Article Writers Beware!Something Really Fishy Is Going On Lately

Hmm... can't say I have, but I'll knock on wood now.

A little advice...

Case 1: Send him a Paypal invoice. Wait two days, send a reminder (this is built into Paypal's invoice system) and a notice that all rights to the material are held by you until you receive payment. Wait two days, send another email and remind him that any use of the material is illegal until you receive payment. Wait two days, send another reminder.

Keep a Google alert set up for phrases from what you sent him so you know he isn't using it without paying you. Pick a few phrases of five to ten words... for instance, I'd choose "and a notice that all rights to the material are held" if I were setting an alert for this post. Set up about two for each article, just to make sure he doesn't change a few phrases and get away with it. Here's another article by a writer I really respect about it.

Normally, I would say to send a polite, "Hello, just checking to make sure you received the Paypal invoice I send you on [X/X/2011]. If there are any edit requests you would like me to make prior to payment, please let me know. Cheers!" type email. Since he's gotten rude, you can get scary-legal-sounding immediately.

Case 2: Get back to him and let him know that the email he sent on X date (then quote the email with the date and time stamp) was a legal contract... you agreed to perform Y work on Z keywords in exchange for X payment. Again, remind him that use of your articles is illegal until you receive payment. And set up a Google alert again.

Case 3: See above.

When clients refuse to pay, don't throw up your hands and say, "Oh well." Be polite first, but aggressively proactive. You did work -- you deserve to get paid.

It's people like those clients you've met that tell others to just steal content because writers don't care enough to go after the money. Make them respect you.

And yes, get 50% payment for anything over (insert cost of a few articles... I like the round number of $100, but that's 4-5 articles for me) upfront, with 50% due within two days after you send the work. Anything under that amount is paid 100% upfront. Get a formal procedure in place sooner rather than later.

Best of luck!

Wow, that is strange, especially if you've never had problems before. Maybe there's a full moon:-)

I'm sorry for the trouble you're having. I guess the "live and learn" aspect applies here. Requiring the money upfront will alleviate the problem, so it' good at least there's a pretty simple solution.

strange problems.. thats qutie surprising

Please excuse the observation that I'm slightly surprised you didn't do so years ago.

When I was doing this, I never wrote articles, email series or sales copy for anyone without pre-payment, and this never once caused me a problem, right from the day I started.

My terms were prepayment in full for all new clients (and in theory a minimum of 50% in advance for returning clients, but in practice they almost always paid in full in advance anyway).

Anything you buy online, you have to pay in advance. Why should writing be any different?! :confused:

It isn't a problem to state "prepayment in full" as your terms, when marketing a professional service. Clients will treat you professionally if you treat yourself and them professionally. People who have a problem with this are clients you don't want or need.

Never do creative work without being paid up front. You will avoid 99% of these types of problems.

People are taking advantage of you and you are letting them do it. Implement a policy of payment up front from now on.

I would only ever consider doing a payment-on-delivery when doing this kind of work with clients that you've worked with in the past as you have a relationship established.

Very strange cases. However, totally believable. Well if the amount wasn't really high in all three cases then I would suggest to take it as the price for a lesson you have learned and move on. This is business. Losses go along with profits. These type of losses are known as bad debts.

PRE-PAY <--- or at the very least (if its a reputable Warrior) part of the pay in advance.

Years ago i got burnt HARD and i am still wondering why i was so stupid at that time. (Talk about writing poker articles worth EU800 for weeks and then never saw one single penny).

You're right about that.

I never need the money that bad, I make pretty good money providing services here and on other forums. I do however appreciate the honest words. Also, I have had quite a few customers pay me upon delivery. This is not just something I started doing.

I recently had a client, who had previously paid upfront, contact me about doing some articles for him. I agreed and he sent me a list of keywords. I waited for him to pay, but payment never came. I sent him an email about it, but got no reply.

I simply ignored the keyword list and continued working for my other clients.

The lesson here is to stick with your policy of never writing a single word without some sort of upfront payment. You're running a business - not a charity.

The content you produce has lots of VALUE. If they could do it themselves they would, but they can't, so they come to a skilled writer to create valuable content for them. Remember that.

Thanks for sharing your story, Robin. I'll make sure to take the advice that others have given to request payment upfront.

It's good to know that the majority of people you've worked with on the forum have been honest and ethical.

When I get someone like that I just turn them over to a collection agency and let them make their life miserable until they pay. Works like a magic charm.

Re's
Rob Whisonant

Sorry to hear about theses problems. Unfortunately there are always going to be scammers out there, so try to take at least 50% upfront payment. If the client really wants you, then they will do this.

