Diligent interview questions

The process began with a phone screen with the recruiter and then the hiring manager. An in-person interview was then set up for 2 weeks later with the hiring manager and several colleages. Lastly, I was invited to do a skype interview with another person. A few days later I was informed that we were moving to the references stage of the process, which took over a week and a half to speak to 3 people for less than 5 minutes each. Finally, I was given an offer which was drastically lower than what we had initially discussed - it was so low it was actually insulting. Thus resulting in me having to decline the offer, and me wasting over a month of my time along with theirs. I was extremely dissapointed in the outcome which was a result of poor planning on their part.