Hit Web Design review: bad business to work with/for! abc4 news utah will expose! 528

Throughout the interview the point was made that HIT seeks to be fair in every undertaking we make. The essence of the interview was very positive and overall a pleasant experience. It gave HIT the opportunity to express to a news organization how proud we are of the progress we have made, the commitment our staff has to our customers and how our efforts are focused. Occasionally we stub our toe (we are human), but at the end of the day, we truly seek to to treat the client and employees fairly.

I am excited to see the final cut, and personally I welcome any customer with specific concerns to contact me. You can email me directly at CEO@hitwebdesign.com or QCA@hitwebdesign.com

Personally, I do not consider deceiving people "stubbing a toe!"

If you have been a victim of Heritage Web Solutions or Hit Web Design or whatever name they go by please follow the following steps.

1. Call your bank or credit card company and file a "charge back." This is really the only way you can get your money back.
2. Contact the Utah Attorney General's Office and file a formal complaint with them about the Hit Web Design's practices.
3. Contact the BBB and file a formal complaint with them.
4. Contact your local TV, Radio, Newspaper and tell them about Hit Web Design's predatory behavior, and destroying your small business plan, and taking your money.
5. Contact ABC4.com and help them with their story.
6. Post HERE and on other sites about your situation with Hit Web Design.
7. Share your results with us!

/currently removed/

well said Bryce! U DA MAN!

My name is Ryan Nelson and I am currently employed in HIT’s legal department. I am somewhat taken back by the ignorant nature of the comments posted here by what are apparently disgruntled ex-employees of HIT. They are nothing more than mere allegations made out of frustration in an attempt to get revenge or to harm HIT’s reputation; yet they provide no specific instances or substantive evidence of wrongdoing whatsoever.

I have to give Bryce Turpin credit for being man enough to provide his identity. If what Bryce says about his time off requests is true, then I would have to concur that it is unfortunate. However, it is certainly not typical of what I have seen in my experience at HIT and without knowing HIT's side of the story, I can't formulate a fair opinion of Bryce's claims. HIT values family and tries to accommodate personal and family leave as well as vacation leave and sick leave and I have seen that throughout my career at HIT.

The rest of you—what are you hiding from? I suspect that most of you were terminated as employees for some shortcoming or violation that you committed and you are now feeling embarrassed and revengeful. Why don't you come out of anonymity and tell us about it? I'm sure that it’s easier and safer to hide behind an anonymous online nickname and take pot shots at HIT’s reputation than it is to identify yourself and raise some legitimate issues for discussion.

Consider, for example, the blatant ignorance of stopthegreed’s assertion that Dave and Jeremy Aitken are “uneducated idiots” – two guys who established and currently direct a company that sells and produces millions of dollars’ worth of work each year; and who made their company rank #22 in the Inc 500 list in 2007. They obviously must be doing something right to have accomplished all that they have accomplished.

Now, before you go calling me an “uneducated idiot, ” I will have you know that I hold three college degrees, including a juris doctorate, and have worked in web development since 2000. I have personally performed probably all of the job functions that you ex-employees have performed and more. I have sold products and services to HIT customers; I have personally built websites and fulfilled orders for HIT customers; I have managed a developmental department at HIT and have overseen HIT employees and hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of projects; I have personally helped and continue to help many customers with concerns; I have personally investigated and responded to BBB and other complaints made by customers; I have also personally represented or been involved in representing HIT in legal proceedings and have represented HIT in arbitration cases.

I will tell you from experience at HIT that not everything is as black and white as your cowardly allegations make it seem. I won’t lie and tell you that I think that HIT has never made a mistake. However, I will tell you that HIT consistently works diligently with customers to resolve their concerns when they arise, especially in cases where HIT has made a mistake.

For example, I remember one particular occasion where HIT completed a customer’s custom database website exactly as specified in the database write up. The customer was very dissatisfied and wanted something different. I personally took the matter to Dave Aitken, who told me that we should start over from scratch and give the customer what she wanted at no additional charge - something which had a value of a couple thousand dollars beyond what the customer had originally ordered. We did. The customer was thrilled with the result and expressly told us how pleased she was. She thanked HIT by walking away and not paying her original bill, to say nothing of the free thousands of dollars of work given to her by Dave Aitken.

I have worked personally and closely with Mark Strong, a partner of HIT, and a man who I greatly admire and consider to have a great amount of integrity. Mark is the Chief Quality Officer of HIT and personally responds to BBB and other complaints. Mark has told me on numerous occasions that in dealing with customer issues, HIT wants to do the fair thing and be treated fairly in return. I have seen Mark on countless occasions offer free work to customers, give substantial discounts to customers, give refunds to customers and follow up personally on customer concerns.

The nature of HIT’s business is challenging in and of itself. HIT tries to take an abstract concept from the mind of an unknown third party and make it into reality through a creative process. This is not easy to do. It is hard for customers to communicate clearly what their expectations are and those expectations frequently evolve over time. Customers, for example, will order websites with particular features. Then during the course of development, they think of ways to improve upon their websites. They expect HIT to honor their change orders to make their site conform to their latest mental picture, but they don’t want to pay HIT for the extra hours that it takes to complete the modifications; and those extra hours do cost HIT.

Some customers have buyer’s remorse. They order something worth thousands of dollars, then decide later that they really shouldn’t have spent the money and want a full refund. That’s not fair to HIT after work has been completed in good faith and in reliance on the customer’s order.

In short, some complaints are not fair and do not portray reality fairly. Some are legitimate and HIT diligently strives to resolve them. Unfortunately, it seems to be human nature to complain rather than to give compliments. Upset customers post complaints and those relatively few complaints we find online seem to get a lot of attention. But, HIT has thousands of silently satisfied customers as well and the few customers that do complain represent a very small percentage of HIT's actual customer base of approximately 20, 000.

HIT will work to address all reasonable concerns and I invite you to bring them to HIT’s attention. You may email ceo@hitwebdesign.com.

