If the client got lost, and then showed up and wanted to return the money for the work already completed and accepted, then what to do?

Question

Law in IT

The situation is this: there was a project for which we agreed to design and then design a website. But the client froze the project after he accepted the design, and I started writing the code. A month later, he came again, but with his own design and a bunch of new desires. In the first case, he paid 50%, which was the design fee, which I told him about, but personally. In the second case, I warned by mail that the project was different and I needed to pay 50% of the new cost, but then I went forward and combined the cost for both projects into one so that the prepayment was less.

As a result, I had a lot of things to do, in addition to this project, and I offered the person 2 options:
- leave the project, but also the money paid in early
- delete all the developments and return the advance
He chose the second option, and I returned the advance, but returned for the second project (which is with his design, and which is large). And about the first one, he said this: "You accepted the design and paid for it, so there will be no return on it, only on a new project that I could not complete."

The man is naturally offended and threatens with his legal machine. I'm probably wrong in this situation, because I made a lot of concessions because of the amount of work and the unwillingness to frighten the client with the cost. But still, I made a design for him and gave it to him, so shouldn't the client pay for the time spent on it? Is there any way to prove that the site development service included two separate steps, one of which I completed and earned my money.

By the way, on the first project, we mostly communicated personally. For the second, there is already a document in Google Docs with what needs to be done. There was no contract for that and that project, as well as any other official documents. Only correspondence in Whatsapp and TK for the second project.

(I apologize for possible errors and ornate writing)

Answer 1

No contract - no problems :)
You voluntarily agreed to do the job for him for free :) And he voluntarily agreed to give you money :) You did not have mutual obligations :) You can’t sew words to the case, correspondence is not proof.

Answer 2

He went into business - there must be contracts, etc.
he somehow sent you money, but you somehow received it, which means that there is an opportunity to collect this money from you and collect interest on the use of this money. Correspondence by e-mail is poorly accepted by the court, but sometimes it is taken into account.
Another option - dressed up, he will go to court if you are both in different states.
I think it's better to return the money, because reputation is often more expensive than money.

Answer 3

Dmitry Baskakov , what can you be accused of? Or rather, what claims can the customer make to you?
1) That you deceived him by taking money and not placing an order? So the design is there, and even approved.
2) Immediately did not like the design? Why did you approve?
And you also worked without a contract ... Here you can safely send a customer by the forest ...
What can we say, even if an agreement was not signed when buying a car, then there was no purchase as such. There was an exchange. And in the exchange, both parties must assess the risks and draw conclusions. Here the law is powerless.