The Captain's Blog ™

We all know that things don’t always work out as planned, either in life or in business. As part of the learning process, many of us take time out to look back when things go wrong. We ask ourselves whether we missed any obvious warning signs and whether, if only we’d been more attentive, we might have avoided the negative outcomes.

Of course, there are obvious steps we can take to reduce risk. Most business relationships, for example, are governed by contracts. Whilst they can be tedious to the point of “snoredom”, it often pays to read the small print. Contracts can be tricky things, after all.

So it was that yesterday I was fortunate enough to find an obvious warning sign at a nice, early stage. Just one short phrase, it was part of a new agreement with a marketing partner. But it set the warning light flashing and siren sounding.

In specifying how they plan to pay me, it reads: “Payment will be made 1 month in the rears – and will be based on figures provided by DART”.

You want to pay me where?!

You can imagine my alarm. I have no desire to be shot in the bum by a dart – and even less to receive payment where the sun doesn’t shine.

Is this an obvious warning that I’ll get shafted if I do the deal with this “full service” agency?  Or do they want a backhander?  I’d ask, but the guy who sent it has already apologised for his “back log”.

Footnote: DART really refers, of course, to a marketing software solution owned by Google. Which led me, foolishly, to search on “rears” in Google…