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Apr. 3rd, 2011 at 9:32 PM synchra WHO: Aliases: SophieCabra, Waji "Company": SurfCatCostumes WHERE: http://surfcatcostumes.com/ WHAT: Costume of my character Tokkebi Kesaki done in the same style as Luskwood (with permission from Luskwood. SophieCabra used to work for Luskwood so she had confirmed she could achieve this quality. It was promised to be the same quality.) Art: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/1745-1/tokkebikesakicharactersheet.jpg Product: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7306-1/IMG_5509.jpg (in depth pictures and descriptions of everything below) Screenshots of initial e-mails confirming these facts: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/10055-1/Screenshot-AB-1.png (Note: She mentions a non-refundable deposit of $495 but never mentions what it is for. In talking with other makers this is always accepted as a cancellation fee, I never canceled the product while it was in process. The promised product with the promised quality and features was just never delivered so I asked for a refund because it was offered to me.) http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/10057-1/Screenshot-AB-2.png http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/10059-1/Screenshot-AB-3.png (I never received guidelines or a real contract or a ToS so all agreements were made through e-mail in this fashion.) WHEN: Initial Costume invoice was sent 6/18/09. First Payment of $520 was sent out via paypal Jun. 7, 2009 Second Payment of $545 was sent out via paypal Sep 1, 2009 Final Payment of $600 was sent out via paypal Sep. 2, 2009 Product promised to be done and received by: Halloween 2009, if artist could not get it done in time then sometime in January 2010. Total of all payments as well as price of costume: $1665 Costume received: Feb 6, 2010 Promised refund: Feb 6, 2010 (Promised refund by: August 1st, 2010) Costume confirmed to have been received: Mar 18, 2010 Partial refund of $1,081, $1050 after fees was sent to me via paypal Apr 18, 2010 Current payment owed: $584 Asked for rest of payment initially: 4/19/10 (never got a response) Gave artist a time line to pay me back again on: Feb 15, 2011 (end of march) Artist failed to pay me back by: 03/31/11 (never got a response) Demand Letter to be sent: 4/4/11 Court date if Demand Letter is not responded to: TBA PROOF: Here is a review of the costume I wrote which includes all proof needed of the quality of the product received including pictures, videos and e-mails sent and received throughout the process. http://community.livejournal.com/fursuitreviews/31415.html (I figure it's better to just post that part here as a link because it's just as good as copy-pasting and putting it behind a cut, please tell me if you'd rather have me go about this another way.) Here are some e-mails in which the refund is mentioned: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/10077-1/Screenshot-AB-refundmention-4.png http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/10075-1/Screenshot-AB-refundmention-5.png (promising refund for suit.) I can provide screenshots of anything asked for if needed. Here are the paypal transactions: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/10061-1/Screenshot-AB-5-1stPayment.png http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/10063-1/Screenshot-AB-5-2ndPayment.png http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/10065-1/Screenshot-AB-5-3rdPayment.png http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/10067-1/Screenshot-AB-5-refund.png Note: She mentions that it's $1050 even after fees and isn't including the initial 30% even though I never canceled on her and she had promised me a full refund. However $1665 - $1050 = $615 which was not even the down payment. The down payment was $495 so even if there is some reason that I am not owed the original 30% (which I still have yet to clear up since she has never responded to me about this) she still owes me $120 by her own standards. With fee money included $1665 - $1081 = $584. Which is what I am currently asking for. However if her statement that I do not owe the 30% is true then: $584 - $495 = $89 So, she would still owe me $89. http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/10055-1/Screenshot-AB-1.png I was told to cover paypal fees (which is apparently against Paypal's TOS https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=p/gen/terms-outside ) so I sent her $520 with the first payment to make it even/easier to track how much I still owed. I also paid for her to ship it to me. The receipt she scanned for me: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/10072-1/Receipt-AB-6-shipping.png (I blurred out most of my address, the address of another person she mailed something to, and her card info.) And I paid a lot more than that to ship it back to her with tracking and confirmation which was something she failed to do herself. EXPLAIN: Once again, here is a review of the costume I wrote which includes all proof needed of the quality of the product received including pictures, video and e-mails sent and received throughout the process as of March 23rd. http://community.livejournal.com/fursuitreviews/31415.html Also copy pasted here: ----REVIEW START---- I have given this maker an entire year to come clean and fix the problems with this transaction and they haven't, so unfortunately, this is not a positive review. As a DISCLAIMER, this person may have changed their ways since my commission and I have never seen the produce work of this low quality before or after my commission was made. Name of Artist: Surf Cat Costumes/SophieCabra Website: http://surfcatcostumes.com/ Character/species commissioned (link to photo/concept art): Tokkebi Kesaki, a ghost Korean Jindo dog. Here is the concept art: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/1745-1/tokkebikesakicharactersheet.jpg I also included some snapshots of my SL avatar of her (my by my friend, Luper): http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/6484-2/Snapshot_003.png http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/6472-2/Snapshot_001.png http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/6480-2/Snapshot_002.png (I have more, but you get the idea.) Links to picture(s) of your commissioned item: Currently I have absolutely nothing, and I am down -$584, but this is what I got in the mail last year in February: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7306-1/IMG_5509.jpg Because there is a lot to be said about every other picture I have of it, I'll put them in the appropriate places throughout the review after all the other information has been said. Is the item old or new (if old, how long have you had it/when was it made?) This was made sometime at the end of 2009 but I did not receive it until February 2010. (again this will all be explained below.) --Grade each below aspect on a scale of 1 (worst) to 5 (best)-- Visual Aspect (does it match the concept art? Is it consistent with other items the maker has produced? Is it visually pleasing overall?): 1 Okay first, let me say, this wasn't my first fursuit commission, this was my 5th or 6th fursuit commission so I had had a lot of experience with this at this point. The product did not match the concept art to the degree I had hoped for (to me it doesn't match at all other than colors really), it's not consistent with the other items this person has made, and it came out looking pretty bad overall. Why? I was promised something I did not receive. This commission was originally going to be made by Luskwood and when they stopped taking commissions and I saw Sophie, who used to work for Luskwood had parted off and started her own company I approached her asking if she could do that quality of work for me. I had seen the work she did at Luskwood and it looked good and I had seen the suits she had made on her own at that point and I thought they looked pretty nice! She promised me this quality, she promised me leg padding, eyes that light up, glowing fur, and that she would match my concept art... you know what? here is that part of the original e-mail, no better way of putting it: First E-mail: Ooh. Awesome character. I can totally play around with some glow in the dark effects. I could hopefully even find some transparent glow airbrush paints I could highlight the fur with. The problem would be finding one that went on completely transparent. But I would love to play around with that and experiment beforehand and to see if I could get it to work for your fur. ? Anyhoo, before Luskwood disbanded, I worked with Arito, so I can do the same leg/foot padding system and whatnot. I think for the whole thing (supplies, labor, shipping) I'm going to say $1650." I was excited to hear that she liked the character because usually that means the maker will make a better product when they like the character as well! I was also excited that she promised me all of these things and that she was going to do the glow in the dark stuff as well! Sounded like a dream right? The price was the highest I had ever had at the time but I was willing to pay that much for the promised quality. (All my previous commissions at this time were a lot cheaper, were much higher quality when received and were from big names like B3/Joecifur, JillCostumes, Midori, and Rose Quoll.) Here is my initial response: "Awe, thank you so much. ? I wouldn't really need the fur to glow, but actually it does on the SL avatar my friend made for me: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/2228-1/Snapshot_483.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/2232-1/Snapshot_480.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/2222-1/Snapshot_485.jpg Hahaha, so that would be really freaking awesome if you could figure it out. I know that paint from that kotaku link is really good for stuff like that, but I can't remember what it's called. I know Beetlecat used it once on some claws. I can do the 30% paypal deposit. Man, thanks for responding so fast, I asked for quotes from a couple other people and it's been months and no one has responded! Then you finished that Roo head recently and I was like OH DUH everything you made with Arito and the stuff you've made alone seemed to be the best work that came out of Luskwood/in the style I want! I was all emo there for a week about loosing my quote. I got a good price on it, but I don't mind paying more if I am still going to get the same quality. (It wasn't THAT far off from yours. :P) I wouldn't "need" the suit until FC 2010 so anywhere you want to put me in is fine, I am patient. XD Just tell me where to send the money and I'll snag my space! ? Thank you so much!" Well pretty much none of these promised things came out right. The bodysuit didn't fit at all (we made a duct tape dummy), most of the claws on the feet had fallen off, I couldn't see out of the head and it flopped around, it didn't look right, the "glow in the dark" fur was yellow, uneven, and atrocious. There was absolutely no body padding, the eyes didn't glow (there is more on this though, I'll explain this in the service section), there were no teeth, there was black eyebrows on it (character does not have eyebrows), the mouth and nose were uneven, the ears were uneven. There was pretty much flaws with every part of the suit. More on this in the workmanship section with pictures. Service Aspect (Deadlines. Communication. Little extras.):0 I have actually been afraid to post this part because it DID start off wonderful and she was a pleasure to talk to for months of this transaction! Everything seemed to be going great but then several major flaws we're made towards the end. She is also a well known person in the furry fandom and has a lot of friends so saying anything negative about her seemed "awful".. but these are facts, and this is what happened to me. This is long, so I am going to put it under a cut. Most of this was typed last year in April as well. Communication/Deadlines/Shipping: The suit was originally supposed to be done for Halloween or in October. I asked to have WIP photos because I am very particular with how my characters are represented and I never got any WIP pictures, then suddenly I got finished pictures of the suit the week of Halloween but it just didn't look right in the picture and the eyes looked awful to me. It looked wall-eyed and she had worn the bodysuit. I had sent her a duct tape dummy so that the suit would fit me and I was aware Sophie is bigger than me, so it made me kind of irked to see that she had worn the suit because she said it was hard to get into and I was hoping she hadn't stretched it or something like that. Here are those photos: http://www.surfcatcostumes.com/v/costumes/kesaki/ I didn't really like the head shapes and some other nit picky things from the photos but the eyes were the main turn off so I asked her to change the eyes because I was thinking maybe the other stuff looked better in person. I remembered from experiences in the past that some fursuits look like shit in photos, but in person they look really nice. I'd rather have a nice suit, than have it by Halloween! She took 2 months to change the eyes and they still didn't look right. She sent me this picture on December 3rd: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7856-1/eyes1.jpg I asked to see them with the lights on in them since it was the point of them and she sent me this: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7858-1/eyes2.jpg Which looked just as wall-eyed as the last pictures. Also.. why not ever show me the whole head at once? ? She told me she'd change them again, maybe the light effect was just not working out right and she'd replace them with glow in the dark painted blue eyes. She also promised me the suit had body padding and that the whole thing "lit up like a light bulb" before I got it. She finally replaced the eyes again by December 31st and sent me blurry cell phone pictures of it after I requested to see photos instead of her just sending it to me. http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/6943-1/s1.