Ryan,

The reason people post comments as anonymous is because they don't want to be sued by the legal team of HIT Web Design, are you serious? Ryan you know as well as I do that if I blast the sacred name of HIT Web Design, you will take everything I own. But you can't slander when what all these people on here are stating as fact. We should stop selling websites and complete the ones we have here and make these customers happy. The incoming phone calls we are taking are all pissed of consumers. When they ask for a simple change on there sites it takes 3 weeks. We don't know how to run a business and our customer service sucks, let's stop lying and take care of these customers. As far as our team here at HIT quit threatening to decrease our pay, oh wait you didn't threaten you did take away our pay! Any legit business makes room for a slow economy any ### knows that. If you take care of your people they will take care of you. The scare tactics needs to stop!

We started to be forced to stay after our shift, keep in mind this is after our 8 hour shift. If we wanted to leave at 5:00 we had to talk to the supervisor first. They then would pull you into a room in the back sit you down and poor out a sorry excuse for a guilt trip.

I am quoting Tanner Wolsey Supervisor over Account Managing dept. Again keep in mind this is after working our 8 hour shift. "If you do not stay after I will be putting your name on a list, this list will be shown to upper management, if you do not stay late we have plenty of people that apply here everyday that will".

My response "well I have a family I need to get home to".

Tanner's response "I don't care if your wife is labor right now, that is not a good enough reason to leave right now."

WHAT THE $%^&!

This is the kind of crap that is happening RYAN, of course you would not see any of this going on. Quit making excuses for them Ryan just because your a still receiving a check. Needless to say it didn't take me long to find a new job and quit this company. This company needs to held accountable for their business practices, this can't continue to happen.

Ryan,

Glad you got a call to try to backup a company that no matter what you say or do is going under. All because the owners are GREEDY! If I were you I would look elsewhere if you really have that much education. I will agree and Say that Mark is a very nice man but he is behind closed doors and really does not know the amount of mental abuse that his employees go through DAILY! The biggest mistake is when they let Jeremy TRY to manage a company of fear and fear alone. If that is how he treats his employees that he says he considers "family team" then I'm sure glad I'm not part of his real family!

At one time this place was enjoyable and there were happy clients until they chose poor management that only sees number signs!

Abusive is putting it mildly. Tanner Wolsey is by far the very worst manager I have ever worked for. I have never seen a manager allowed to stay in a position of power that is so abusive. I have had golf balls hit me, Nerf darts, playing cards thrown at me just to name a few. Everyday I made my revenue goal and it still was not good enough. I would exceed my goal and It still was not good enough I still was not allowed to leave at the end of the work day. I spent many evenings until 7, 8, 9 o'clock. This was not because I wanted to to, it was required. If you did not stay, you were not a team playing. Non team players are fired.

Everyday I was told that it does not matter how well I do, because they can fire me just to set an example. Who fires a good employee just to set an example for the bad employees. Does that sound as crazy to you as it did to me?

I would never put my name on a compliant, because we were told that they will sue me. Someone has to stop this BULLY of company. They are destroying peoples lives financially and emotionally. Both customers and employees alike.

THEY ARE A BULLY!

I have as many others have gone to the Utah Labor Commission only to be told that "it sounds like you have a bad boss". They did not perform any investigations. How many complaints do they have to have to do something? They have allowed incomprehensible practices at this company for to long. They need to step in NOW.

Honesty & integrity are certainly words that should not be used coming from former employees at any company that would consider going to these great lengths to slander their previous employer for the purpose of vengeance.

Had any of you been this altruistic while working at HIT, why did you continue to work there? After seeing or experiencing your first, second or third disturbing event why didn't you leave immediately?

Look up specious on dictionary.com and consider applying it to all of your previous statements. Suggesting someone throws golf balls at employees, really?
That is specious.

So let's throw out everyone's complaints about taking advantage of customers. Because all of you kept working regardless of these perceived events.

This leaves the primary complaints that HIT used fear tactics to motivate employees, that HIT was unfair in pay cuts and that HIT was unfair regarding time off.

So let's discuss fear tactics. "Work late or lose your job..." This could also translate to "work hard or lose your job". I would hope everyone knows that a failure to work hard would result in losing your job.

Yes, it's heartless to not allow someone to take time off for family emergencies. The supervisor who denied that should be reprimanded, or worse.

One aspect of using fear is pay cuts. To be fair to HIT, the entire company was warned 3-4 times that if we do not better our efforts, then pay cuts or lay-offs were unavoidable. Most of the company chose a pay cut while maintaining the same recidivism rate. Given the option of a pay cut or a job loss, I think it's clear what option makes sense.

Now what doesn't make sense is that all of you chose to stay even after the pay cuts. So now you've witnessed (or heard of) apparent illegal activities or horrible working conditions and still stayed even after pay cuts are levied. Really? The wretched working conditions, the abuse with golf balls and illegal activities combined with a pay cut simply weren't enough for any of you to quit (save for Bryce). All of you had to wait until you were fired.

Now let's drill down deeper and expose the farce that is this thread. Everyone complaining here earned a commission at HIT for sales. It was part of your pay structure upon employment. The primary objection from non-existing customers is due to bad word of mouth via extortionist sites. (you know sites that allow anonymous complaints while charging companies to get the complaints removed)
So it would behoove all the recently fired employees or recently upset employees to take their proverbial pound of flesh from HIT by furthering negative rumors.

Honesty & integrity. Really? Not one of you is this altruistic.

PS. Bryce, does your current job know you're posting about your previous. employer while at work?

Wow, lots of comments today. Someone who knows, while I disagree with you, I do have to at least commend you for being civil in your response. I get tired of seeing unintelligent complaints that serve no purpose beyond muck-slinging and allege egregious near-criminal activity by HIT. I can assure you that HIT's modus operandi is not to defraud its customers, but indeed to timely deliver the services that are ordered. As I mentioned previously there many factors that contribute to customer satisfaction, some of which are beyond HIT's control.

Bryce, I apologize if I sounded unsympathetic in my previous response. If what you say actually occurred, then I am indeed sorry to hear it.

I know this sounds cynical, but I believe that several (not all) of the above comments relating to this post were actually made by the same individual using different user names. I don't believe that as many individuals have taken part in this discussion as it would appear.

I welcome your individual comments or concerns (anonymous or otherwise). My email address is rnelson@hwsinet.com. Particularly, I would welcome "helpful" comments and/or suggestions to improve rather than baseless allegations of wrongdoing.

