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https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/1014686.html WHO: FarisBatwan (FBsuits) - http://www.furaffinity.net/user/farisbatwan - https://twitter.com/fbsuits and the facebook which is under "FuzzyBatSuits" https://www.facebook.com/fuzzybatsuits/ WHERE: Conversations were spread out between Facebook and Texts. WHAT: body suit commission, feet, handpaws, head trade, a pre-made black body suit, and Lastly a body suit that she was fixing for me made by headsandtailsstudios named "Zaroo". WHEN: Febuary 22, 2018 [As of October 29, 2018; we're working it out a resolution] November 17, No progress has been seen/started since resolution was discussed. EXPLAIN: The initial transaction was 550$ for a Body suit of one of my characters and a pair of black feetpaws, she said that she would throw in a pair of handpaws in for free with the commission. Transaction 2/22/2018: https://imgur.com/a/oJhGtyB full payment as she requested here; https://imgur.com/a/ANWt6HB While the commission was taking place I was in the process of looking for a black body for my character Kieraa (We did a head trade so she was making my Kieraa head) when she learned I was looking for a black body suit she told me about one she had for 400$ it was a planti-grade black body https://imgur.com/a/mDiAzAs I questioned her about why we couldn't swap my ZER0 commission body out with this one and she told me that since she had already gotten the materials and pattern out that she wasn't going to (also needed the extra money; https://imgur.com/a/uuypkVd) so I went ahead and paid 400$ + 22$ she requested extra for(Payments for it: https://imgur.com/XJFkBBY Apologies they were sent in weird amounts I had to dig through and balance funds at the time) Upon further discussion I wanted fur to be added to the back of the body so it had a moehawk/mane look to it so when I brought that to her attention she wanted an additional 22$ to pay for the fur cost to add that look onto it (essentially making this now a commission even though it was a premade) https://imgur.com/wr60I4s So I paid her the 22$ on May 14 which can be seen in the payment plan started for the body picture. May 31st I get this message https://imgur.com/plykAWG "So I ran into a huge problem" So I was curious what was going on ... But wasn't getting any responses back so I messaged her on my phone asking what the problem was and getting worried because there was no responses. I find out later; https://imgur.com/oDqGNkt / https://imgur.com/VnrQNLb That the body was a 'premade' only because it was someones DTD who messed up and then later was demanding their body back. But I had already paid for extra work to be done on this body that she did say she did and all of that stuff (never got pictures of the extension fur on the back though still) She said it would be handled, but I'm still not sure if it was handled correctly. Fast forward a little bit and my partner ends up getting angry at her for not producing any WIPS and making a lot of excuses - He wanted me to open a paypal case and put his foot down on it because we sent the money "Friends and Family" and if there was a chance we could get it back then we should try https://imgur.com/5FnF1X8 so she responds back to me https://imgur.com/4QdVRCz and https://imgur.com/MWCi0Ne Holding me responsible for the case being opened and I told her it wasn't about the money so much as it was about the WIPS for the two of us because they were flat out promised https://imgur.com/cNCEkgo Case was 'mutually decided' to be closed because of the Terms of Service she has set in place so I couldn't have a case open and she provided me with pictures of an abandoned project along with SOME of my commission (seen here: https://imgur.com/K3fvK1t / https://imgur.com/jTTu6Ay only I couldn't see my commission part very well because everything was so jumbled and bunched together but there is; The black body suit which I couldn't see very well, Zaroo's suit she was fixing up and some side projects which were a black and red body with a bio-hazard symbol in the middle along with a tail she didn't want to throw away because it was a canceled commission she had prior so was giving to me and a pair of handpaws that weren't part of that exact commission) With the case closed it takes me a little bit to get something from her for a while but eventually I got tracking information; https://imgur.com/aw9QzRy by it's history it took a while to update, the number was made on September 1st https://imgur.com/Ds2L3DH but the item was not picked up until September 7th, which is shown there. It looks like an odd route the package was going but I decided not to question it, I live in Florida so the route looked odd to me. When I finally looked at 'estimated' delivery date and lined things up, the package was headed and delivered to North Dakota; https://imgur.com/lqwUcWD I asked her about it; (Here's where shes saying it's the right tracking number and going to me; https://imgur.com/lAQqbQm / https://imgur.com/wjb6Bbk and here https://imgur.com/pSgeo2J) in that package was suppose to be half of my commission + a bodysuit she decided to fix for me almost a year ago (https://imgur.com/f3Tt6SR where she was asking for the measurements to fix him, you can see it in the pictures I received when the case was opened) she said it must of been a post office mix-up and it was out of her hands. She didn't give me a postal case number or anything like that so I had to call in and ask all the questions and when they got back to me they said the package was suppose to go to North Dakota and not Florida, so where my stuff is now? "Edit: I found out what happened with my tracking, In the comments someone claimed the tracking number and gave me proof https://www.dropbox.com/sh/smkpciia50xrorh/AAAaPASAnzU6ylwx_81o9Y5Va?dl=0 that the tracking + package went to them. I honestly don't know where my stuff is, but she had told me so many times she would be 'done' with my stuff but never had any pictures to back up the rest of my commission being done. There's more I'd like to add to this so when I get the rest of the screenshots in order where I've asked countless times for WIPS and haven't gotten responses I'll upload the link to the album to the beware. Update: We are working on payment plans for refunding. Will update when refunds are being sent.