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7239-1/s2.JPG I was tired of dealing with it and I wanted the suit by FC so I asked her to send me the suit because maybe they looked better in person, who knows. She told me she sent it and I waited. On January 11th I realized the suit really should have been there at that point so I asked her if she had tracking info. She evaded the question and said the post office said it would be there by Wednesday. I waited. I e-mailed her on the 14th saying it still wasn't here. She said she'd call the post office on the 15th if it still wasn't there. I told her on the 15th it still wasn't there. She never responded so I waited some more. On the 20th I e-mailed her asking if she had ever contacted the post office. She said: "I called them, got the run around, was told to email them with the receipt number. There's not record of damage, insufficient postage costs, etc. They gave me some BS about being slow after the holidays and this past federal holiday weekend, blah blah blah. I'm calling them again. They filed it as missing as transit, so from what I hear that puts a fire in their asses if it's just sitting around in some office somewhere. It really should be there today. God, I hope. If it is lost, I'd say we allow until the end of Feb to come back and after that I can either remake the costume or begin issuing you a full refund. I am terribly sorry and infuriated this is happening. Let me know if I can do anything else." I said thanks for calling and everything she had done and continued to wait for it.. Throughout all these e-mails I had asked her multiple times if she gotten insurance and tracking info on it and she kept evading my question. On the 25th I still did not have the suit so I sent her this: "Yeah I think it's gone. ? I hope you got a large amount of money claimed for insurance on that. ? I'd feel bad getting a full refund now if you didn't, but I think now I need the money more than a suit. I lost my job on the 15th. X.x GUhhhhh stupid mail!!!! I swear this character is bad luck. The badge that ****** made of her got lost too! >.<" I censored out that artist's name just in case! Yes, a badge of this character got lost as well. We both had been completely friendly with each other up to this point and there had been no problems with each other. I already didn't completely like the suit she had made just from the pictures in the first place so getting her to remake it again seemed pointless (I would've rather just had the money at this point and commissioned the suit from another maker at a later date, especially because I had also just lost my job, and on top of that someone had stolen my identity so I couldn't get my unemployment money either.) She responded: "Went to the post office today with my delivery confirmation and receipt and in person they told me that as far as their records say, it's been delivered. o.o What the post man says he believes this means is that either one of your housemates (if any) accepted the package and never told you, or got a package notice (due to you not being home or it being too big to deliver) in the mail and forgot to give it to you, or the package notice may have gotten lost. Their advice was to have you check with anyone in your house, as well as head to your local post office ASAP. If it's been been sitting in the local USPS for a while, then that's why it's just been lost in transit without response. After a few weeks they will sent it back to me, which the post man told me can take quite a while. If you can check any roommates as well as your local post office as soon as you can, that would be the next best course of action. Please let me know!" I sent back this: "Hi ----, I don't have any housemates and nothing has ever gotten lost in the mail here at all in the past. ? I have received numerous LARGE boxes in the past, too. I just live with my boyfriend and we would've seen it if it got here. I will check the post office tomorrow I guess... ? We haven't gotten any notices. You sent it to *****ADDRESSS****** Right? I'll let you know ASAP what I hear from my post office." I wanted to double check my address because people spell it wrong all the time. Sophie responded: "Yeah, I didn't know if you had any, so I was just passing along info. Anyhoo, try the post office and see. That is the address I sent it to, so hopefully the post office was just being stupid and it's sitting with them." This is when I went to the post office on the 29th of January and e-mailed her this: "The post office says they didn't receive anything at all for me. I had them look all over in the back. Are you sure it was confirmed received?? Was it at a different post office? If you got insurance on the package, you should have a tracking number (according to the person at my post office.) I have a feeling it's lost or... at a different post office? My post office definitely doesn't have it. x.x I don't know why it would be confirmed received if it wasn't in ******." I spent a lot of time down there and they had nothing... This is also where I found out that she DID NOT get insurance or tracking on the suit. On the 30th I was upset so I sent her an e-mail explaining to her why I'd rather have the money than another suit because it seemed to me that it was definitely lost. I spilled my guts, I was stupid, I TOLD HER EVERYTHING that had happened to me up to that point because I was stressing out and so that she wouldn't think I was BSing about wanting the full refund that she had promised instead of another suit. I also asked her if she had actually sent it because it was just too weird that the post office had absolutely no record of it and that I was upset with her for not getting insurance and tracking. I was nice about everything I said in the e-mail. I asked to see the receipt so that if there was any tracking at all I could find it from the receipt. I got back an angry e-mail from her... in which she refused to refund me, but she scanned the receipt. She accused me of receiving the package and not telling her. We both basically got unreasonably mad at each other about the stupid USPS losing the package of the suit I was promised was of good quality. These e-mails are really long and tl;dr so I will leave them out and just put these summaries here. x.x I told her that I would wait 2 months for it to show up, but if it didn't I would still expect a refund to be an option if I didn't want her to remake the suit. On the 31st she e-mailed me back and said she could do the refund.. I'll just copy paste that e-mail, I can't summarize it well. "I firstly want to apologize for accusing you of lying. I was on the defense for being accused as well of something I would never do to a customer. I believe we are both just running a bit of a temper due to a regretful situation that is out of our hands. We both don't know each other personally, so it's easy to assume. It's stressful, but I think we both got any suspicions under the bridge and we can work to fix it. I do think you misunderstood me about the refund. Perhaps I worded it poorly, but I meant that I could not offer you a full refund right this minute. Firstly I really believe that we should wait the two months, and I am grateful you agree. But also I meant that I could not offer the full refund all at once. It would have to be paid back in installments, much like how I accept payment for costumes. As for it showing up in the hopeful case it will, I said in my previous email that I would be glad to change the design a bit so you could sell it without selling your character. I have no problem with offering you that at all. I encourage you, should it come to that, to allow me to do so, since I know my own work more than anyone else would. If it's truly just the head that's the problem, I can remake the head if the costume resurfaces. I still believe that I followed the concept to the best of my ability. But I also understand that the way we all see and interpret art can vary. I don't know if this would be a solution for you, but one thing I've done with previous customers is to sketch their character in my own style and render it out as such. It has been a very successful exercise in the past and I think it might work for you. Basically I would email you a bunch of sketches and you can pick and choose what you'd like. Anyways, I believe patience is our biggest ally right now and all we can do is hope it shows up. I am still going to be hawking around on the USPS phonelines until I've gotten an answer. Despite not having on-site tracking, USPS does track all packages in their own system, all I have to do is find someone on the phone that is willing to let me know what their systems are saying. I do not know why they would have told me it's delivered if it was not, but I know that I can find out somehow. It's a government agency and it is a bureaucratic mess to navigate. I will get answers, however, and I will pass them along to you as soon as I have some. Hope you are well and at ease at least a little bit," I explained to her all the things I would want changed if she wanted to remake the suit head (this was before I knew of the actual quality I would receive in the mail.) I thought only the head was a problem at this point, so it all seemed reasonable. Lots of time passed. On February 6th the suit miraculously shows up. The suit was the most terribly crafted suit I have ever had in my own possession. NONE of those things I was promised were on it. The whole suit was crammed into a huge box with no packing material at all as well... I told her my honest opinion on everything including pictures like I have posted here. Her response: "All right, send it back to me. Once I get it in hand I'll start issuing a refund in installments to be completed by Aug 1st. I will sell the costume off myself." On top of this I was told she was writing snarky posts about me on her LJ this whole time! I did not see them myself but people told had me about them. ? I never had any "buyer's remorse" for the suit I EXPECTED to get, the product I received was just NOT WHAT I BOUGHT AT ALL. There was no body padding, the eyes didn't glow, it didn't match my art, it was not Luskwood quality..etc.etc.etc. I'd be perfectly happy if I had gotten what I had commissioned. Anyways, you can see why I was not pleased with the amount of money I paid. Manda did not cost anywhere near that much and is MUCH MUCH higher quality..and she fits me, I also never sent Joe a duct tape dummy either, he just did