Good thing that this happen to you only now in the span of two years...other writers have been victimized a lot...though not here in WF.

Yeah as others have mentioned, you should be requiring a deposit. And assuming you have been writing for as long as you say you have, that should not be an issue, even a partial deposit.

In the worst case, if they still decide to proliferate your work without paying, you can write to their hosting providers and send them a DCMA request to have it removed. Or what often times works, immediately publish all of the content on your own site, so their content becomes duplicate content and you have more proof of when it was created. Most people at that point, will either pay up or are just scammers.

It is not fair on the part of others , they should and must pay you. thanks for generating awareness and guiding for being more cautious while dealing with people in such deals.

It's really very simple, 50% upfront upon order, the remaining 50% upon completion and BEFORE delivery, for all work over say $100, and 100% upfront for everything under $100, if you are doing quality work you will have no problems with that model

I would advise that you set up maybe a 1 page design and market your services that way, many hosts offer a free billing system with their plans that will allow you to bill your clients BEFORE the work is delivered. This way you get payment upfront before sending an invoice. The internet is a scary place.. not everyone will honour their agreements with you.

Good luck.

I never agree to do work for anyone without having a full or 50% payment up front before any work is done. I do this for literally anyone and I recommend you do the same.

I never do work without complete prepayment for my services. Seems like a simple solution to your dilemma if you would do the same.

It depends how much they owe you on each contract.

Obviously, you'll never do business with them again.

There's an old saying: "If you lend someone $20 and never see them again, it was probably worth it."

Same applies here, if the amount wasn't too high...

I think the idea to have bette terms will suit me well. I am going to create one and start distributing it to my clients from now on. By the way, the three non paying clients equals 150.00$.

Sounds to me like you need to get a signed contract before you write an article. Then if they try to stiff you, you can threaten them with a lawsuit.

OR--insist on 50-75% payment of the agreed upon fee upfront with the remainder to be paid upon completion.

I blame Obama. Seems like personal responsibility and initiative is dead, and more people are expecting a free ride at someone else's expense. To them, your hard work is their entitlement.

No, political arguments please... I was only joking. But I do think the kind of irresponsibility shown in your cases does reflect the spirit of our times.

Normally, a writer would charge more overall to compensate for this kind of "shrinkage" (like higher prices in stores due to shoplifters), but IM writing prices are already at the bottom of the scale, so there is little hope for that.

A lawsuit would be a good scare tactic, but would not be worth the trouble.

I just made a couple of revisions to protect myself and I think it will work out nicely. I got alot of ideas I would have never thought of from some of the replies in this post. Thank you.

I know I'm a little late to the game but I wanted to add my two cents. I never work without being paid first and also I have two small clauses in my Paypal invoices that state copyright and refund policies to cover my butt. If I'm writing an ebook then they have to sign a contract with me.

That seems to be a potential curse on the internet, such a shame it is that way. I know every time I have bought articles, I have had to pay up front. May be something to consider.

John

You are protected in that case because you can simply file a complaint with paypal. The writer on the other hand cannot do much but kick rocks.

mmmm Interesting. I have had somewhat of a similar problem in the last week. I wonder if we are dealing with the same people????

Any chance these were all the same person? I'm thinking that is a real possibility.

Geff

Hey Pheonix

Unfortunately it is not just writers that are having this issue. A month or two ago I had to switch to having clients pre-pay either via PayPal or Fund Projects via Elance.

It sucks to lose trust in people, but I've just been ripped off too many times with providing keyword research, seo, website design, publishing and writing to take the risk any more

For website design the payment side of things has always been an issue and the excuses given for not paying have to be seen to be believed :rolleyes:

It happens all the time. When you were getting upfront payments before, you should'nt have gone back on it. Peope who refuse to pay upfron are usually middle men, and working with them usually involve high risk. Even if they paid upfront the first time, don't agree to work without upfront the next time. This is how this business is.

I only had once the misfortune of working with this type of clients. As I was getting close to finish a project, the guy asked me to refund all the money he paid me so far. He claimed that my work was not satisfactory, even he reviewed it earlier and asked me to carry on with it.
Luckily, I was working on oDesk, which has a payment guarantee in place, so I was just told him to get real. The whole experience left a real sour taste in my mouth.

I don't have problems with my client until now. He always pays me upfront before I start working. I always send him the Paypal invoice and reminder every 2 days if he doesn't pay me yet. So far, so good for me now.

what a horrible situation. You are definatly in need of help Wasnt there a warrior offering his legal services for free in here teh other day.