There is much to be said on these topics, I am another employee of HIT that can attest to the unfair and sometimes illegal tactics used at this company. Forcing employees to come in when they are sick is illegal. Making your hard working employees feel like if they don't stay late on a daily basis just because the team has goals that are unrealistic to hit that their jobs are not safe is unethical. These are things that I also personally have experienced. I must say Ryan from the legal department of HIT I am taken back by your response to these postings when you made it a point to create a laundry list of just how intelligent you are and then quoting

"I am somewhat taken back by the ignorant nature of the comments posted here by what are apparently disgruntled ex-employees of HIT. They are nothing more than mere allegations made out of frustration in an attempt to get revenge or to harm HIT’s reputation; yet they provide no specific instances or substantive evidence of wrongdoing whatsoever"

The post by Bryce sites 3 specific instances where this has happened. Saying that people are cowardly by not postong their real name is nothing more then a childish ploy to get people to post their info so you can try and stand by your bogus Terms of Service and treaten them with a law suit (that will never go through) to try and hush them up and hide the truth. I realize that in your position you are ignorant to what is really happening now in the various departments to try and motivate employees to perform, because you are not there to see it. Another interesting fact I might point out, I happen to know 3 of the employees posting on this forum and they all quit of their own free will because of the abusive nature of the enviroment they worked in. So you may not argue that these are just random employees that didn't perfom their job well enough and so they got canned.

I remember a employee that was a assest to the company that was forced to quit because he called in sick to work and they told him that he had to come in or would lose his job. He refused. I too have been forced to work when I had the flu and even when my voice was lost. It's hard to leave a good impression as a professional when you are calling to sell a product, but you sound like a dying lung cancer patient.

I have talked with every single person in the department where I work and they all secretly hate the management style at this company. Telling your employees that every time they don't hit goal that they are just not trying hard enough or don't care is bad for moral and then backing it up with " kids are going to die at the orpanage we fund in Haiti because we don't care enough to give 100% to hit our goals" is not a fair motivational tactic and then on a daily basis when employees are feeling the pressure and it shows on their faces using the term " come on guys it's not like we are saving babies" is kind of a oxy ### in my book.

I will not be at this company much longer. Will write more later

The reason why I post, and have taken up quit a passion on following this company is because I see a cycle of mistreating customers, and mistreating employees. Looking back to posts posted in 2007, NOTHING HAS CHANGED! The complaints are the same, but the people making the complaints are different! How they have stayed in business for as long as they have I honestly have no idea. What I do know is that people who operate like Hit Web Design don't last forever.

Reading the stories from people who have endured intimidation, manipulation, and unethical business practices, to them I am truly sorry. It saddens me that there are people out there who take advantage of those who need to feed their family and pay their bills.

The "person" with the user name "growup" needs to take some of his own advice. It is clear as day that she/he is a member of upper management. So quick was that "person" to dismiss everyone's complaints, so quick were they to flip the coin and turn them self into the victim.

I hope people read that comment OVER AND OVER AND OVER again. It is a clear sign, and example of the manipulation and intimidation that these employees have suffered.

If you are a customer of Hit Web Design or Heritage Web Solutions PLEASE stand united and take this as a clear sign that we as consumers cannot stand for this kind of companies to exist! CANCEL YOUR ACCOUNT TODAY! Call your credit card company or bank, and dispute your charges, then contact the Utah Attorney General's Office and file a formal complaint about your experience with Hit Web Design, the file a formal complaint with the BBB, then contact your local newspaper, radio, TV station and tell them about Hit Web Design's unethical practices, then POST your results online, everywhere! Let people know that this is not a company that you want to give your hard earned dollars to!

I again feel for all of these poor employees and ex-employees! Shame on you "growup" and Ryan Nelson, and shame on the managers like Tanner Wolsey, Matt Nelson, Lance Card, Davide Aiken, Mark Strong, Brad Stone, etc... You all should be ashamed of yourselves!

This is getting a little interesting. to the last comment made by "GrowUpPlease"

I was hired on in the middle of the first pay cut, I am not sure when they reset the pay structure, I think it was in March or April. But then we were cut again another 15%. That means we were hired with a 15% pay cut and then added another 15% pay cut, that is a 30% HIT on my paycheck. I for one had no choice but to quit, by the time I left there I think I was making $8.50 an hour, how do you expect us to support our families on that.

But wait there is more, and before you reply to this comment with "but you get paid commission on top of that, and it works out to be around $48, 000 per year. But no, you thought I will first set the dollar amount that you need to sell per day at $500.00 and you will make 10% commission" (I must admit I was making pretty good money, this is great!". A few months later the goal gets raised to $650.00 per day. (making it a little harder to get your commission) A few months later it gets raised to $850.00, (now I'm starting to feel it now, playing us like pawns in a chess match) oh but now we are going to change it again, but this time we are going to make it sound like this is a much better solution than previous structures. Now, if you do not average a certain amount of money in the pay period, lets put it at below $650.00 per day you will not get commission, $650.00 to $849.00 you will receive 5% commission, $850.00 and higher that is when you will get the 10% commission. So we just HIT you with 30% now lets get you on your commission as well.

I remember seeing the looks on peoples faces in that meeting, it was classic. It was the look on your face when you stub your toe, or slam your finger in the door, right before you are about to scream and drop the fbomb, that was the look I saw on peoples faces. I walked out of that meeting in shock and I too wanted to scream and drop the fbomb. So I was not fired you left me no choice but to quit. Days after that meeting I saw people just give up, they knew they would not hit the numbers you were throwing at us, so the quality of work went down, the drive was not there anymore. people lost respect in the company.

Your comment regarding all of us just sticking around until we were fired. Your damn right people will do that, who wants to go look for another job, going through training...who wants that headache. Are you not doing the exact same thing by staying there?

"So it would behoove all the recently fired employees or recently upset employees to take their proverbial pound of flesh from HIT"

Are you not taking a pound of flesh from your customers and employees on a daily basis?, no, in fact you are doing more... you are bending your customers over and screwing them, and then when your done with your customers you use your employees for sloppy seconds. Try looking in the mirror before making a comment like that. There are plenty of people out there and you don't have to go very far to find them, that would like to see you take it in ### for once.

I would like to submit a little challenge to HIT management. I would like you to try and find a company that is in the same field or close to yours with as many complaints and pissed off customers as you have.

