I got bait-and-switched as a candidate thinking I was going in for a sales pitch to find out it was an interview. I thought it was my company they were hiring (which I guess they were, but with me being butt-in-chair at their office).
I got weirded out when they asked for a resumé mid-pitch, and I said, I don't normally hand anything like that out, and I could give them our portfolio. I kept using the words "we" and "our" they kept using the word "you" and eventually it all clicked. I had been recruited for a job not a sales meeting. I handed them a 5 year old resumé that was kind of crumpled up, gave them my spiel and our rates, still using "our" and "we" then left feeling like I just wasted half an afternoon on nothing.
Less than an hour after I left, I was offered the gig at a 5% discount from my rate but with a guaranteed 30 hours a week. I never thought I would hear from them again. They are actually still one of my "best" clients.
A second anecdote - Half a year later, I was asked my opinion on converting a HUGE legacy project to a different web framework in a rewrite attempt to modernize it. To which I discussed another clients project and how easy it was to get off the ground quickly using the new framework, but said I wouldn't recommend it for such a large legacy conversion. And the Manager asked, "wait, you have another job... you are supposed to work for me." - Apparently he was unaware of the fact that they hired a company to consult them, not a developer.
This happened to me with Google in 2002. Back in the heyday of the desktop widget craze, Google approached me several times via email wanting to discuss acquisition of my widget application. Bear in mind, this was when Google was just buying stuff up wholesale, rather than absorbing the team behind an acquired product. I eventually responded, and the rep and I set up a phone call - solely to discuss the sale of my code to them. I was pretty surprised when the person I spoke to jumped into a full-blown tech screen. I humored it initially, and was then subjected to meeting-reschedule-pinball. Super weird bait and switch by the googs.
Google flew me from the USA to Europe to do this in the late 2000s!
I thought I was going for two days to discuss Google acquiring my (very small) product and company. What actually happened was half of a two-day long tech interview, and me being a tourist with my second day...
I feel like I should be annoyed, but weirdly I look back on it all fondly. They obviously didn't get what they thought they were going to get - but I got a weird, interesting, day with them, a stay in a great hotel, and a free day of vacation...
I got weirded out when they asked for a resumé mid-pitch, and I said, I don't normally hand anything like that out, and I could give them our portfolio. I kept using the words "we" and "our" they kept using the word "you" and eventually it all clicked. I had been recruited for a job not a sales meeting. I handed them a 5 year old resumé that was kind of crumpled up, gave them my spiel and our rates, still using "our" and "we" then left feeling like I just wasted half an afternoon on nothing.
Less than an hour after I left, I was offered the gig at a 5% discount from my rate but with a guaranteed 30 hours a week. I never thought I would hear from them again. They are actually still one of my "best" clients.
A second anecdote - Half a year later, I was asked my opinion on converting a HUGE legacy project to a different web framework in a rewrite attempt to modernize it. To which I discussed another clients project and how easy it was to get off the ground quickly using the new framework, but said I wouldn't recommend it for such a large legacy conversion. And the Manager asked, "wait, you have another job... you are supposed to work for me." - Apparently he was unaware of the fact that they hired a company to consult them, not a developer.