A friend of mine (Let's call him Brian) is a Wordpress developer/designer who wanted to reduce his hosting costs, so I set up a reseller account with a large hosting provider and now provide him with his hosting at almost cost price as a semi sideline/favour. I make very minimal money from the ve...
@Homerothompson I agree with you on that entirely. But I do tend to assist them directly with technical issues. I understand that is a mistake and I need to stop doing that, because while it solves problems quicker in the short term, problems like this become a serious side effect
This seems to be more of an interpersonal problem since you presumably don't consider this to be a business relationship? Or is it but are you looking for a way to word "In-depth support isn't included in my services."?
@motosubatsu I know, but there is a difference between establishing boundaries with a client and establishing them with a friend where money got involved. The latter is simply not on-topic here.
You have to explain the missing context of "A client of his, D, has complained directly to me". With B's knowledge and consent ("If you have any tech suppt questions, contact OP?"), or how? Why would D put you in that situation then ignore your opinion. Do you have any agreement, written or verbal, with D? or with B when/if/how you are supposed to respond to D? What's the damage if you simply email them both a one-paragraph: "I've investigated and confirmed that load time is not an issue except on devices X,Y [show table]. I suspect this is due to js libraries..."
"...If you encounter slow load time (> threshold), please use <tool> to confirm and send us your log attached". Push the self-diagnosis back on the end-customer, and if they think there is a genuine issue, have them provide incontrovertible advice to both of you upfront so you don't end up disagreeing with B. Ultimately, who is footing the bill for your support on behalf of end-customer B? is it D? B? you? something fuzzy in-between? I guess in general, strive for clear crisp metrics like this, instead of "If you need support call OP". Unless you get paid hourly :)
Have you tried using a speed test tool like developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights on his website? It will hopefully point to the fact that he hasn't optimised his website. It is only your issue if it returns 'Reduce server response time' as an issue. Even then it could be down to the way he has written his back-end code. It should hopefully point the issue back at him.
This question is meaningless until you tell us whether you get paid or not for doing work under this vague arrangement - and by whom. Until then we can't understand who does/doesn't need to be convinced of what, or ignored.
I find that most of these issues come down to other factors including client side computer or network latency. While this is obvious, you only lightly touch the topic in your question. It would help to use Chrome Developer Tools to see if there is something specific to the site or if there may be another issue such as DNS resolution that is specific to the customer. It may be that Brian needs to walk through this level of analysis with his customer and something you may want to look at just for expediency. Also consider the client computer may be slower and heavy sites chew up I/O too much.
It isn't your problem as other say, but maybe you could install and add-on or something that logs page loads times and sends out alerts if they are above threshold X.
Simply state the words "As you know when I set up the hosting for you as a favor, I put it on XYZ which is the fastest host available. If you'd like me to change it to another host, just yell out and I'll change it either at no cost or a small fee. No problem! Again I'm fairly sure XYZ is the fastest host available, but I'm more than happy to move it to another one, if you want me to do that for you as a favor." End of story.
Off topic, but if you're getting complaints about latency looking at the average doesn't tell the whole story. Try looking at 95th percentile latency or 99th percentile latency.
If you're getting paid, then "someone else's problem that has been dumped on my desk" is a mischaracterization. And if you're not, I gave you one effective way to deal with it: pushing the requirement to document and root-cause back on the customer, in such a way that your friend can't disagree. Either way, your title misrepresents your role as too passive. You own your operating relationship with your friend, so if you want to fix/clarify/change it, then do. Don't ask the internet for permission. I'm retitling the question until you do.
"Derek is sitting waiting for an answer from one of us" - can you clarify why you think Derek is waiting for an answer from you? As I understand it you've answered him, passed it on to Brian, given Brian all the information he needs to the ball is well and truly in his court. Did Brian throw the ball back to you in some way? In what way do you think you are still involved in this issue?
"I strive for client satisfaction..." and "...I don't really want to spend any time on it..." don't really work well together. Either you care about the client or you don't.
Discussion on question by Charlie: Ho…
Discussion on question by Charlie: Ho…