it right with nothing but measurements and she still fit me. Licorice and Cricket were even cheaper and are just as high of a quality as Manda. Pierah was cheap as hell and much better quality, my "secret" suit is obviously higher quality and extremely cheap, same goes for Sync and none of them cost anywhere near this much. I was expecting the quality I had gotten in the past from other makers but with everything promised. I sent it back to her as soon as I could after getting back and asked her to tell me when she got it. I paid an extra $65 total to ship it and to get tracking and insurance on it (I will never get that back, but I knew that!) I just wanted to send it back to her right. It got back in a timely manor. I expected installments of payment like I was promised because she had said she didn't have the money so I agreed to have it by August 1st. I sent this to her on March 2nd because she hadn't told me she got it yet: "Hi, ----! I am just checking in, did you receive the suit yet? I sent it with insurance and tracking on the 18th, but the USPS website is giving me errors when I put the tracking number in. (Can anything with them ever work right?) Anyways, if you didn't get it yet, I am going to go down to the post office and figure out if they messed up their system or something. Thanks!" She never responded to it. So I sent this on March 18th. "Hey, just checking again since I never got a response back before. I just want to make sure everything gets there. Thanks," She responded: "Hey, I got your box. No worries." I never got any payment installments as promised but I randomly got most of it back on April 18th. This suit or.. lack there of.. THIS EXPERIENCE cost me: $584 + the money I spent to send it back to her.. and whatever I paid to send her a duct tape dummy which I doubt she used. I e-mailed her about this remaining money and she never responded. I e-mailed her again last month giving her an ultimatum, she sends the money back but the end of March or I go to court. I am hoping I won't have to go to court, but what's done is done. TL;DR: She didn't meet the deadline, the eyes never looked right, she promised me she could do something she obviously couldn't (make glowing eyes like my art), it got lost in the mail, she didn't put tracking on it, I asked for a refund when I got a bad product, she refused, she finally paid me back most of it, she still owes me money a year later and has about a week to pay me back before I go to small claims court. Workmanship Aspect (Is the sewing neat? Are things that should be sewn glued or vise versa? Does it fit? Has anything fallen off yet that shouldn’t have):1 Now to explain everything individually... First off, not fitting. I sent her a duct tape dummy so you'd think it fit? I don't know how she made it on it but it seemed to fit her pretty well: http://surfcatcostumes.com/v/costumes/kesaki/IMG_0915.JPG.html Here it is on me: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7306-1/IMG_5509.jpg (ignore my hair popping out.) http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7280-1/IMG_5522.jpg (There was no leg padding.) Here it is with a pair of pants on top to show just how baggy it was on me: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7898-2/IMG_5594.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7882-2/IMG_5592.JPG It had some strange crotch bunching thing going on in the front: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7296-1/IMG_5514.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7290-1/IMG_5517.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7890-2/IMG_5596.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7886-2/IMG_5595.JPG The fur was full of weird stuff that had collected in it: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7870-2/IMG_5591.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7926-2/IMG_5576.JPG (oh look foam!) And loose threads all over on the inside, this is the hole the tail was supposed to go through: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7878-2/IMG_5588.JPG With the belt as tight as possible, this is how the tail help up: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7288-1/IMG_5520.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7286-1/IMG_5519.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7282-1/IMG_5521.jpg Oh yeah.. and for some reason you could see my divesuit through the fur? It must've had thin backing or something I remember it being scratchy, I don't know where it was from though. The glow in the dark paint glowed, not blue, nor white, and it was splattered on unevenly and looked gross glowing, I have a video of this but I am unsure of where to upload it.. (I don't want it on youtube.) Okay so second, not looking right. Why didn't I do something about this before? Well It looked "okay" in the pictures on her. I was "eh" about the eyebrows and some facial shape things but it's white and white never photographs well so I figured I wanted to see it with my own eyes before forming a solid opinion on asking for anymore changes (also, I had already had her replace the eyes 2 times when she showed me the pictures of it all together and it took her and extra 2 or 3 months to change the eyes.) So here are those things, first off the feet: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7308-1/IMG_5510.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7304-1/IMG_5512.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7302-1/IMG_5511.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7298-1/IMG_5513.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7270-1/IMG_5531.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7958-2/IMG_5571.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7966-2/IMG_5569.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7994-2/IMG_5568.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/8006-2/IMG_5554.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/8014-2/IMG_5553.JPG (mysterious shoe) http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/8010-2/IMG_5555.JPG (strange holes in the bottom?) http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/8018-2/IMG_5551.JPG (scale, next to a DS Lite, they were huge, I couldn't barely fit through the door wearing them actually.) A lot of the claws had fallen off in the mail, they were painted blue and left unfinished so there was fur, foam and dirt/dust stuck all over them, they were also shaped very elephant like, and not dog like at all. There claws that were left attached were loose and the ones that weren't, I found loose in the box but there was one I never found.. which means it fell off before the suit was sent? I know my concept art has chunky legs but she still has a foot in it and this is definitely not how I imagined, I was thinking more like this suit made by Luskwood (quality I was promised and paid for once again): http://luskwood.org/costume/gallery/canines/nataliecevichelimahusky/1 http://luskwood.org/costume/gallery/canines/keovi/2 http://luskwood.org/gallery/costumes/canines/keovi/keovi3.jpg I already mentioned the claws issues so here are some more pictures of that and the hand paws: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7950-2/IMG_5573.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7962-2/IMG_5572.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7970-2/IMG_5570.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/8038-2/IMG_5556.JPG The Nose: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7284-1/IMG_5523.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7274-1/IMG_5525.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7998-2/IMG_5565.JPG (loose hot glue on the felt) http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7978-2/IMG_5564.JPG It was very flat and had an outline around it which is something I personally just don't really like the look of on most suits. Does not look like the art. The Eyes: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7278-1/IMG_5526.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7990-2/IMG_5567.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/8002-2/IMG_5566.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/8030-2/IMG_5560.JPG Slapped on, falling off at parts, covered in scratches and at this point I had thought they were just glow in the dark (not EL wire anymore like originally promised because the first couple attempts at this had come out looking very wrong), but they weren't even glow in the dark and I could actually look through them because of how the head fit on my head. I had to look through the mouth. The Mouth being un-even and the lack of teeth: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7974-2/IMG_5563.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7986-2/IMG_5562.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7982-2/IMG_5561.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/8026-2/IMG_5559.JPG http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7276-1/IMG_5524.jpg http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/7268-1/IMG_5527.jpg The Tail back: http://www.synchrastudios.com/gallery/d/8042-2/IMG_5557.JPG This was just messy, and strange for what it was supposed to be. I feel like I am leaving things out. I don't know, anyone who was at my house when this thing was received knows this was just NOT a top quality suit, it was somehow worse in person. (A lot of friends were over when this came in the mail, my excitement quickly died when I opened the box.) Describe your Experience. Pros, Cons, Comments: Well I pretty much described it all already. This was an extremely negative experience for me. I have waited almost an entire year for this thing to be resolved and she has made no attempt to refund me the remaining money, next month it'd be a year, and I am tired of waiting in silence. By law, because I have absolutely NO PRODUCT, and I DID NOT cancel on her while she was in process, she owes me ALL of my money. On top of this, I have not seen her resell the suit.. so I assume it's still at her house or.. possibly in the trash? I don't know. I have put off posting anything "publicly" about this because I didn't want to start a bunch of e-drama and because I was hoping keeping it out of the light would help to keep a nice neutral relationship between me and Sophie so that we could solve things in a calm and fair fashion but now that she isn't responding to me at all, it's public. Final Grade (out of 5): 0 EDIT: Figured out how to upload videos to youtube so that they can only be seen when linked or something! So, I hope these work. These were filmed last year in February right after getting the suit. This is the "glow". Impossible to photograph, hard to video tape, but this is as good as it gets to convey the issues with it. Show media This one speaks for itself. ----REVIEW END---- An update on what has happened since then: I have received no response whatsoever from her and am in the process of settling this legally now. She has failed to respond to me in any way through all the conventional methods I have tried. Yesterday I noticed she had been active on Furaffinity so I attempted to contact her through the website (which I had never tried before) and received the response that I had been blocked. The fact that she has blocked me on a website where I have never once been rude to her or attempted to contact her before on leads me to believe that she is refusing to cooperate with me instead of just neglecting to check her e-mail addresses. I had a "demand letter" written up which is being sent on Monday. (I waited until Monday because April 1st is well.. April 1st and I wanted this to be taken seriously.) I have been researching and talking to people for the last month or two about small claims suits and finding out everything I need to do. I have asked her to explain her side of the story with no response. If there is something I missed, or am doing wrong, I want to hear it because I will admit my faults if there is some valid reason or something I missed. With nothing work off of on her end, I can only go with what I know and have on my own end. I saved every e-mail and record of transaction with her and have all the evidence I need for court however. Once again, I was never given ToS so I cannot share that with you either, I can just go on what I know.

