Advice needed - waiting almost 1 year for a VHS resto job to be completed

[editor707]

Hello all

This is not a post I wanted to have to publish, especially being my first on this forum

Unfortunately, I believe I may have been ripped off by a member of this community (I will not reveal the person’s identity - yet) and I am seeking advice from the members here as to what course of action I should take

The story goes like this:

I am a video editor, and was given 4 VHS videotapes by a client in mid 2018, which contained footage of a sporting event from the 1980s that my client and his brother participated in

The client’s request was that I convert the VHS footage into a digital format, and do whatever I could to make it look and sound better, including editing some parts out and adding titles and credits

I have access to some high end VHS players and so I digitised the tapes myself

I believe the result was as good as could be expected, however these tapes were in poor condition and suffered all the usual VHS problems, some of which I could address and others which I believed an expert might have better luck with

My research revealed a particular person who runs a business digitising video tapes, and who seemed to have quite a reputation as the ‘go-to’ person for advanced restoration as well

After some email correspondence between myself and the person in question we worked out (with my client's blessing of course) that the best way forward might be for him to try and recapture the tapes himself, and so in November 2018 I posted a 1TB HDD and the 4 VHS tapes to him

He asked for payment up front, and I paid the full amount immediately

Fast forward to December 2019, and I still have nothing back yet

There are almost 200 emails that have been sent now - the large majority by me - asking for delivery dates…begging in some instances…for him to deliver the files and/or to post the tapes and the files back to me

All I have received (if I’m lucky enough to even get a response) is multiple excuses (see below) and often weeks would pass before I received an answer..and even those were vague and only a few words at best - and it also appears some responses are outright lies e.g the job has been “completed” on various occasions but then there is more work to be done..

Here is a *small* sample:

Dec 13 2018

“tell your client he'll get a polished restored
archival copy in January”

April 29 2019

“I’m gathering everything off the drives. It's done.”

May 20 2019

“Encoding and uploading, just need time.”

June 16 2019

“You'll be able to grab those in the next few days.”


July 19 2019

“Timeline is for sure by end of month.”


Sep 22 2019

“I just need a bit more time.”

Nov 19 2019

“Sending this Friday”


I am at my wit’s end, I have been suffering a lot of stress because of this and my client is absolutely livid and I don’t know what to do

To make matters worse, my client suffers from a degenerative illness which means he has limited time to share these memories with his family

Unfortunately I am on the other side of the world to this person so visiting them to retrieve my goods is not an option

At this point, I just want my stuff back - I don’t care about the job anymore and neither does my client - but he doesn't appear to want to send the tapes and hard drive back until the job is done

I’m quite a patient person, and have been nothing but polite and understanding throughout all the correspondence, but my patience is almost depleted…

So I would like to ask you, the members of this forum, what should I do now?

[Sharc]

There is a guy on this (and the other) forum trying to get help and comments on how to improve a clip for more than a year now. Some people seem to be over-ambitious when it comes to restoration.....

Seriously: I am afraid there is little you can do in your case without running into a costly legal exercise across borders/continents.
You have taken your lesson:
- Don't give away originals unless you know the trusted person and unless you have easy access to him
- Don't give away material without a contract with the legal issues. Even then, it's difficult to claim a value for the tapes, as the value is mainly non-monetary. It's even more difficult to do it across borders with different jurisdiction.
- Never make 100% advance payments for a service you don't even have a clue about the result or a reference, just based on hope, blind trust and vague promises.

Hopefully someone has a better advice for you. I wish you good luck.

[amaipaipai]

Call the police.