It was so hard to answer the phone and be yelled at everyday by frustrated customers, 95 of my incoming calls were customers so frustrated, to threaten to actually fly to UT and burn the building down...I for one would feel like I had to constantly keep looking over my back while out in public.

So, I guess we can "GROWUP" when the day comes you actually GROW A SET OF BALLS and swallow your pride, admit that you are in the wrong and truly sit back and think maybe we better re-think how we are running this business. Wake up man!, I know you are smarter than this!

Did you seriously threaten him? You do know this is a public web site? Example of Hit passive aggressive behaviors.

Dave, you assume that this is only ex-employees. All I have to say is never assume.

I am constantly stunned by what I read on here. I hope that all of you ex-employees have contacted ABC 4 and have reached out to that reporter. Also I hope that each of you who were denied breaks, and were ASKED let alone HARASSED about taking sick days contacts the Utah Labor Commission, and the Utah Attorney General's Office.

I am disgusted, appalled, and saddened by what I have read on here. I truly hope that everyone who has posted on here, works together so that Hit Web Design cannot harm another employee or client.

As an account manager I was told that I must provide customer service. I take great pride in my work. My clients have an advocate in me. However, it is very difficult to listen to the clients on a daily basis screaming out of frustration that they were promised a 4 week turn around time of a custom web site.

I have customers from a year ago, with completed web sites that cannot get anyone to contact them for the updates that were submitted 2 months prior to the call. They call me for help.

I was then told by my manager Tanner "that I was to nice on the phone" you were hired to sale!

HIT Web does not honor any promise, not with customers and not with employees. There GOAL is GREED They do not care about anyone, just the money. They do not care about their customers, they do not care about the staff.

I have heard Jeremy yelling over the phone at different managers. He is very verbally abusive man. He is not a nice man.

Hit Web Design is nothing more than a SWEAT SHOP. Their turn over rate has to be astronomical. Most new employees do not last a week on the sales floors. Most just walk out because they see the horrific environment that they are required to work in and they are smart enough to leave.

I sat in a team meeting held by Tanner and he had the nerve to tell the team that he "hated us". I think the feeling was mutual.

Tanner has said very inappropriate things in team meetings and then backs it up as a joke that HR will need to know about. I do not know what is wrong with him, but he is mean, rude, abusive and a flat out liar.

The account Management team is broken down into 4 groups. The top 5 favorites. The top 5 are handed other peoples sales to close out from under them and are handed anything that comes in. I had 5 big database handed to someone else to close. Then there is the Top 10, then the middle people that do all of the work and the Newbees.

THE PLACE IS A JOKE. GO TO WORK FOR THEM IF YOU ARE EMOTIONAL UNSTABLE, you will fit right in.

I think the pressure is getting to him as well

http://www.co.utah.ut.us/dept/Sheriff/Corrections/InmateDetail.asp?id=235059

all I can say to that EthicsCommitee is WOW!

According to the information that I have been given the man in that Mug Shot is the VP of Sales... can anyone else confirm that for me?

The funny part is he told us all he was leaving to go to California to be with his very sick father and left his phone at home. We all believed him so we borrowed money to him so he could go. We also gave him cards because we trusted him as a friend. That was our first mistake. The worst part of his sick lie is that he came back with pictures and stories.

I think they are trying to make as much money as they can before they close the doors.

ABCNews is not airing anything about HIT. Sorry stopthegreed, call Annie and ask her why.

I have worked at HIT since Brad was visible in the day to day operations. I have done literally every job there is at HIT to do. I am happy with my career so far with HIT. But that's because I dont let my career or employer define my happiness.

But Bryce, although not tenured long enough to accurately testify, is right about the atmosphere changes. In HIT's defence, it has gone through maybe 5 changes in atmosphere and tone.

As far as the fear tactics, its an easy crutch for crappy managers. Why do you think the GOP constantly uses fear to keep their constituents loyal, because it's easy and it works. But it SUCKS.

So I'll talk about the atmosphere first because it means more to employees than pay and makes work memorable. There were days when getting up in the morning for work was exciting. You never knew what spiff or contest was going to yield something cool like a flat screen TV, motorcycle or xbox360. But it wasn't the value or money that meant something to us, it was the drama, the fun and the care free buzz. That is gone. Outside of sales, the spiffs are usually 5-10 bucks. It isn't fun to go to work anymore. It isn't fun to be at work and it's not fun to talk about your day with your family. If the big boys were to do an anonymous poll they'd find out that people aren't having fun at all.

Someone mentioned a 30% pay cut. That is a lie. We had a reduction of 15%, it was returned to us in April and taken back again recently. I took the cut over getting canned. But there were two seperate cuts. There were ample warnings for both and while someone is suggesting sales are the same, they are not at all. And the cuts were absolutely required to keep the doors open with the same head count. I guess they could have cut 15% of the workers, but the option was nice.
What I don't agree with is taking 15% without offering a way to get it back, like sustaining sales at a certain amount of a certain amount of time.

I say that it would be best to lay people off instead of pay cuts because I see too many pregnant women from HIT using WIC. I see too many HIT employees at Macey's using their food stamp debit card for food. Forget about Haiti, Dave and Jeremy you have people going without IN YOUR OFFICE! Act locally, think globally.

Something that should be noted is HIT combines telesales and a call center. Both are hard to manage. Combined its hell.

Telephone sales, while easy work, is very very stressful. I've been on the phones doing sales and if you think it's hard on that end, try managing a telesales dept. The stress is far worse and you often get consumed with goals. It's not unique to HIT. Sales managers are over bearing, that isn't unique to HIT either. It's not fair to bash sales VPs when they are taxed so heavily emotionally.

Turn over isn't unique to call centers or telesales. It's the nature of the beast, as are poor managers. It's unavoidable. Most managers and supes are filling that role for the first time, and it's easier to be a bad manager than a good one. Bad managers are a sign that they themselves need mentoring.

Am I defending HIT? No. Do I think HIT makes poor choices, sure we all do. Do I think HIT is evil, no. Would I run it differently, hell yes. But I still enjoy my work. If you have this much hate for something maybe consider therapy (I'm not being condescending at all). It's not worth your time or effort to fling this much hate around.

