2023 (almost 3 more weeks after that)!
  
  I agree that grant preparation is a process, but there was very little "work in progress" in all this time.  No applications or proposals were started, shared and/or filled out.  If this was to be a year contract, then all the grant work should have been completed before the grant season ended and we should be in the review and waiting for acceptance or denial process.  At this point, there are not even any significant drafts of "work in progress."  You even stated in your response, that you "completed a grant plan to move forward with grants and worked on your mock grant and funding plan.  This is technically where we left off."  This is correct, five months to construct A PLAN with no drafts or deliverables.  
  
  In summary, I paid, up-front and in full, for a service that has taken months with no results.  Your multiple illnesses, vacations, other work and personal obligations are of no concern to me.  I have missed a very critical grant submission cycle and now I have to start over and wait another year.  I have already contracted another consulting and grant-writing service. They have stated that it should only take 3 - 4 months to complete grant applications and proposals, utilizing the exact same information I submitted to you, early in this process. 
  
  I would like my money back and then we can both move forward with our lives.
  
  Thank you,
  
  ******** ****** *****