I commissioned Gamblepaws for a NSFW picture around December of 2020. I paid the invoice on December 17th, then heard nothing for three months. After three months of waiting and not hearing anything I was finally told I'd be getting a work-in-progress sketch that evening (June 15th, 2021). Then after not hearing back I waited a little longer then asked if there was an ETA. I've asked a few times over the months now but I've not heard back since then, so now it's been another three months since they've said they'd have a sketch done by the evening.
In total I've been waiting nine months since paying the invoice and I've only heard from the artist once after paying, and that took 3 months... After nine months my commission hasn't even been started and the artist is ghosting me. They've been active on Twitter and have posted as recently as October 1st, 2021, yet still haven't opened any of my notes on FA nor responded to my DM on Twitter.
https://cdn.artistsbeware.info/monthly_2021_10/Screenshot_2021-10-06_14-46-37.png.c0ada617cd7078ad868e204c520c9f68.png
Hello all. So I ordered this commission back in February 16th of 2021. I have previously worked with this artist before and never had an issue with them so I decided to work with them again since I quite like the last piece I did. Anyways I successfully put in the request commission form from a Google from thing can't remember the exact thing and got a response back within a few days and she was quite excited to be working with me again.
About a month later on March 19th I did receive a rough sketch so just the line arts. As for what I commission was in general I ordered a single character illustration with full shading and a background. When I got the sketch I was quite happy with it as it looked very cute. I did requested two things to be changed on it though. The first one was the body style. The character I used was a bit chubby and they drew her as a thin character even though I had her body style listed in the character info tab thing for the refs I sent. The second was just to make the boobs a bit bigger as they where pretty small for the character and just looked a bit weird to me. And following that she agreed to change those for me and have it fixed in a few days
After the sketch was approved that is when things took a turn. On April 11th I asked for an update and got no response, I waited two months and asked on June 15th for an update and once again no response. Then I became a bit annoyed and sent another one on June 19th asking for an update as it has been three months since I received anything. Finally the next day June 20th I received a reply She mentioned to me she was having health problems and was worried this affected our business relationship with us working together for comms or however you put it. I mentioned to her that that is all fine and I hope she makes a good recovery and feels better soon.
Next month July 8th 2021 I receive a message saying she will have an update by the weekend and I responded with how I was excited to see it. And this is the last I have ever heard of her. On August 9th I sent a hello message and was ignored and two in July but deleted those as I thought I was spamming. Finally I had enough I sent a message on August 29th detailing my annoyance and lack of response and how I was a bit stressed especially with how much money this was. I outlined I would like a refund but she could keep what is owed for the rough sketch. As of me waiting this it is September 16th and I have yet to hear a response.
I am slowly getting done with commissioning people a this will be the fourth artist I have had to deal with that has run off with my money. I like to commission people and support others but it is really getting hard for me to do so as I'm just paranoid at this point so idk what to do. Anyways here is a bunch of images
Paypal Invoice statement I paid on February 18th 2021
Message one: Discussing comm stuff, like pose the character I'm using and background junk
Random stuff and Paypal being weird for me with the invoice
Rough sketch received
Lack of response 1
Response back and saying when I'll get an update
Where we are at now
But yes hopefully this all checks out. Still learning how to do these. But ea take care and have a great day, cheers! ^^
Hawk and I agreed to do a trade where he was to give me a set assortment of video games in return for $50 usd and lots of art from me.
I believe he goes by he/him pronouns so that is what I am using for this post.
His account has since been deleted so the user is going to be “instagrammer”
He took a long while to actually tell me what he wanted with reguards to artwork so I didn’t actually start drawing until he picked out said drawings that they wanted me to do.
He ended up asking me to choose the amount and type of drawings I do for him.
and this is the reaction to me sending WIP photos of the artwork and eventually finishing them all (images aren’t there anymore)
I asked him for his address so I could ship the artwork off as soon as I could and it took them a few days to respond to that.
I am pretty sure I shipped the box out on October 19th or 20th 2020 and asked him to let me know when he received them.