In April 2021, KidRhinoBoy opened for commissions. A friend of mine and I decided we would get a commission from him. I messaged him on Twitter (seen below) about availability and pricing. We exchanged a few messages regarding prices and what exactly my friend and I would get. We chose to get a single, colored picture from him. Each of us paid $80 to KidRhinoBoy. (I do not have a receipt for my friend but I do have mine). Initially it was going to be a three person picture, but the third person dropped out due to financial reasons. Figures 1-14 PayPal Receipt on my end shown in Figure 15 In late October 2021 I messaged KidRhinoBoy again, discussing a change to the drawing. I thought this would be alright since he hadn't started the drawing yet. Figures 16-17 It should be noted that at this point, KidRhinoBoy had opened and accepted a new round of comissions in late December 2021 / early January 2022. At this point I was starting to think that perhaps my commission had been forgotten about, hence my message about two weeks after he closed. Around this time I also told a friend what was going on. This friend had KidRhinoBoy's Telegram information and relayed what I had said to him. KidRhinoBoy then reached out to me on January 14th. He told me at this time that the sketch would be started some time in the next week or two (Last two weeks of January 2022) Figures 18-20 I would also occasionally reach out to him about his art, not looking for any updates, but just because I thought what he was putting out looked good. In April he messaged me again asking about my commission. He said he would sketch it soon. (It was not made clear to me what soon meant in this case, however) Figures 21-22 In June I reached out again asking to see if there was any update from his end. This time he said he would get me a sketch the next day. Three days after he asks me about the idea again. (To be clear, I did not delete or make invisible any of my messages in Telegram, so I was a little confused why he was asking again) Figure 23 I sent him a reply a little over 4 hours later, but at the time of writing it does not appear that he has read my messages. Figures 24-25 In hindsight it probably wasn't a great idea to change the art idea when I did. I know he also runs his own restaurant/cafe and suits a lot where he lives, so he's certainly busy. I understand that no one can do all things all at once. I'm not sure what to think about the various times I was promised a sketch, perhaps he's tried and wasn't happy with the results, but I genuinely don't know. Figures 26-27 Fig 1: Fig 2: Fig 3: Fig 4: Fig 5: Fig 6: Fig 7: (Blanked out to hide artist's name) Fig 8: Fig 9: Fig 10: Fig 11: Fig 12: Fig 13: Fig 14: Fig 15: Fig 16: Fig 17: Fig 18: Fig 19: Fig 20: Fig 21: Fig 22: Fig 23: I sent him a reply a little over 4 hours later, but at the time of writing it does not appear that he has read my messages. Fig 24 and 25: Fig 26: Fig 27:

I met Finley at AnthroCon while they were running a booth in the Dealer's Den. There were suiters attending the con in suits that Finley had made, and the tails they had on display were of good quality. We talked for a while about pricing a fullsuit, how long delivery dates were, how deep the queue was. At that point, I decided to commission a Full Digitigrade suit from them for $1600. Communication was great until December, at which basically all communication ceased. The only reason that Finley responded here was because I had 2 emails: I am open to marking this Beware as "resolved" if and when the refund has been processed on PayPal. New information as of 7/1/2019. I was promised a refund (partial in June, the rest in July). Finley has not been in contact since those promises were made. I've attached the email conversation below, and you can see comments for more info. At this point I'm forced to raise this to Beware status from it's current Caution status.

Originally posted on Jun. 18th, 2013 by draeling Mod note: All images were hosted on the OPs website, but the site seems to have gone down since. Update 2: 30/01/14: It's been 7 months since the refund was agreed. Only $260 so far of the $645 has been refunded, with the last payment being 4 months ago. Iko still does not keep in contact unless a shout and note is left, which receives an apology but no dates of when the next parts will be refunded. Update 1: Since the AB, Iko has agreed to a full refund in weekly increments. Will update when it is complete. WHO: Iko, Sierra Tudor, Kay the Dragon, Pathetic Dragon Studios WHERE: http://furaffinity.net/user/Iko, http://www.furaffinity.net/user/patheticdragon, http://www.furbuy.com/seller/Iko.html?as=a WHAT: A Nightfury Fursuit for $850 on 2010/04/29 WHEN (with proof): $410 Downpayment on 2010/05/05, $86 materials on 2010/12/12. EXPLAIN: In 2010 Iko posted an auction on Furbuy for a Nightfury fursuit, and though she did not have many recent good examples of her work, she was really excited to be spending more time and working on Fursuits, and the concept art posted of what she intended to make was looking really nice. We had a lengthy email discussion to confirm the features, design and looks, and the initial downpayment was sent. I bought two pairs of good shoes & created a DTD, and shipped them all at total extra cost of $145. As much as I really wanted to give her a chance, and I was really patient during those three years, it was a frustrating and prolonged flop of a project, with lost costume parts and need for constant requests for updates. :c Timeline of issues: 2010/05/05: Payment sent. 2010/09/08: Asked for update: Bodysuit sewn, needs zippers/spikes/airbrushing. Said she has been slow because she doesn't know what to do next. We discuss and agree on features and design looks again. Motivation issues mentioned because someone had criticized her work. 2010/10/05: Asked for update: Foam base for indoor paws and tail done. 2010/12/12: Iko emailed over some pics of the head in progress, mentioned another $86 of materials needed to be bought, sent via paypal. LEDs for the head almost done. 2011/04/13: Asked for update: long period of no contact: Iko mentioned work was slow because she was unsure what to do about zippers (Handpaw and head zippers). Iko asked if I was willing to send the second payment, but I declined until the suit was ready to ship, due to some small worries about the lack of updates and progress photos. 2011/08/18: Asked for update: Iko says most of suit done, still waiting to install zippers, make outdoor feet and wings. Sewing machine broken. 2011/11/22: Iko emailed: Says it's nearly finished, but is tweaking it after someone helped model it. Apoligises for how long it has taken due to how complex the suit is. Sewing markings. 2012/04/07: Iko emailed: She had lost the duct tape dummy due to leaving it out when apartment cleaners came. Requested I send a second one, but I declined, though I provided detailed measurements instead. (I was also wary at why it was still needed after the bodysuit was said to have been completed.) Said progress is slow because of complexity and working on four other fursuits at the same time. 2012/07/03: Asked for update: I requested pics to see everything in progress, as I wanted to see exactly how she has been doing. Iko mentions she doesn't have the bodysuit due to a recent move, but will get pics soon. 2012/10/03: Asked for update, multiple emails before getting one: Bodysuit & rest of costume has been in storage in another city due to a recent move. Promises Christmas shipping date. (After how long and dragged out this had become, I started getting more insistent about regular contact, emails, updates and pictures) 2012/10/30: Asked for update: Bodysuit still in storage, until she has free time to go and get it. Zipper problems cited as reason for slowness again. 2012/12/04: Asked for update: Iko said she has lost the bodysuit, cannot be found anywhere. Again requests another DTD so she can begin making a new one. (I really didin't have enough trust in her left after all the previous delays.... to make another DTD and ship it over). I politely declined and she gave a reference sheet explaining all the measurements she would need. Sais she still intended to get it done by Christmas, but that it's probably going to be late. (Emails become unresponsive/sparse, so we start communicating on FA Notes) 2013/02/26: Asked for update: Iko said her water heater exploded, and was afraid of mildew affecting costumes, so didin't want to bring them out for work yet until it was fixed. (I was a little sad and frustrated with the issues so far, so I started requesting fortnightly updates and requested a firm deadline of when the suit will be done) 2013/03/04: Iko came to the conclusion she doesn't have the skill, time or motivation to continue working on the suit, and apoligised profusely about lack of contact and unprofessionalisim. Offers to send me all the materials she has available, including the Head, tail and one set of feetpaws, as well as a $100 refund. She says even though her auction said the downpayment isn't refundable, she'll be nice and offer the token refund anyway. (Due to how few parts there were, and the head not even being complete, it wasn't worth me asking her to ship them over, so I ask her to list the parts on furbuy and refund it all.) 2013/06/13: After direct questions & requests