It’s a regular Wednesday morning. The coffee’s hot. The servers are stable. Life is good.

Then the door swings open.

In walks a man — shirt untucked, eyes fierce. Let’s call him Mike. MD, business owner, and judging by the storm he brings, probably the janitor too.

He marches up to the front desk:

“I want to speak to the BOSS!”

The receptionist (an angel in human form) asks:

“Is there a matter I can help you with?”

“NO. Just the BOSS.”

They call me. I walk in. Mike sees me and suddenly, like magic — he calms down.

We step into my office.

Me: “How can I help you?”

Mike: “My websites are down. All three.”

Me: “Why are they down?”

Mike: “Paul took them down.”

Me: “Paul?”

Mike: “My IT guy. He’s… disappeared.”

Me: “Do you know why?”

Mike: “Not really. We had... a misunderstanding.”(Translation: Paul wasn’t paid.)

Me: “Can you prove you own the domains?”

Out comes a CR12, His National ID, company stamp, and a Certificate of Incorporation that looks like it saw the Mau Mau war.

Me: “Do you have any written agreement or authorization showing Paul was acting on your behalf or he was your employee e.t.c?”

Mike: “No. He just used to do everything.”

At this point, I have to say the dreaded words:

“Mike, without formal documentation or control over the domain records, we’ll have to maintain the current status-the sites remain suspended.”

Mike pauses. Looks at me dead in the eye.

“I’ll sue you.You will hear from my lawyer” then he walks away.