# Third Party Facebook Administrator Refuses To Give Up Rights



## Creditlimit (27 May 2011)

Hi,

Apologies in advance for the lenght of this but if you manage to read through I would greatly appreciate any feedback.

I’m writing this following a conversation with a friend yesterday and felt that their experience should be highlighted in the hope of determining if others feel as angry as I do and obtaining some solutions to their predicament.

Story in brief:
My friend, lets call them Susan was contacted by a third party company offering to create a Facebook Fan Page. During the conversation it was stressed that such pages could not be created by the individual and only a ‘professional’ company like theirs (lets call them Unprofessionals.com) could complete the job!  At this point I should point out that Susan is not familiar with online marketing and in hindsight she accepts the folly of their ways! It should also be pointed out that Unprofessional.com has only one employee.

Susan signed a contract and Unprofessional.com received a €400 upfront payment and a monthly management fee of €70!!! It was agreed that Unprofessional.com would provide over 10,000 followers to the page, provide insight into generating new leads and ultimately manage their entire page. 

After some weeks went by Susan began getting concerned after numerous emails requesting updates, requests for new features etc went unanswered for days and sometimes weeks at a time. She would then receive a call during which the company would become rude and unable to provide any feedback on their requests. 

After several months there were less than 250 Likes on the page. 

Susan sent two recent emails both of which went unanswered for over 14 days!

When she then spoke with the company the rudeness and complete lack of professional emerged at which point Susan decided to end the contract. 

2 hours later a defaming post was put on the Facebook page alleging that the company in question was not fit for purpose, lacked all credibility etc (very harsh and completely inaccurate as the company had never received such negative comments in the past.)

Susan later agreed to keep the contract and continues using Unprofessional.com today!

Upon further investigation I found that the person who posted the comments was a friend of principle behind Unprofessional.com. The profile of the alleged individual looks fictional i.e. they have less than 10 friends, profile picture looks it was taken from a glossy magazine and all comments posted by the user relate to other Fanpages associated with Unprofessional.com. 

When the association was brought to the attention of the owner it was dismissed out of hand as they noted that they have thousands of Friends and how could they be expected to know each one. They could be forgiven for this except that when I investigated further and reviewed previous posts there were several communications between both the ‘disgruntled poster’ and the Unprofessional.com owner. All communications related to topics associated with Unprofessional.com and were posted in the last 2 months…

My question is this: Unprofessional.com set up the Facebook page and are nominated as the main Administrator. While Susan has access to the Page he does not have authority to reassign all rights to him. 

Would Susan have legal proprietary rights to a company’s Facebook fanpage that was created by and administered by a third party e.g. Even through a third party created and managed the page on Susan’s behalf the content and details surround the site belong to a company Susan owns?  

The reality as I see it is that if Susan cancels the Page she potentially loosing access to the Page as based on her previous experience Unprofessional.com will not give her access to manage the page and will do all they can to harm the credibility of the company and Fanpage.

There is plenty more to add on Unprofessional.com’s rudeness, lack of professionalism and lies told to Susan but there is plenty here which should be sufficient for you to get an understanding of the type of company in question. 

Thanks and would appreciate any feedback.


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## DB74 (27 May 2011)

What did facebook say?


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## Time (27 May 2011)

You need an American lawyer to sort it out. Facebook will not do anything.


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## Creditlimit (27 May 2011)

As far as I'm aware they have had no response from FB re above. Like similar sized company's there are no numbers to call.


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## DB74 (27 May 2011)

Don't know if this case is relevant to your situation. Might be worth keeping an eye on

http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/jp-mcmanus-to-take-court-action-against-facebook-506729.html


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## Creditlimit (27 May 2011)

Its a little different but will be worth following all the same.
Cheers


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## alexandra123 (27 May 2011)

This is facebook. Facebook should have all rights to everything contained within their site. To make things simple - why doesnt your friend temporarily close down the profile. Then re-create it in a couple of days/ weeks time ?

Why let someone hold you over a barrel. Is it the case that her business wont survive without Facebook - surely that is not the case ?

Close the account - ask facebook to delete it. 
Then send the mail asking them to re-create the same account again and see if they can drop the unprofessional.com from being associated with their company as it is not providing a service to facebooks customers and could potentially lead to a court case.


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## Oscaresque (29 May 2011)

As the page only has around 250 followers could she set up a new page similarly named which still represents her business like Susan Ireland and not just Susan for example. She could then post on the original page encouraging people to move to the new one or she could private message all the members explaining that the integrity of the page has been compromised and that any posting on it are not representative of the company?

To use Facebook as useful marketing tool, and to convince people they should be following the new page and not the old one she will need to keep it updated and relevant and really use it to drive her business.


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## Creditlimit (1 Jun 2011)

Thanks for the responses. I have already suggested that their current page be replaced with a new site but the reality is that as Unprofession.com is the primary Administrator she cannot delete the page despite being the business owner. 

Another factor is that based on past comments posted by alledged disgruntled customers will darmatically increase once Unprofessional.com's contract is cancelled. 

My opinion is that the she cancel the contract asap to ensure that no more money is forwarded...


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## jhegarty (1 Jun 2011)

Is her company logo on the profile ?


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