for exact payment dates, Iko mentions she will not be giving a full refund (FA note transcript), as her auction says the downpayment is not refundable, but she is willing to be nice and will cover half. After 2-3 months of notes & eventual direct questions of when and what she intends to refund on FA, it turns out her idea of the refund was $320, given in 5 $64 installments over the next months. I was out $645 at this point, and she is adamant that she is not responsible for the other half of the refund, due to materials and it saying on her auction that downpayment is non refundable. I'm really sad the project ended this way :c I do understand life gets in the way at times, but the final staw in deciding to post this was her refusal to offer a full refund, even in light of how many years it took for Iko to put her hands up and say she doesn't have the skill or motivation to continue the project. I also wouldn't like to see anyone else experience what I did during this project. It is also a painful lesson that researching your seller and seeing how professional they are, in both communication & their existing work is really -really- important. I sadly gave the benefit of the doubt her few fursuit examples were just because she was just starting up... but that is no substitute for seeing real professionalisim & ability in completed & delivered works. I also understand now that $850 is a very low price for full suits like this, including wings, digitigrade, leds and features, which I should have saw as a warning flag too.

Hello. Sorry for the mistakes, I'm using a translator. The commissioner, whom I will call Chi here (according to his furaffinity profile), has not fully paid for my services as an artist. In early March 2022, Chi wanted to order a commission, but then changed his mind and bought two YCHs at auction (https://www.furaffinity.net/view/46350007/ and https://www.furaffinity.net/view/46350081/). Chi had bought YCHs before and paid for them through PayPal and had no problems. I live in Russia, so since March I started accepting payment through Boosty. We started chatting with Chi on March 15, 2022 via Notes Furaffinity. Total value for YCHs: 240$. Chi had difficulty paying, so we often contacted Boosty support and rescheduled the payment day. I made the mistake of starting to draw before payment, thinking everything would be fine and the payment issue would be resolved quickly. The first YCH was published and given to Chi on March 19, 2022 (https://www.furaffinity.net/view/46414100/), and the second YCH on March 30, 2022 (https://www.furaffinity.net/view/46554556/). We were in touch all the time. By then the payment had not been completed. Chi was also in the process of getting a new payment card (or something like that), but in the end that didn't help to make the payment on Boosty either. On June 21, 2022, after a month of silence, I wrote again. It was decided to switch to Telegram for faster messaging. However, we don't added to each other's contacts at time - it seems Chi was very busy in real life, and I didn't want to bother him too often, thinking it was in Chi's interest to pay for my work. On August 8, 2022, I wrote to him at Furaffinity, asking him to answer me within a week or I would have to write a beware post about him. He replied the same day, we exchanged contacts and started chatting in Telegram. Tried some ways, we picked up a donation service. Chi managed to send me $5. I said there would be no problem with big payments. He later sent me another $20. I also asked him not to send me too small amounts because of the high service tax. In general, we have chatted rarely since that time because of the difficulties in Chi's life. I could wait weeks for an answer. On November 21, 2022, I received another $20 from Chi with Boosty. Afterwards, Chi promised to add a tip for the inconvenience. It wasn't necessary, though... On November 30, 2022, Chi sent me $100. I wrote to Chi on March 16, 2023, since I had not received any messages from him before that. I read the empty promises of payment again. I also notified about me on April 1 and 20, but these messages were not read. It must be said that Chi posts new artworks almost daily to his galleries or writes journals on Furaffinity. Also found commissions from other artists for Chi (including Russian speakers on Boosty). So far, $145 of the $240 for the two YCHs has been paid. I'm not sure I'll see the remaining amount at all, so I'm writing this post in order to speak out about this kind of experience with this commissioner. I'm sorry to hear about the difficulties in his life, but I also feel cheated. I drew YCHs for Chi before payment, thinking it would make happy. My mistake was trusting and being too soft as an artist. Be careful and value your time.

PLEASE NOTE: In any screen cap dated after April 4th 2019 I had moved and there is now a 5 hour time zone difference between she and I. (this means that it may seem like I am messaging very early, but for her it is 5 hours ahead of my time stamp.) I was directed to Tamsin (Tammy) via a friend from whom I was purchasing a fursuit head. I had wanted to commission matching hands/tail/arm sleeves in time for Confuzzled. Tammy and I discussed prices and materials and I agreed to pay once I got paid. (The total was 130 GBP which is about $160 USD). I paid promptly upon getting my pay check: After I sent the payment there was apparently a hold up in paypal where they wouldn't release the money to her until I marked the item as shipped with no tracking needed. I was concerned but did as she asked since I had no reason not to trust her. She specifically stated that she needed the money released so she could order the materials quicker. I had some issues come up and ended up not being able to go to CFZ (Confuzzled). Due to this I expressed that I did not need them finished by the con deadline. I was still under the impression that she had already ordered the materials because that was why she needed me to promptly release the funds into her account. After the con passed I didn't hear from her, so contacted her in order to set up a deadline. She expressed that it was a bit hard to do the deadline I suggested because of work/school. I tried to compromise and just prioritize the most important parts first. By June 14th I was starting to feel a bit ignored, as I would see them online and they would check my messages and not respond. The friend who had originally sent me to them (Cas as mentioned in screen shots) mentioned that there were some issues between the two of them at CFZ, and I became afraid that she wasn't communicating with me because of my friendship with Cas, as I had been told that she was answering other messages. I admit that my behavior was a bit pushy in these screen shots, but I have been burnt several times by fursuit builders and was feeling anxious. We agree here on a Halloween deadline and I express that I will make a new ref with the updates I had previously discussed. I make sure to mention that I absolutely must see some sort of work started in July, since they said they would probably start mid July, due to my paypal protection window. I am still fine with the Halloween completion deadline, but just need to see some sort of progress, or materials to show the project is in the works. They express they are stressed due to personal issues. Concerned that this commission is adding onto their stress, I offer to just take a refund in parts if they are no longer interested or have the motivation/time to work on the parts. At this point she starts to seem a bit aggressive, so I inquire as to her having purchased the materials in case we need to work out her shipping them to me and subtracting the cost of shipping/materials from a refund. I was told by our mutual friend that she didn't actually buy the materials, and so I requested pictures from her in order to just prove that she had bought the items needed, as that was the whole reason she asked me to release the funds, so that she could more swiftly buy the materials. At this point she makes excuses one after another on why she can't provide pictures. I give her a deadline on when I must see materials. I agree to a Wednesday deadline to see the materials that week and reiterate that she said she needed the funds to order materials promptly. At this point SHE offers the refund and expresses when her paydays are. I feel this was done because she had never bought the materials and knew she couldn't provide proof in the time frame requested. At this point I feel I am being scammed and lied to, so I agree to the refund and offer her the option of half and half payments on the 27th of each month. I leave her alone for the rest of the month until the 27th where I then message her and remind her of my email. I see her active all day and get no answer while our mutual friend confirms that she's been answering their messages. They finally respond and claim they were working and then go silent again. I get a bit snippy and let them know that I will just file a dispute if I don't get the half payment on the promised day. She finally makes time to attempt to pay me and then gets upset about paypal fees based on currency differences. I try to remedy this by adding GBP to my paypal options, but it still charges a fee, which I tell her I will cover. She sends the first half of the