A quick list of things that might make life more enjoyable at HIT...
1.) Less golf balls.
2.) A fun atmosphere.
3.) Cut 15% of the staff instead of doing pay cuts.
4.) Mentor or cycle the current supes out. I've seen great ones and horrible ones in my tenure and this is the worst bunch yet.
5.) Put up a board where people can make suggestions anonymously, open door policies dont foster enough openness.
6.) Stop with the Haiti thing or at least shut up about it. Charity is awesome, but should start in your own backyard.

Hi …Everyone has been calling me and emailing me to find out all the details of how and why I left HIT…the bottom line is I just could not take it any longer ..Sitting at my desk crying 2 and 3 times a day is just not what I see as my future with a successful company ….When I started with this company 4 + years ago..IT WAS GREAT! I BELONGED I was so proud to be making the amount of money I was and helping the company grow to become successful..Giving away thousands in toys and prizes to employees including a Harley Davidson, vacations..ect, ..it was never going to end..Life was great …so I thought…?
I don’t know what happen to the management side of this company all I know is what I felt and went through as an employee.
I feel I have been there long enough to have an opinion and to be heard..
It started to all change about one year ago ..when management started to look at the big picture they either saw “dollar signs “or “oh no were going down”..Either one pushed them into a discussion that would hurt customer wallets, employee’s integrity and their own.
The personal sales training meetings from the owner was great but we never could apply it to our sales pitches because, to the VP it was just a joke and we needed to say and do whatever to get that sale!
Our sales team pitches were so misleading and just flat out wrong! And management may not have liked the way the sales team was being ran ..but nothing was done ! and no one stopped it ! too much control was given to VPs from the owners with “head turned and one ear and one eye closed “as long as the NUMBERS were hit every day….no one was to be accountable
8 hours a day or more hearing …..…if they’re not going to buy get them off the phone…just say whatever it takes …just get their cc card#. ..If your blanking your staying..meaning you would have to stay after 5 to help the company HIT their numbers even if you had already hit your personal goal which is understandable if everyone on your team was a team player…, and the guilt and looks brought on with walking out the door at 5 was ruthless, having to go to the owners office and ASK and BEG him and give him an EXCUSE and reason why you have to leave at 5pm?…Endless emails telling us were NOT trying, were not good enough, were just not motivated, and need to work harder to feed the kids in Haiti, saving kids in Haiti is an amazing thing, I even donate money every check, but I did not start out working for a Non Profit Org. and my kids and family are just as important to me …emails sent from management may have been sent to motivate us? But we also had 2 very loud and annoying leaders telling us and confirming what we already knew that we were behind! And the extra stress knowing if I did not get that company money lives and kids were starving in Haiti ..wow the pressure!

Also another annoying word was ..Stay GREEN (no one would know the curdle up my spine and what that means unless you were sitting there every day hearing it at least 20 times a hr )…yelling behind my desk as leaders would hit your chair and yell at you to get working and get on the phones ..VPs Throwing and kicking things when he felt we were not “trying” ..at one time the owner told us on a Monday “5 employees WILL BE LET GO on Friday “so all week we walked on pins and needles, mean while we had constant emails telling us how hard it is out in the world to find a job in this economy ….So Friday morning came and for a JOKE one at a time the VP would come to our desk as everyone watched and asked you to go to the conference room..the stress on that floor was bone chilling thick…once we got into the room the owner handed us a paper, … in big black letters it stated “””YOUR SAFE””””how cruel was that… also after many un planned pay cuts, commission changes and unreal expectations and unreachable goals and all the lying to employees the brain washing the cold cold office the having to ask to go to the bathroom, no 15 min brakes scheduled, and 15% pay cut because of the economy, and commission cuts even when hitting your personal goal daily.

The VP is willing to change your numbers because someone knowingly jacked your lead and sold it with him very well knowing ! And after the fact saying sorry nothing I can do it was already in the system…leads being given and taken depending on his mood and who he wants to help that particular day or hour and depending on who stayed late to hit goal. (even though jacking a lead is as bad as stealing money out of my pocket.) As wrong as it may sound on some occasions I was the one that needed help that day and excepted his help.

Reading all the [redacted]s.com consumerreports.com ect… and lying to my customers everyday (I want to sincerley apologize to my thousands of customers to whom I mislead and changed there course in having a successful website), The product and services we were providing was just not worth the commitments I was promising to the customer ..I became a high paid liar!… ….all this and much much more within the 4+ YEARS I HAVE A RIGHT TO SPEAK MY MIND…
This is why I Quit I was just one of the weak ones I guess? I just could not cut it …this was what was told to my peers.
Today I visited a friend in the parking lot next to HIT ..20 minutes later I was called by HR asking me by the owners to not converse with HIT employees from the hrs of 8 to 5 …WOW… Because she was afraid I would recruit.
If you haven’t already left I give you the courage and hope to tell you …your better than this company leads you believe …...
PS: already found a new job ..took me one day..and I will be making just as much …feeling Free and appreciated..isn’t that all we really want….

HIT has a grievance policy in the policy manual that is made available to every employee. I doubt that anyone ever uses the grievance process much, and I also doubt if most employees review the policy manual from time to time to even remember that such a policy exists. Nevertheless, it is there and it is available to all HIT employees. All employees all have an individual responsibility to review the policy manual from time to time as it includes policies that protect the rights of employees as well as guidelines to protect the company.

Basically, the grievance policy encourages employees to work differences out among themselves first. If unsuccessful, then to take it up with their immediate supervisor. If they cannot resolve it through those means, then they are encouraged to file a grievance and there is even a form in the policy manual for such purposes. The grievance should be given to a department manager, Human Resources or a member of upper management.

Bryce, in your case, I don't know whether you did this or not. However, I find it inconceivable that HIT's upper management would not have been sensitive to your circumstances and needs if this procedure had been followed. I think that this would have addressed your specific issue at your time of need and would have promoted greater awareness among management of the need to be sensitive to family emergencies, etc.

I don't think that employees should abuse the grievance procedure by utilizing it to give ordinary suggestions or to circumvent the ordinary process for resolving problems. But, upper management is busy performing responsibilities also and cannot constantly monitor activity and behavior on the work floor. While management has a responsibility towards employees, employees likewise have a responsibility to promote awareness of true problems that may exist. Management cannot address legitimate problems if they are not brought to management's attention.

