Me: I've not done this before, so any guess would be pure assumption.

Client: Okay, but still, you would have some idea, right?

Me: It might get done in 3 days or may take even 30.

After 3 days:

Client: But you said that it will be done in 3 days. Now you are saying there MVP is not ready. Do you even know, your part is the most critical one in the project. We believed in you. We trusted you. This is insane. It was a wrong decision to choose you.

Me (in my head): Didn't I say, this is the first time I am trying to scrape Coles? It might take time?

Me (in actual): I understand, it is getting delayed. Am trying to get this up ASAP....

Anyone else experienced toxic clients but still didn't lose their cool?

Yup. Never tell a client how quickly it could be done if everything goes well. Always tell them the maximum.

It's your own problem if you don't deny that you told what they say you did.

> "Anyone else experienced toxic clients but still didn't lose their cool?"

Yep, and why everything, *everything* is documented. Email, word doc, slack channel...anything and everything to CYA. Over time, you'll develop a 6th sense for BS users will try to pull over you.

User: "Make the button green, and say 'Override All'"

You: "Um, the standard is blue and its a confirmation pop-up. Its not really overriding anything. The button should just read 'OK'"

User: "NO NO NO! I told you green!...The button *IS* allowing the user to update inventory, essentially overriding all the inventory for that product. DO IT!! "

<next day>

User: "Why did you make the button green? Confirmation dialog box standard is blue. 'Override All'? Why did you say that? It should be ''OK'."

You: "Those were your requirements...here is the email .... and my objections to the changes ...., and your reply to do it anyway. "

User: "OK smart ass, you win this round."

"It will take between 3 and 300 days"

@PaperTrail Holy shit, are they mental sometimes?

@ojt-rant 😅

@PaperTrail crazy!

@lungdart yeah, learnt that lesson the hard way.

@PaperTrail Documenting everything is pretty fitting considering your name.

You should not have taken the blame.
If it comes up again. Any time at all. You can just say:
"I never promised it was going to take 3 days. I specifically said that I don't have any metrics to go on. It might take 3 it might take 30 days."
Don't forget you are critical to the assholes success. The asshole made promises to other people and blames you.

@hjk101 Yes. But my instinct at that time hinted me that the client (who himself was a consultant to the main client) was in blame game mood. And if I had answered back, it would have further worsened the situation. So, I just tried to stay cool and ignore his opera a$$#0lism.

@Demolishun no.

not sometimes.

@TheSilent > "Documenting everything is pretty fitting considering your name."

A DBA used one of my flowcharts for the pricing flow in our system to explain why/how we sold $1,000 items for $1 (yes, that happened) to an outraged VP. One of the notes were "In this step, the manager can override the price below cost. Team was warned that this could cause a significant loss in profit because it bypasses all safety checks, but approved by VP on mm/dd/yyyy". VP reads who wrote the note.

VP: "Who wrote that!?...oh...it was king CYA.... Damn. It was me who approved that feature. Never mind. Take that out that override feature now and any other back doors I might have approved."

Still not sure how I felt/feel about having that 'king CYA' nick-name from the corporate office.

@PaperTrail CYA means "cover your assets" here, I'm guessing.