refund, I confirm I got it and then leave her alone until July 25th, where I just send a reminder of the email for the refund. After contacting on the 25th of July 2019, Tamsin expresses that she needs a bit of an extension on the payment time because she is at a con. I thank her for letting me know and leave her alone until the day that SHE set as the new payment day for the final half of the refund. I decided to send an invoice for the remainder to see if that would keep her from having to pay a fee on her end. She claims she can't pay and cancels the invoice. I express that I am not really wanting to wait longer, as I already extended the deadline to Monday (which was the day SHE asked for). I give in and ask her to give me a definite deadline on when she can pay. She ignores me and I wait till the next day (July 30th ) to message her again asking for a definite deadline again. She says she couldn't pay because she had bills. I express that I am unwilling to wait another month because I feel at this point she is jerking me around. (Our mutual has expressed that she' had been spending money on frivolous things, so I felt I was being jerked around and scammed.) She makes a snippy comment about "not relying on her as a source of income" and it really rubbed me the wrong way. I got extremely upset and rather argumentative, as I felt that her statement was in direct contrast to her own behavior, (taking my money and spending it at an event while not even purchasing my materials). Our conversation deteriorated quickly. She continues to claim she bought fur but cannot provide any proof (pictures, receipts, tracking on shipments, etc), and completely twists the situation to paint herself in a better light. (Claiming I wanted a refund because I was broke, when she was the one who chose a refund over just providing proof of the materials that she swears she has bought.) At this point I feel that I am being jerked around and that she has no intention of paying me at all, so I decide to take things to Paypal and open a dispute. I know due to me changing email addresses between payment to refund, that it will dispute for the full amount paid. My intention was to simply send her back the half she had refunded previously once Paypal handled the transaction if she was unwilling to work something out. She proceeds to completely go ballistic once the claim puts a hold on her account. She claims she was going to pay me aft 8 because she was waiting on our mutual friend to pay her for something. This is information that she NEVER once brought up until I filed a claim. She in fact explicitly stated that she didn't know when she'd be able to pay. I initially refuse to cancel the claim because I don't trust her at this point and know that she is a liar. I attempt to make arrangements for the mutual friend to just pay me directly but he can't, as he is doing a bank transfer to her instead of paypal. They claim they will send the money as soon as I cancel the claim and their account comes out of the negative. I make the mistake of trusting them because I am not out to hurt someone, just want what is owed me. Big mistake. I cancel the claim and she ghosts me completely. I send a couple of reminders and get nothing. Cas (the mutual) confirms later in the week that they already paid her, and I still am getting nothing from her, either messages or money. I decide to try to be nice and just leave her alone except to send a reminder on the 16th asking if I will get pair, then left her alone for the rest of August until the 27th and message her again to see if I can get this finished. As of now she has read the messages and still refuses to respond. She has been active on her Instagram (selling adopts primarily), but has failed to answer or send the money. In summary, she is a liar, a scammer, and a thief and I hope that no one else ever has to deal with her or falls for her lies. The below screen caps show her publicly available information / social media accounts so that hopefully others can avoid her.

Before I begin, let me reinstate that I wish no ill will or harm towards DaskerLizard or their business. I am simply posting my experience about my time with Dasker so that others my avoid the negative experience that I have had. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ I contacted Dasker/BlueFoxFursuits the morning of June 16th, 2016 via email asking if it was okay for me to order being 17 (turning 18 within the next few weeks) and what their payment plans looked like. I was responded to 4 days later with both my questions answered. Given the okay to order, I then submitted a application via their google docs quote form. I was responded to almost immediately with the approximate due date and how much my suit (which was/will be a partial) would cost. I responded back within a few minutes saying I would like to go ahead and reserve my spot within their queue. After a few hiccups, (me paying in the wrong currency), I finally had paid off my deposit and had a reserved slot for May 2017. I paid £190 ( $287.16 ). A few emails from me about what furs they will use for my suit were exchanged so I could order a bodysuit to match with no problems. I have since received my bodysuit from another maker. The real problems started when it finally reached the due date for my commission. I was struggling for with money due to unforeseen car problems, so I emailed them on the 15th of May, 2017 and asked for an update on when I would be up so I could prepare on when I needed to pay/how much to put aside. They replied telling me they had to "do a lot of shifting around in my queue due to confuzzled suits overrunning" and how they had injured their back moving fur supply boxes and that they will be "starting up the queue again towards the end of june when I'm back from confuzzled, and also back from visiting family for a late birthday meetup". I was both upset and relieved on how I would have time to save up further and put aside my money problems, but also a little sad considering they had taken more con crunch commissions and put them ahead of other preexisting commissions. The next time I contacted Dasker was 5 months (October 9th, 2017) past the given completion date of end of June 2017. I simply stated how I had not received an email from the regarding my commission and how the queue was looking/when I would be up. I was then informed unknowingly that I had been once more pushed back to February of 2018. At this point I was rather upset, so I did not reply. I emailed them ONCE MORE on July 21st, 2018 (another 5 months after the due date they had given me had past), asking what the wait time is looking like since my slot had been missed once more. They responded a week later on July 28th, 2018 saying they had moved and had eurofurence deadlines to focus on. Again, putting convention crunch commissions ahead of regular commissions. I was told that I would have my commission and "all older orders out by jan-feb next year". Again, moved another year back. I did not reply. After waiting so long, I then took it upon myself to contact Dasker one more time on January 8th, 2019. They replied saying that it "should be february". Seeing as it was the beginning of the month, I was VERY excited to finally get around to getting my suit. That is until as of late. On February 17th, I contacted Dasker after finding out that they had once more opened for more commissions. This has had me extremely worried that my commission from 2016 would be pushed back once more to make room for other, newer orders. I asked them if there was a problem with my character and asked that if they did not like the character given, that they would tell me and refund me my deposit instead of pushing me back over and over. They then confessed to me that I am not the only person who has been waiting since 2016 for their suit and that I should have my suit by March. I was upset by this information considering how I am 1) not the only one going through such an experience and 2) my slot had once again been pushed back. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ To reiterate, I am a very patient person. I from the above evidence, it is obvious I have only emailed one to two times a year asking for updates, often waiting months after the date I was told to contact them. To put it into perspective, I ordered when I was 17 years of age, I am now not too far off from turning 21. I have given Dasker the benefit of the doubt one too many times, and I can say that I am very unhappy and disappointed with my experience so far. I only paid the deposit needed to reserve my spot, but I have had the rest of the money needed within my Paypal for up to 2 years now. They do not email/contact commissioners when they come upon hard times, leaving one to basically chase them to get a vague answer on when your commission will be started. Dasker seems like a nice person, they not once seemed rude and often replied in a very professional manner. However, it seems their queue is VERY disorganized and unprofessional. At the moment of writing this, I still do not know what spot I am in their queue and do not recommend working with DaskerLizard/BlueFoxFursuits. I will update further when/if I receive what I have paid for or if anything else unfolds. If you see any inconsistencies within my writing, please let me know and I will fix them!