The owners of HIT are reasonable people and are sensitive to the needs of their employees.

Sorry not trying to hijack this thread.

But I am yet another ( out of the 4000 odd) unhappy customer, stumbling across this posts and 10000s of others.

I am just wondering how many employees heritage has on its sales team. Some where in the post I read that heritage does about $80K in sales, which probably equates to about 125 Sales people. Is that true? Now how many web designers do they have in house? I think the sales to designer ratio is ###ed up and thats their primary issue.

I am assuming they outsource all their work to folks all over the world, my project, my designer was an AH from Texas.

p.s: have you guys seen http://shitwebdesign.com

Stop the greed, can you extrapolate on that point about there being no sales force anymore? What do you mean by that? Do you mean that everyone is a high pitched sales person now?

but "hit sucks" you are are allowed to high jack the thread! The consumer is the number 1 priority on this board, and I am glad that you can read first hand from employees, and ex-employees about that state of Heritage Web Solutions.

I know that I personally would not do ANY business with them. I do hope that people who have contracted with them are able to get their money back, and I hope that people who have been employed by them find new employment soon!

Also as a side not to Mr. Ryan Nelson, truly intelligent people do not have to state how intelligent they are.

"Also as a side not to Mr. Ryan Nelson, truly intelligent people do not have to state how intelligent they are."
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LOL, thats 10000% right
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I had filed a charge-back, but I think i have lost it, My bank stands by HIT web design's biased TOS. I have lost over $2000 of my money on these AHs. I think somebody should start a blog and compile all the complaints from various websites together in a single resourse. till 2-3 days back, I was thinking I was just one of the few complaints, Now that I am doing more research, I see that its NOT TRUE. There are 1000000's of complaints all over the intenet about this ### of a company.

I should say the sales person who sold me was not bad at all, he was a very good sales person, i don't think he miss-sold me. He just sold me something which was not possible for the low amount I was quoted. I am finding out, my needs, cost 3 to 4 times that. I think this is their problem, they try to be low cost and bring in customers, and hope that everything goes easy and assume its a perfect world, Its not. Needs are different for different people.

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INC 500, says that they did 20 million Dollars in Sales in 2008- holy cow, selling $300-1000 websites ! wow

You know why they don't have a sales team anymore?! After three paycuts and telling everyone on that team what POS's they are everyday having them work 10-12 hour days or else threats gets old. All but 7 sales people are still there along with the VP of course that has to jump on every call before anyone gets off the phone to make sure they won't go! It's a joke.

The hard facts are they are turning into a template company with out saying it and treating everyone like crap until they quit so they can hire at $8.00 an hour and bank the rest.

DO NOT USE THEM! You can use a cheap template and you will get the same amount of help they are willing to give you for alot cheaper! (and you will not be paying custom prices for a template!)

Add me to the list of people that left the company 100% voluntarily. All of my complaints were brought up to management well before quitting, and it became very clear that the company was not interested in my feedback; the only suggestions that seemed to receive any attention were ideas on how to make the company more money. For your viewing pleasure, I have included my slightly-edited resignation letter. Bear in mind that I never received any response from the several levels of management I forwarded it to, even though it was included with my two-week notice:

"I have decided to end my employment at Heritage Web Solutions shortly after one year of employment. It wasn’t an easy decision, as there were moments where I felt like I was a part of economic history – after all, not everyone gets to work for a company prominently featured in the Inc. 500 list. Unfortunately, my experience as an employee has been dissatisfactory as a whole.

"I want to make it clear that I have been continually impressed with the caliber of people that I have worked with directly. _________, _________ and _________ have been excellent supervisors, and I have found many of my peers to be honest and capable workers.

"Unfortunately, I have faced situations that are unacceptable to me as an employee. The current emphasis on sales has been a daily psychological burden. I have every intention of satisfying each and every customer, but there is an implicit message in this push for sales that I am sub-par if I do not sell. This is not stated on paper or in company emails, to be sure, but it is tangibly present nonetheless. Our company totes professionalism as much as any other, yet our supervisors are apparently instructed by upper management to shout the current cash prizes for making sales. I am not against these awards, but find the announcements excruciatingly distracting and unprofessional when I am on a call with a client. If I were on the other end of the phone, I would wonder if the company considered me as anything more than an unexploited resource.

"Perhaps the most perturbing part of this development is the fact that technicians are being assigned to close sales even when we clearly cannot handle the volume of in-house activities and incoming calls, as evidenced by the implementation of outsourced technical support. Equally impossible to comprehend was the fact that the employee closing the sale would receive half of the commission for their “work”. When I inquired about this, I was told to follow up on these pitches in spite of the fact that they often overlapped with someone else’s efforts to close a sale.

"Despite the fact that our technical support, updates and programming departments are currently overwhelmed with tasks, we are only encouraged to sell more. I have seen a marked increase in customer dissatisfaction since Heritage began stressing these sales. I know the equation by heart now: work takes longer to get done, promises are made and unfulfilled, customers become understandably disappointed in our service, and then the account needs to be saved. Sadly, not all of them are.

"I was glad to hear that the department was going to start holding weekly training meetings several months ago, and then was disappointed to hear that we could expect verbal or written warnings if we did not meet a daily goal of enhancements that was set for us without employee input. Neither plan was ever carried out. Empty promises, empty threats, and seemingly no room for honest employee feedback – an unfortunately concise summary of the impression I have from working at Heritage.

"I do not intend to bad-mouth Heritage at every opportunity. I admire the niche it has created in today’s aggressive web development market and expect it to do quite well in the future. However, I also do not intend to recommend my friends and family to apply for employment or purchase a website through the company, as I doubt Heritage will give up its sales-centric approach to satisfying both its employees and customers anytime soon.

"I feel that Heritage has a conspicuous interest in maintaining its status as an Inc. 500 company through sales revenue that outweighs its efforts to retain employees and customers, which is regrettable. I wish success to the company, but candidly refuse to be a part of its extant façade."

I am another former employee who was not fired, but quit. For obvious legal reasons, yes, I will be anonymous. HIT does tend to be legally aggressive (I often had to use veiled TOS threats when speaking with customers, per my managers instructions) and it's slightly frightening.

