How it all began…

In October 2024, the marketing agency Jade Advertising booked several advertising banners for a customer on three of our websites. It was not the first time we had worked with this agency. We had already successfully completed several campaigns with them in the past.

The contracting party was officially Raflin Sarkisyan Ltd. from Bulgaria, which acts as the operator of Jade Advertising. Our point of contact was Adriana G., the Digital Account Manager in charge of the campaign.

We had agreed with Adriana on a collaboration for the entire fourth quarter: from October 2024 to December 2024. A fixed price per month was agreed as compensation. As usual in the past, it took a few days to finalise the financial and technical details of the campaign.

The agency explicitly requested that the invoice for the first month be issued before the campaign launch. The commercial agreement on the framework conditions was reached on 11 October. The planned launch date for the campaign was 17 October 2024. The invoice was sent to Adriana by email on 14 October.

The lies begin…

Three weeks after the invoice was issued, we still had not received any payment. The first enquiry followed:

Our reply referred to ‘Ralfin’. Ralfin Sarkisyan is the owner and managing director of Raflin Sarkisyan Ltd. She also acts as ‘Head of Media Buying’ at Jade Advertising. She is Adriana’s superior.

Since we had not received a reply after a week, we sent a second enquiry:

We were assured that the invoice would be paid by the end of November.

While we were waiting for the payment of the first invoice, the second month of the campaign started on 17 November, as agreed. Since we had already worked with Jade Advertising / Raflin Sarkisyan Ltd. in the past and had always been paid, we saw no reason to stop the campaign and deactivate the advertising banners.

On 25 November, we received written confirmation that the money had been transferred. This turned out to be a lie.

After the lies come the tricks…

In response to our reminder that the invoice for the second month was now also due, the agency tried to renegotiate the financial and technical conditions – even though the second month had already begun:

We rejected a change/adjustment to the campaigns and referred to the existing agreement. As a compromise, we offered to end the campaign prematurely and issue a pro-rata invoice for the days on which the advertising banners were displayed.

Despite our clear refusal, we were presented with two further offers, which were significantly worse than the originally agreed conditions.

On 9 December, we then agreed to a compromise solution with new conditions, as at that point we already feared that the whole thing would not end well. Before we gave up all the money, we were willing to accept a discount.

Short note: In the email of 9 December, Adriana claims that the ads have been ‘disabled’. That was also a lie. The ad ran from 17 October without interruption.

On 9 December, we immediately sent Adriana the second invoice for the second month, pointing out that a five-digit amount was outstanding and that she should please transfer the money promptly.

As with the first bill, no payment was received and there was no response.

After the Christmas holidays/vacation, we asked again and made it clear that we would not take this lying down:

More lies…

The agency also claimed that the first invoice had been paid and that the advertisements had only been running until November. We then requested proof of the bank transfer.

And again lies…

We have not received any receipts/proof. On 23 January and 13 February, we asked for an update two more times. On 20 February, we were assured by Adriana that the outstanding invoice amounts would be paid by the end of February.

To date, we have not received any money or any evidence that the invoices have been paid.

Adriana has been ghosting us since the end of February.

Lying again at the end

In the meantime, we also had direct contact with Raflin Sarkisyan via LinkendIn. There, too, we received a written promise that everything would be checked and that all outstanding amounts would be paid. Nothing happened.