Product (PWYW Commission) was offered as a public solicitation in a local State Telegram Chat. I was interested and contacted the seller via direct message on Telegram with inquiries. They explained that they were offering "Pay What you Want" (PWYW) commissions for sale: "just tell me what u want and a price and ill do it" to which I responded with for a $10 traditional commission request. After providing my character reference and commission details they gave me their paypal address and responded "ill get started when im on break", and "and i cant start until paid btw :)" to which I immediately paid $10 for. Up until now, all of this had occurred within one day on February 19, 2020. After I sent the payment, we had casual conversation about their fursuit and our dogs, which does not have much relevance here. My next communication with the seller was on March 10, 2020: I sent another Telegram DM "Hey there. Have you had a chance to work on the pwyw I had paid for a little bit ago?" to which they responded "no- i ned to make a trello. my commission list is so big atm xD. cuz i opened a ton of like $1 headshots". This was no big deal to me, it wasn't even a month since I purchased the commission and they seemed to have taken in a lot of other commissions at the time. On March 11, 2020 they reached out to me, "To all of my commissioners: its been super hard to keep on schedule so i have decided to make a trello 🙂 please send your ref(s) and what you purchased at your earliest convinience so i can add you to my trello, hope to satisfy you with my work soon - Connor~!" and I immediately resent my reference sheet along with the details that I paid for a $10 pwyw commission. On April 10, 2020 I sent the seller a screenshot of our previous telegram history of the initial 2/19/20 communication to which they replied "ty" On May 2, 2020 I replied to my 4/10/20 message asking "Any update on this? If you can't do it can you just refund me the $10?" to which they responded "i cant as that was my exs paypal. and he took it over" This was the last time that I spoke with the seller. To this day (Currently 06/08/21) I have gotten neither commission or a refund. In short, the seller made a solicitation in a public Telegram chat and I requested a $10 commission on 02/19/20 which I paid that day. Months went by with no commission despite me asking about it every once in awhile, and on 05/02/20 I requested a final update or a refund to which the seller said they could not do because the paypal that I sent the money to was not theirs and the actual owner locked them out. I never got a commission or a refund. Relevant images of the discussions I had with this seller and paypal transaction history are shown below. I censored out the seller's paypal address for the purpose of this posting.:

Back in July 2017 I applied for Dubmutt’s fursuit opening for a slot on their January-May 2018 queue. I wanted a fursuit head of my character Loki, he was to have magnetic eyelids, septum, and plugs. Everything seemed to be going well, I received an email accepting my commission and we moved forward from there. My suit was to be $920 with a $276 down payment. July 14th, 2017 I received the invoice and July 24th I made the down payment of $276. On December 26th 2017 I finished paying the invoice, and was told swatches would be sent out soon and I’d get an update when work was started. I reach out on February 2018 to see when swatches would be sent out as I was originally told beginning of December. I also wanted to see where I was at on the queue. Dubmutt told me swatches would be sent a month or so before starting and that I was scheduled for beginning of March. March 7th Dub reaches out to let me know they may need to cancel a few commissions while they focus on their health and that I will be updated. April 19th I reach out to dub out of curiosity of if my project was to be cancelled or completed. I was told mine was still scheduled. A few months go by so I message Dub on August 15th, 2018 to see if there’s been any updates. I am told they are finishing up two other suits and they were hoping to get to mine soon. January 8th, 2019 I reach out again to see if there was any progress. January 12th Dub replies to say they are finishing 3 suits and mine will be next, and to contact them through twitter from now on. August 31st I message Dub on twitter since it’s been quite a while, I ask if there are any updates or even an estimate on when my suit would even be started. September 9th Dub posts a PSA to twitter stating that they will be leaving the fandom, but owed commissions will be done. I haven’t heard from Dub since January 2019. At this point in time, I have received no word about my suit even being started. Update: 09/20/19

Greetings! I'm here to inform you about this client and the ordeal that I had to endure since the last week. Honestly, it all started pretty good actually. The 4th of April I got contacted by this person saying that he had the idea of commissioning me a couple of OC's of its own (since he kept saying that he was a writer and that he wrote stories, fan fictions and so on) and I was like "Sure, tell me the details!". And everything went pretty smooth, he always payed me what I asked for and never complained. However, the big problems started to happened the 8th of July, Friday of last week. After waking up, I find three emails from PayPal, in which all of them says that the buyer has opened a claim against me because of unauthorized transactions made. Honestly speaking, I was baffled. Like, why in the first place? Also who was the one responsible for all of this? After tracking down who could've possibly be, I ended up finding the curlprit. Then I decided to confront him, ask him why he did such a thing, but to no avail. What he kept saying over and over like a broken record, was like "I didn't do it. My bank did it" or instead "PayPal did it, it wasn't my fault". Now, I might not be an expert on how PayPal works and neither how the Banks do, but I'm pretty sure that neither of the two without an explicit request from the one who sent the money, does everything automatically. PayPal definitely doesn't do it, and the Bank the least they can do is calling you if they see high transactions, but in here we were talking about 50/100€ at best. Every month. Then, afterwards, he contacted me saying the following After this, he blocked me. If the truth is on his side, then he wouldn't have blocked me, right? So honestly, I really don't get it. Afterwards I tried to reach him even on DeviantArt, since there I was still not blocked from him because I actually talked with the PayPal customer service myself. In the end they told me what I already knew: and that it was him who did everything on his end. And so far, he kept lying to my face. The sad part is that I'm not the only one who got this "little problem" with him. Many other artists had the same ordeal with him. I'll share afterwards the claims that he did (choosing even the wrong dates because he surely did everything so fast, in a blink of an eye, that he didn't even sat through everything and thought if the amount and date were exactly those - apologies in advance if you see another language) (For context, "Denaro ricevuto" translated is "Money Received") And the fact that the dates doesn't even match to begin with (aside from the first one, which the only wrong thing is the amount that he declared. He gave me 50€, but instead he wanted 56€ back, for some reason) (again, all three of them shows the "Money Received" word, translated from Italian) I'll also share some snippets of our conversation where, after I completed the render, I uploaded it and sent it to him. And he of course, received it. See it for yourself, all three of the claims. First one Second: (this one here was mostly a variation of the third one that I'll share in a bit) Third one: Proof of being blocked To this day, so far the problem hasn't been solved (and also currently, the claims got processed and now I'm wait for PayPal to actually talk with the bank of the client. Sadly, it will take approximatively 75 days to get an answer) and when it will, I'm afraid that this person will try again in getting his money back. I made assumptions as to why he did this, but really, I can't even believe it. Like I said, also another artist right now is undergoing the same treatment as I'm experiencing. Thank you for your attention.

Back in November 2021 (on the 14th specifically), I saw that netcrow had opened for emergency commissions and messaged them to inquire about a 3-panel page since I love their art and was excited to get an opportunity to commission them. Here is the exact tweet of theirs advertising their commissions: It was stated that turnaround times would be "very slow" and I understood that they were dealing with health issues, so I was aware of this ahead of time. However I did not expect to be where I'm at currently, going on 9 months since I commissioned them without having received any proof of my comm being started, with every deadline they have provided being missed and very poor (or lack thereof) communication. I'm not writing this out of malice but to make other clients aware and to hopefully motivate netcrow to work out a better sort of routine or workflow for managing their commissions. Shortly after I messaged them on the 14th, I received a reply stating that my commission had been accepted and we then went over further details: Initially, I was told that that I could expect the first WIP "that week." That week passed without me receiving anything, but it was no big deal to me since I understood everything they were dealing with, and I was content to wait longer. I did not hear from them again until February 10 of this year, when I reached out to give them an updated ref for my OC after being reminded of my comm from seeing them open for another batch of commissions: I received an apology for the wait and was given a new time for when I could expect the first WIP. I absolutely do/still did understand what they were dealing with so again, I was content to wait further but was admittedly excited about being able to lookout for a WIP again. The week after this came and went however, and again, I did not hear anything from them nor did I end up actually receiving one. Several more months passed, and I still did not hear anything from them. I was starting to get concerned at this point so I reached out again on June 18th to inquire about the status of my commission and ask to know where I was at in their queue: What really alarmed me is how netcrow stated that they have "no particular queue," but again, I tried to be optimistic and as understanding as possible. At this time I received another apology and was told that they would try to get my commission that month and "maybe even finish it." To their credit I have seen them posting some finished commissions, but almost every one has been captioned as being "very overdue" or "extremely old" such as the ones below: Between the time of June 19 - August 7 I did not hear from them anytime; it was radio silence again. More recently, I informed some friends and other artists about the situation to ask for advice, which has lead to me now writing this beware and reaching out to them again. On the morning of August 8th, I messaged netcrow again expressing my concerns and requesting that they provide a firm deadline for providing a sketch: At the time of me submitting this beware, I have not heard back yet. Like I've stated, I truly do not mean this out of any sort of malice but simply out of concern and frustration. I wish the absolute best for netcrow with navigating their health issues, but this is not a good way to manage commissions and I'm figuring that other clients of theirs may be in the same or similar positions. I'm a very patient person and do my best to be as polite and understanding as possible, but the lack of communication and lack of a proper queue here have me greatly concerned and anxious as I am out of $320 with not even a sketch to show for it 9 months later. I still do love their art and would love to receive my commission, but the long periods of silence and overall experience have me a bit down :[ I don't wish to come across as a spiteful or mean individual whatsoever.