I worked for Tech Support at HWS just over a year ago and worked there for almost two years. When I first began working there, things were great! I loved it there and things were manageable and I felt like a worthwhile employee and I loved the management and the style of things there. But quite some time after I began working there, things went downhill. I discussed my problems with management, but was mostly ignored... management agreed with me, but implied that their hands were tied by a higher power. I was very good at my job and was told so repeatedly, but suddenly when I began to seek promotion, all sorts of obstacles were erected, such as ridiculous tests (which I passed, but then was informed that I would have to wait and take a revised test to be promoted) and ridiculous on-the-fly rules being implemented that hadn't existed until I asked for promotion. I went through the proper routes to file a grievance, and was ignored until I claimed that they were being sexist, which it sure seemed like it, as I was the only female really ever eligible for promotion in that department and all these things were suddenly popping up to seemingly keep me from promotion. Then all of a sudden I was promoted after I really started to get mad (some male peers were promoted before me despite obvious qualifications on my part... including seniority and superior numbers... and the fact that I passed these tests that these male employees had not passed) and I went to HR with my issue.

Anyway, besides that, the company started forcing the TS team (and every other department) to make sales. That's when I noticed the downhill shift in the company. Customer service really went downhill from that point and I noticed more angry customers calling in repeatedly with unresolved problems. It really started to suck big time, plus I suddenly felt that despite my excellent TS and CS skills, my job was at stake because I wasn't much of a sales person. And ironically, it became harder to sell the more they emphasized sales over CS. I brought up my concerns multiple times, offered good suggestions for improving our CS while leaving more room for sales and was again, ignored and basically told that hands were tied, that my ideas were good, but they didn't have the resources at the time.

Anyway, I ended up quitting and moving to outsource design instead (because they didn't force outsource to sell at that time and it seemed like it would be better, and because I still needed income and there aren't a lot of WFH jobs that are legit, and I needed to work from home). That wasn't so bad for the first 6 months, but then they started shifting everything there too and I got ridiculously incompetent project managers who wouldn't respond to inquiries (multiple tasks, emails and voicemails) for 4 or 5 days at a time (but oddly enough, would send emails/tasks the next day telling me to get to work on this same project I was waiting for a response from them on...), causing me to get projects that I had worked for HOURS on reassigned and my compensation then lost with no recourse, despite documentation that I was waiting for a response from the PM. At that point, I was pissed and I just stopped working for them. It had just gotten too ridiculous and I kept on losing big $ projects that I had worked on for many hours.

Anyway, many of the grievances here I agree with wholeheartedly, although I did like my direct managers for the most part while I was there and didn't really have a problem with any of them... I'm still not sure who was the one behind the sudden obstacles to my promotion though, so maybe I would have had a problem with whoever did that if I knew who it was.

Also, I knew Ryan Nelson pretty well while I was there, and while I like you, Ryan, I know you had some grievances with the system too while you were over the programming department. You know it's not all rosy... you know how messed up things started to get and I know you agreed with some of my complaints at one point, because I talked to you about them sometimes and you commiserated. But I know it's your job now to defend them, and you also now that legally they are butt covered by the TOS, so you can pretend that they are a good company, but just because a company is working within legal boundaries doesn't mean they are a good company. My experience has been that the bottom line was suddenly changed to "Get on the INC 500 by making as much money as we can", and the implication is that Dave and/or Jeremy Aitken are the ones who promote this, because I always had the best experiences with Mark Strong and the other owners who seemed concerned with CS, but Dave always seemed to be SALES SALES SALES MONEY MONEY MONEY and unfortunately that seems to have taken over a once good company who cared more about customer satisfaction and employee satisfaction than money.

I wish the best to the company and I'm really sad that they've degraded to this point. I hope they will wake up from their daydream of pretending they're as great as they used to be and realize they've fallen into a ditch... They used to be an awesome company and they could be again, but they really need to change their structure. They have a good product, but they are no longer managing it as well as they used to. Best of luck to them, but if something doesn't change soon, they'll be gone.

I'd also like to point out the Heritage is no longer BBB accredited... they used to be proud that they were, but now it seems to be the excuse of "well, you can't please everyone... and that's not our fault, because these people just can't be made happy". I'm sorry, but there are many large businesses that have a far larger client base than HIT and have a far better BBB rating. Get your noses out of your butts and acknowledge that you have a problem, and maybe you can save this company. Or keep Dave Aitken running the moneymaking machine and find yourselves bankrupt and no longer viable in a few more years (although, I'm sure Dave has stashed away enough cash to not be worried about that proposition, so maybe he doesn't care).

And stop trying to delegitimatize everyone's statements on here. Your reluctance to acknowledge the problem and then your subsequent attempts to explain away these complaints is a big part of your issue.

Love,
A concerned and not vindictive former employee

As a former employee of ### Web Design, unlike most posting here, I was fired! And why? Because my child was in and out of Primary Childrens Hospital! As a single mom who else was supposed to sit by my child and hold their hand? I was told once I hit my one year mark I could get FMLA and then my job would be safe and I could take the time off needed to care for my child. Yep! Sure! I was fired one week before my one year anniversary. There excuse? When I’m not there it hurts the sales of my team. It also did say I was not one of the “team players” willing to stay and help the team hit their goal. Yes that is right in my termination papers. Also in my termination papers it said I had taken too much time off to care for my child and doctor notes were not going to excuse my absences anymore.

So Ryan! Yes they are heartless. And also it is illegal. Still dealing with these problems with my child and working for an awesome company who actually cares about family and makes sure I am able to get my child the care they need, my doctor after he had spoke directly with Human Resources and explained the situation and wanted to know what HIT needed so I was able to keep my job, has tried to pursuade me to file a lawsuit. Which I won’t, I think that HIT loves the attention it gets and I won’t give you the satisfaction.

For those of you who remember Jeremy and Dave’s brother was seriously injured in a tragic accident. I wonder how they would have felt to be told “Oh I’m sorry. You can’t be by your loved ones side. You need to make your goal first.”
Numerous times I was told after giving my supervisor a doctor note 3 days to a week prior, so they were aware I had to leave, “You can go if your green.” So in other words my child can not go to the doctor unless I make my sales goal for the day.