I thought it was weird only because I didn’t have any other international or US packages take this long even with the pandemic.
I messaged him when I saw that it was delivered and he hadn’t messaged me.
Since he stated that he had COVID I let him be and didn’t message him for at least 2 weeks. I ended up messaging him for a check up on February 17th because he said he would package it up and send me a picture in the previous message which he didn’t do.
here he sends me a picture of the labeled package (just a handwritten one) so I believed the package would be sent that week like they said. I tried not to message him about shipping or tracking at the time it because I didn’t want to seem like I was pestering him.
Since it took so long one way, I assumed it would take just as much time the other way so I decided to message him about a tracking number when I falsely believed the package was well on its way. This is the last of the messages we sent through Instagram
when I saw that the Instagram account was deleted I assumed he just ran away, hence my first message to him through Telegram
I knew I wasn’t the only one having issues with him (as about 3-4 close friends privately messaged be about similar issues with him as well)
to this day I have not received anything out of this “trade”. No artwork or money or games.
I tried to be extremely patient this entire time with him as I know he has mental health problems and 2020 was a year, but I honestly don’t know what to do at this point. Talking to him seems to get me nowhere.
Here is the original agreement for a paw commission and a headshot commission.
Proof:
Part 2 of the Agreement:
Also how you can see on the screenshot above the artist has received the payment, but here is proof of the transaction anyways:
After everything was settled I checked out the artists queue to get some kind of idea how long I might have to wait on the commissions.
And well I was very surprised that the artists list is really long... So I figured I give the artist a reasonable time period to work on them.
So after two months of radio silence in the dms, I saw that the artist still took a lot of commissions, even thought their current list, which got even longer the last time I checked, wasn't even done yet.
I thought I'm gonna message the artist again, cuz on their list they wrote that people can message them to get prioritized on their list.
This went as follows:
I received no response on the original message, even though the artist was tweeting and engaging the entire time on their social media accounts.
After a week of no response I decided to message them again. Which is the second message on the screenshot above.
When this message was ignored as well I set a deadline for the artist. Which is the third message you can see on the screenshot above.
There was a shorter time period between the second and third message, because I already got a bit annoyed.
Finally after another week I got an answer from the artist:
First I was a bit sympathetic with them, because I get that mental stress can have a big impact on someones life and I explained why I was so persistent to them as well.
But showing my sympathy was a mistake, because after the conversation above the artist started to make excuses for not working on commission more and more frequently on their public twitter account.
Also communication with this artist stopped entirely in the dms. They never responded back.
So I messaged them regarding a refund, after again almost 2 months of radio silence. I gave the artist more time than the deadline I set them originally.
And I still haven't received an answer yet.
Initial agreement of two images. Two illustrations. One for a playmat and another for card sleeves.
payment proof:
First image delivered + no response on the second one.
It has been radio silence for 2 months with not even lineart done on my second picture
ordered a mini-partial on the 13th of April 2020, head was completed on September 2020, no further updates on the rest of the order and artist is yet to ship the finished item and as of august 2021 I have not received anything from the artist nor does the artist respond to messages anymore
Mel and I agreed to a $300 piece of my character with a background. The original agreement is on a Twitter account I deleted years ago, but here are my payments as well as a message on Facebook that she would be working on it.
Mel had delivered 6 smaller commissions in the past, so I trusted her and was fine with waiting. When she started, things seemed to progress smoothly. (Text with personal details are marked out.)
I reached out occasionally from Twitter (on the same account that I had deleted) for updates. On her Trello, my piece was last updated in 2019: https://trello.com/b/DTDzsnqX/commissions
2020 was the last time I sent a message on Twitter. I realized I had not heard from her in a while, so when I went to ask about the commission status, I saw Mel had set her Twitter account to protected (so I could not contact her). I then tried to reach out to her on Furaffinity and saw my account was blocked.
I tried to contact Mel one more time by e-mail.
I saw the next day that she had disabled her Furaffinity account and deleted her Twitter.
