Tell HN: How I fired my customer for the first time

So a customer signed up for one of my paid subscription plans of my daily deal software and started using it to run his business. He launched his website for less than a week and had no sales, so he decided to somehow trace the problem back to me. Fair enough -- my product is part of his business matrix -- perhaps I was the one who faltered.

Here is an excerpt of what he wrote:

There is certainly something wrong here, as it does not make sense at all having sent emails of about 15K and having only 39 views? Lets say even if half of 15K emails that were sent... I shouldn't have gotten 39 page views only. It seems either the emails are not being sent or even if they do, they go directly to spam.?

As for credit, I think I deserve a refund of what I paid and at least 6 months free in exchange with reporting issues, all the ideas, and tips I have been giving. Specially because it hasn't been working Because I feel like I have been working for the company during these whole period since I signed up that I have been encountering all the issues which I had to report. (even not making money because there seems to be some issues)

Putting aside the true reasons for his business failure, I was dumbfounded by how audacious some people can actually be. A refund is fine -- if a customer is not happy, I do not deserve the money. No problem there. But wanting freebies in exchange for something so intangible and unquantifiable in value? I laughed a little, but then I composed myself and wrote back:

It takes time to build a business, daily deals or not. Your site has been launched for less than a week.

But from experience observing many daily deal sites, we can guess that uploading a large non-opt-in list and literally spamming them and buying Facebook fans, etc. are not going to work in the long run or even in the short run. But that was a business decision for you to make, definitely not something we should interfere with (and we did not).

We have daily deal site owners who toil day in and day out to genuinely market their site, and they're making money even with only 300+ opt-in subscribers. As far as we have seen, it always takes some hard work at the beginning to market the site and build a genuine following of people interested in your offers.

"Issues" exist with any platform, and, while we thank you for reporting certain things as issues, a lot of them are really feature requests described as bugs. We work really hard to please our customers -- and we add working features almost immediately to fulfill your needs; I believe that is something that should at least not go unmentioned if not praised -- but feedback is something each of our customer provide freely, regularly, and without any strings. It is also only useful when it is in aggregates; individual or even peculiar feedback does little to help us move the product forward to serve our customers better.

I note your request for a full refund and 6 months free use of the platform. Now, my take of how we can move forward:

- I understand your concern about wanting to plug a financial leak (assuming you garner no sales if you continue to run the site).

- I am agreeable to make a full refund to you immediately.

- I cannot accede to your request for 6 months of free subscription. This is unprecedented, and we see no need to do give in in exchange for something that many other customers provide sincerely and freely.

- However, if you would like to upgrade to our US$9.95/mth plan, giving you 10 months of runway instead of the original 1 month using the same amount of funds, we would be happy to continue to work with you, while you restrategize your business.

The fact is our interests are aligned; we are actually on the same side. We cannot do well unless you do well, and we certainly want to see all of our customers do well in their own niches.

P.S. The mails are sent out, as much as your interpretation of your data disagrees. It is indeed possible that virtually no one clicked on your deal; spam mail click-through rates are notoriously, notoriously low. It is a fact of email marketing.

Let me know what works for you.

I am now awaiting his reply. My life has been basically consumed by this one customer for close to a week now, and I can really do without the money he brings to the table, if it has to come with an attitude of entitlement. The best thing that I can do to salvage whatever remains of my sanity, integrity, and patience is to fire him, and let us both have a peaceful separation. I am not one to bow down to unreasonableness, and I will not start just because I am a vendor now and someone else is the customer. No way. No bloody way.