That aside. Since not working for this company I have had numerous former customers contact me on myspace and facebook. Some said they loved working with me and would like to keep in touch with me. Others to email me about what they thought about me working for a company like that. But I must say what topped the cake was being in the Southtown Mall and being assaulted (literally, I was punched in the side of the head by a woman that her husbands company had been taken for 5k from HIT) for working for a company like HIT, because I was wearing a HIT hoodie. It was great! Being escorted out of the mall by mall security was just awesome.

For all of you that quit. Good for you. I needed my insurance for my child and could not quit and wait 90 days to 6 months for another insurance company to start covering my childs much needed medical care. It didn’t help by being fired and losing it all together. My medical bills now total over $300, 000.
For those of you still there... Good luck!

To Brad Stone, Mark Strong, Leah Young,

From what I gather reading on here, and in the literally countless e-mails I get from people about Hit Web Design, is this one piece of advice that really seems to stick out.

GET RID OF THE AITKEN FAMILY. It seems that Dave and Jeremy Aitken along with the rest of their family (I believe there is more, correct me if I am wrong) has had a TOXIC effect on your company!

PURGE your company from the Aitken family and restructure. That seems like it will be your only chance to actually make Hit Web Design a good an ethical company. Until then customers need to call their banks, and do a charge back, because as you have read on here their only focus is taking money away from you, and never delivering a real product.

SHAME ON YOU HERITAGE WEB DESIGN, HIT WEB DESIGN OR WHATEVER NAME YOU GO BUY. IF YOU ARE TREATING YOUR EMPLOYEES WHO MAKE MONEY FOR YOU, THEY WAY YOU DO !

SHAME ON YOU ! Brad Stone, Mark Strong, Leah Young, Dave Aitken, Jeremy Aitken .

RYAN NELSON - ADVICE FOR YOU - YOU SHOULD QUIT THIS COMPANY ASAP

Does anyone on here know the status of the ABC4 news story, and when Hit Web Design will be featured?

BREAKING NEWS AS OF TODAY!

THANKS TO THE NUMEROUS POSTS ON THIS WEBSITE, ESPECIALLY THE ONE EXPOSING THE VP OF SALES,

MR GREG WOODS IS NOW THE FORMER VP OF SALES! HE HAS BEEN FIRED!

All I have to say is THANK YOU to all who aided and assisted in this movement. Now - - let's get the dirt on the AITKENS and treat them they way they treated us! I have Dave's address and home phone number if anyone needs it.

Oh thats just too bad for Mr. Woods... Hopefully the great and powerful Mr. Wolsley will be next because he is one of the biggest jerks I have ever worked for.

I would love to see him go out the door... Holding his box and having to walk by everybody in the company like everyone else that had been let go... Thats so embarassing. They take you in HR and while you are in there they are out at your desk putting your belongings in a box in front of everyone... As they say "Let this be an example, nobodys job is safe."

Oh and by the way, Mr. Nelson, I would really like to tell you where you can stick your so-called grievence policy. I did review it and soon after I went to HR I was fired. I mean like the next day... So that is why nobody uses it. But let me add they waited to fire me until I put up an almost 5 thousand dollar sell. Within 30 seconds of it going on the board I was called back and fired.

Seriously the way this company is ran is a joke... I think all current and former employees need to get together and do something. Because it makes me sick that more people are going to be going thru the same things as other employees have.

I am sorry I work for heritage still, leaving them soon.

Heritage aka Hit web Design is a JOKE. In our Google ads we say "100% Full Custom Web design. Our work is awesome". As an insider I know, that is such an overstatement. I don`t argue that here we do custom work. The thing is that it looks horrible and appears as if its from 1982. Get real, you don`t get an "awesome" website for $199. Cheap web sites like that won`t take your business anywhere. Not because Heritage is cheap - but because heritage lacks any talent. All the outsourced designers do not give the service which paying clients deserve.

Good Morning Everyone,

When we first started HIT many years back there was an excitement to each day as we arrived at work each day to build on our dream. The four of us that were dedicated to the building of this company spent significant time looking forward to a time when we would be a major player in our industry.

We talked about the day we could actually afford to hire our first programmer and wouldn’t it be awesome to sell 20 sites per month. We dreamed of the days we are living now when we would have hundreds of people working to build HIT into a force to be reckoned with and committed to do all we can to make working with HIT as rewarding and positive as possible. Over the years we have done our best to stick to those commitments and have “shared the wealth” as best we could even when there wasn’t much to save.

My commitment to those beliefs is stronger than ever before. While as a business we have fought our way through some difficult times in the last 12 months and some may feel as though money is all that matters that couldn’t be further from the truth. Money is important to every business and at times it becomes critical. We have to make hard decisions in order to provide great times in the future.

I have been asked if we will ever get back to giving away all the great prizes, like the LCD TV’s, Harley’s and countless cool electronics. The answer to that question is a resounding yes, I also get asked if the wages will ever be reset to where they were. While I have to say that a reset of the wages is not in the future I can promise you that there will be many opportunities to make up the reduced income through additional incentive programs once we have our reserves built back up.

Difficult times like the ones we have fought through due to the economy have a tendency to bring out both the best and worst of people. At times we have allowed the pressure to cause us to manage in ways that we are not proud of. I know that many have felt a lot of pressure to perform and it can make a job difficult to come to each day. It is a difficult position for all because we all know how important the numbers are and I believe we are all working to make them happen every single day.

Things are turning for the positive for us and it is in no small part due to all of you and the hard work you have put in. From the small group that started HIT to the great team we have now its each of you that make a difference. We need to embrace teamwork and help each other learn and grow in our positions. We need to do the things that make HIT great and serve our clients with dedication and a positive attitude. We need to be a family, an admittedly large and often dysfunctional one but we are a family and we need each other to be successful.

The familiar feeling I mentioned in my subject line is one of excitement and opportunity. Not since the early days of HIT have we had the amount of opportunity we have now. We have projects in the works that will make huge splashes when they hit the market and create opportunities for all of us to grow in our positions, income and responsibilities. I plan to share the overview of them with you next week so you can share in the excitement of the things we have working their way down the pipeline.

Until then I appreciate all the hard work you are putting in to keep things on track. I realize the sacrifice of time and the amount of effort it takes can be taxing but I also want you to know the opportunities will be worth it.

Dave