Nov. 6th, 2012 at 5:57 PM WHO: SoulEevee99 on Deviantart WHERE: http://souleevee99.deviantart.com/ WHAT: Stole an icon template from me and has been altering and selling on DeviantArt for DA points. WHEN: Just discovered today, apparently they started October 13th of this year PROOF: Their journal entry asking for commissions with icons (Screencap in case of deletion) Original icons by me on my FurAffinity Overlay showing trace EXPLAIN: LATEST UPDATE: Followed onto FA and sent more harassing notes from Grovyle I do a lot of commissions on Chicken Smoothie, a virtual pet game. I began selling "dango icons" like the ones linked to my FurAffinity on the Proof section in October of 2010 for collectible pets on CS (Link to thread. Date is off since I edited the post, but according to my records I started selling them in October.) I stopped selling them last year in favor of new products. While browsing around the art shops on CS, I found SoulEevee99's art commission thread, which linked to the DA journal above full of stolen icons that were paid for in DA Points. A lot of their friends are using these icons not knowing they paid for stolen material. I confronted the artist and not only did they deny their theft, their SO is threatening to report me for harassment. The comment thread is capped here, I am Rainbow-Smashed. (The replies occurred while I was typing this post) I admit my initial post was rather threatening, I should have been more polite and I fully acknowledge my tone was harsh. This is the first time I've had my art sold and I'm pretty upset. Even though it may be for DA points and not real money, it's still disappointing. I have filed reports both on Chicken Smoothie and DeviantArt. Their art commission thread on CS has been locked but I have yet to hear back from DA. The SO and the artist continue to deny their theft and I've ceased communication after my last reply with sources. I will let DA handle it and hope they rule in my favor. UPDATES POST-APPROVAL: So this is more recent events that have occurred since before this entry got approved. It's been a wacky whirlwind lemme tell ya. The thief's friends jumped on me for trying to get my work taken down and defended their friend. Even with SoulEevee's friends trying to pick fights with me, I ignored them and decided to wait until DA's ruling. DA got back to me on my report and told me to file a DMCA due to "complications in the case." (I'm assuming the complication is that I use different usernames in different places but it beats me tbh.) I sent in a DMCA takedown notice to their violations department on November 7th. As of this entry's approval and this edit (November 11th) the stolen art remains up and the thief has hidden comments from me, their friends defending SoulEevee, and a friend of mine trying to convince the thief's SO that my work was indeed stolen. All that's left is comments in Czech that I don't understand. I foolishly did not cap all the comments. But they did decide to put up this journal yelling at people and vaguely discussing my accusations. At this point all I can do is sigh and hope DA complies with my takedown notice. EDITS (NOVEMBER 12th, 2011): SoulEevee has decided to harass me not only on DA but Chicken Smoothie as well. DA Comments (link to thread. It's on my page and I will not be hiding these.) DA Note Chicken Smoothie post They have also provided a blog post to try and prove that I am a thief. Blog post dates can be altered and the "stolen icon" is really a painted over version of Wildstorm's icon on Chicken Smoothie. Blog post (with original icon) Post with Wildstorm's icon Overlay Image data of "original" icon proves it was made on November 12th, 2012, not 2009. (Big big thank you to !) Sora-kun is not only my furry name but my FurAffinity page, active since 2006. I am slightly disturbed by the coincidence. They also made this journal post and linked me to it on my profile comments to further harass me. I have reported this user for harassment on Chicken Smoothie and DA and have asked them to leave me alone, a request they have not complied with as they and their boyfriend, Grovyle, keep trying to pick a fight with me and continue to smear me on their own pages. As of November 13th, I have ceased communication with both Grovyle (the boyfriend) and SoulEevee. NOVEMBER 14TH UPDATE: Even after my request to stop using my stolen template, SoulEevee has still been using it. SoulEevee, using Grovyle as a messenger, is now claiming a third party gave them the icons, claimed the work as their own, and gave SoulEevee permission to use them. Since SoulEevee has yet to provide a name for this third party (which I would expect they would offer up as soon as they were caught) I strongly believe this is also another lie to try and avoid taking responsibility for their actions. My DMCA notice on DA hasn't gone through (all icons are still there) or have been replied to. My ticket on Chicken Smoothie has been picked up and I am working with Chicken Smoothie staff to build a harassment case. I'm fairly certain they can't do anything about the offsite harassment but I included that in my ticket (as well as this AB) to give background as to how deep this goes. UPDATE 2 ELECTRIC BOOGALOO: My harassment ticket was responded to. I was told to simply block SoulEevee when it seems like Grovyle is doing the harassment. Grovyle has started not only sending me messages, but has been harassing another member of this comm as well as leaving messages with their friends on FA. To top it all off, I got the passive aggressive non-apology to end all passive aggressive non-apologies (comment thread on DA.) This is just salt in the wounds and my nerves are already very VERY frayed. I've said my piece and blocked them. I will block them on any other accounts they try to contact me with. I'm beyond fed up. To all who are getting harassing messages from Grovyle; please report them and accept my deepest apologies for their behavior. NOVEMBER 15TH: DeviantART has denied my DMCA takedown notice. A lawsuit isn't worth it at all (due to international problems) so I've filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau regarding DA's denial of my DMCA. NOVEMBER 18TH: Grovyle has sent me three notes on FA. Not only that, they started watching me! Note 1 Note 2 Note 3 (Links to this. Dead link.)

Sep. 9th, 2012 1:24 PM sbneko I really hate having to post here. I have a bit of anxiety issues and was hoping to just let this go, but many of my friends said it's really something that needs to be shared. I actually wasn't sure if it's even worth a beware, so I asked for the mods opinions first, to make sure I wasn't posting wrongly. WHO: They have two accounts on FA, lil-ariin and ariin WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/lil-ariin/ http://www.furaffinity.net/user/ariin/ WHAT: A digital piece, full colour, two characters and a background. WHEN: First payed on July 29th, finished completely on September 1st PROOF: Commission info he sent me http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/ariin1.png Payment sent http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/ariin2.png Giving his friend permission to approve progress http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/ariin3.png Explaining that I can only work with one person, since he gave his friend permission for approvals http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/ariin4.png Sending the friend the sketch http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/viking2.png Approving the sketch with a minor change needed http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/viking3.png Contacting about how I was having trouble and giving different options http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/viking4.png Bit of a misunderstanding and just explaining what's going on. http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/viking5.png http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/viking6.png http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/viking7.png Got out of that funk and was able to ink it and sent it for a approval, both approving http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/viking8.png http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/viking9.png Sent finished piece http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/viking10.png Ariin now contacts me, no word from the friend. http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/ariin5.png We start discussing things http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/ariin6.png http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/ariin7.png http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do%20not%20Delete/ariin8.png >> I misread what he had said here, my fault! I thought he was upset that only his character didn't have a visible diaper, not that he wanted visble diapers on the ground. http://oi49.tinypic.com/10efryu.jpg http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/ariin10.png http://i1212.photobucket.com/albums/cc453/sbneko/Do not Delete/ariin11.png EXPLAIN: I'd like to state right away that I did do a few mistakes. I personally have always shown progress approvals, both the sketch and inks, this is to make sure that if I do forget anything, it can be fixed right away. When something is my own mistake and something small enough, I'll gladly fix it after the fact. Otherwise though, big things do really need to be asked in the sketch or ink stage. But this varies from person to person. Ariin commissioned me for a picture. As I had others ahead of him, it took a bit of time before I could get to the sketch and make sure to send updates on that. On August 9th, I sent the sketch for approval. On the 16th I sent a reminder of approval. I no longer have the email, but may be able to find it by digging, but his friend, the other character in the image, messaged me to ask about the sketch, Ariin had left for vacation withought mentioning so. I personally cannot work with more then one person, as when I've done it before one would ask for changes, then the other and contradict themselves, because of that I work with one person who is responsible to comunicate for both parties. In the end, Ariin contacted me, approved the sketch and gave permission for his friend to approve stages instead as he wasn't going to be back yet from vacation. During this time, I had a really difficult time continuing on with the image. It's a bit difficult to understand if you're not an artist I think, but sometimes things just don't seem to turn out right and feel a bit awkward. I didn't want to give a bad picture or make them wait too long, so I gave different options and asked if it'd be ok. They went with re-sketching the same idea. After taking a break though I got out of that funk and was able to continue on with inking no problem and sent it off for approval. I realize this is most likely a big fault on my end and should have asked if they wanted me to continue or go with the re-sketch. I hadn't thought of it as I was already working on it and they did very much seem to like the sketch. The friend said they both approved. I continued on and finished the commission. That's when Ariin contacted me. The screenshots have all the info for that. In the end, I felt much too stressed to continue with it and refunded the background fee for things I had missed and couldn't fix and a bit extra for good faith. I would like to say though that his friend was a great joy to work with and talked to me calmly, he seems like a really nice guy that just got caught up in the middle. He messaged me to tell me he did like the picture a lot.