I had felt that things were progressing smoothly, if slowly, and nothing seemed out of place. So I was very surprised by the quiet account block. It was only after these events that I checked Artist Beware and saw she had bewares under previous account names. I hope this helps others avoid the trouble.
I commissioned Raver back in June 2019 for a bodysuit with indoor feet. Prices were discussed and the total came to $1050. I later added on custom shoes to go with the feet paws which was $150. Totaling now $1200.
I had ask if a deadline of late Oct/Start of Nov as I had a convention later in Nov. He said he would try but he had a convention in July he was attending and would try getting it started in Aug.
Over the rest of 2019, I had messaged him multiple times asking for updates which I was always met with excuses about illness or family matters. Which I understand life sometimes gets in the way so I let it slide. See screenshots below of all excuses also excuses from 2020.
Now into 2020 I had asked a few more times for updates to which I was met with more excuses(See above). Then in March world wide lockdowns started to occur. I asked him if he would be working from home during the lockdown and he said he wouldn't be able to so I waited. Come April he mentioned on social media that he would be going back to work. One of his excuses was that my DTD wasn't suitable for use. He had waited almost a full year(April 2020) to tell me my DTD wasn't useable even though he had opened the box when he first got it and would've seen the issue with it(issue was I used cling film instead of a painters suit)
Proof he opened the box when he first got it
He claims that is his TOS it states 50% would be nonrefundable once work had started. Not once were his TOS sent to me nor were they anywhere on his profile for me to access. Only a small message at the start did he say "when I start 50% is non refundable"
After a lot of back and forth I sent him a new DTD and had asked that my feetpaws be worked on while he waited on the new DTD
Feetpaws were not worked out while he waited for the DTD. He then also had a surgery coming up.
That was all he had to show, for almost a year. There's no confirming those are even meant to be mine, could easily be someone else's.
I then asked for more updates in April and May. More excuses(attached above with excuses from 2019). I was rather upset at this point that I had waited almost a full year and nothing had been done. He then posted that he was selling a commission slot for a head piece that would be started in June. I messaged him rather upset explaining my disappointment that someone would have their piece worked on before mine was even started. On 19th of May 2020 after informing him of my disapproval of the lack of work, he decided to cancel my order and was only offering me a 50% refund.
I tried going to both PayPal and my bank to see if they could help but because it had been so long either could do anything to help me. I also tried to get a lawyer but because he's in a different country from me(Scotland and Norway) they said it would cost more to get my money back.
He tried to send me 50% refund but I didn't accept until I had spoken with my bank and PayPal but because both too so long to get back to me PayPal refunded the money Raver had sent back to him. I later requested the 50%($600) from Raver on 26th Oct 2020. Luckily he sent me the money.
Raver has since said in a Instagram Live that he does only 30% nonrefundable deposit. I have since emailed him regarding this and he has agreed to refund me. I am now waiting on the rest that I am owed.
I am currently awaiting a refund on a fursuit comission that was taken on in 2019.
It was paid in installments before it was started. I paid one (1) upgrade fee for the markings and then one (1) rush fee with an optional tip to get my suit finished faster. After a large amount of time passing due to the pandemic and problems on the makers end, after multiple requests for updates, I have requested a refund on the 5th of January 2021. Only then was I shown evidence that my fursuit had been started. After a few requests my most recent message from them was on the 12th of May 2021 and despite seeing my messages they have not yet responded.
I am extreamly hopeful I will get my money refunded as they seem honest with their intent but this has gone on for over 2 years and I can no longer afford to wait.
Pictured is the conversation begining where the commision was accepted, discussion of the upgrade fee, discussion of rush fee, when the suit should be started, requesting a refund,the most recent messages sent by me and pictures of Paypal invoices sent and paid.
I preordered two pins of Raver’s characters from Charapins a year ago. Cost me $32 with shipping. He gave me the run around for months after. I even found a post saying that the pins had arrived and I asked there and on Twitter when the pins were getting sent out. I haven’t heard from him since March. I don’t expect my money back and I don’t even want the pins at this point. I know I’m one of many people that Raver has ghosted but I figured I’d share my experience as well.
And last message was sent 07/28/21