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/1012021.html WHO: Tegan AKA CarrionCupcake WHERE: Original transaction was an in-convention commission at Furpocalypse 2017. Notes have been exchanged primarily through Fur Affinity since then. WHAT: Traditional con badge WHEN: October 27, 2017 (day one of Furpocalypse): I commissioned Tegan for a con badge. The base price was $80, but I asked Tegan to charge me $100 instead, with the extra $20 being a tip. Furpocalypse uses a system where the artist fills out the price on an invoice, which the buyer then brings to a central checkout and pays the teller. The teller then stamps the invoice to indicate it has been paid, and the buyer returns the stamped invoice to the artist. I paid the Furpocalypse teller in cash and unfortunately I no longer have my receipt after all this time, though the Furpocalypse staff might if pressed. October 28, 2017 (day two of Furpocalyse): I went to pick up my badge, as Tegan had promised a next-day turnaround. Tegan told me there it wasn't finished yet and to please check back tomorrow. October 29, 2017 (day three of Furpocalypse): I went again to pick up my badge, and Tegan once again said it had not yet been finished. Tegan asked if it could be done as take-home work, and I agreed. November 11, 2017: I sent Tegan a note on Fur Affinity asking for an update. (screenshot) The same day, Tegan replied and said it would be posted "this week." (screenshot) December 26, 2017: I sent Tegan a note asking for an update. (screenshot) Tegan read it but did not respond. February 18, 2018: I sent Tegan a note asking for an update. (screenshot) February 19, 2018: Tegan replied only with "Hey what's your next con?" (screenshot) February 20, 2018: I informed Tegan that I will probably be doing Furpocalypse again this year. (screenshot) Tegan read the note but did not respond. June 3, 2018: I asked Tegan if I'm to understand from that exchange that the badge will be ready before Furpocalypse? (screenshot) June 4, 2018: Tegan replied that it would actually be scanned, posted, and mailed to me "this week" if I could provide my address (screenshot) June 4-8, 2018: I asked Tegan if it would be all right to send my mailing address via email instead of Fur Affinity notes, because I don't particularly trust the latter. Tegan agreed, and I did so. I'm not providing screenshots of the email since it's literally just me providing my mailing address (which is not information that should be posted here anyway), but here (screenshot) is a confirmation note back on Fur Affinity, informing Tegan that the email had been sent. As of when I submitted this post to a_b, I never received anything in the mail. July 10, 2018: I sent Tegan a note asking for an update. (screenshot) July 11, 2018: Tegan replied informing me that the scan would be posted "this week." (screenshot) July 22, 2018: I sent Tegan a note asking for an update. (screenshot) July 11, 2018: Tegan replied informing me that the scan would be posted "today or tomorrow." (screenshot) August 5, 2018: I sent Tegan a note asking for an update. (screenshot) August 6, 2018: Tegan replied informing me that the scan would be posted "tomorrow." (screenshot) August 8, 2018: I sent Tegan a note asking for an update. Though there had been a soft unspoken inferring up to this point that Tegan needed only to scan and post the badge, the lack of updates over this long a time lead me to ask more directly and formally: The badge actually is finished, yes? (screenshot) Tegan read it but did not respond. August 13, 2018: I sent Tegan a note asking for an update. Because of how long it has been and especially the lack of response to my direct question, I started to more overtly show doubts that this badge is indeed finished. I asked for a refund if it was not. (screenshot) Tegan replied after "finally [getting] home" that the scan would be posted by "tomorrow." (screenshot) August 16, 2018: I sent Tegan a note asking for an update. I also asked what is causing all these delays. I repeated my stance that I would like a refund if the badge had not actually been completed, as Tegan still had not directly answered that. (screenshot) Tegan replied complaining about having a lot going on, but promised to get the scan "soon." (screenshot) August 23, 2018: I dropped a sharply-worded ultimatum on Tegan. (screenshot) The main point, to quote a passage from the middle: "You still have yet to answer a simple and direct yes or no question that I've asked several times now: Does my badge actually exist? Have you drawn it yet, in all this time? If so, prove it. It really should not take two and a half months now just to scan something. If you haven't started it yet, then please don't. I will instead take a full refund." Because of the repeated delays promising updates soon/tomorrow/etc. I informed Tegan that I felt the only way to get the matter resolved was to attach a deadline: I expected either the badge or a refund by September 1, or I would take the matter to a_b. August 27, 2018: Tegan replied "now that [Tegan is] home" understanding and thanking me for the warning, and promising to talk to me "soon." (screenshot) August 31, 2018: Tegan sent me another note suggesting it may have to wait until Sunday the 2nd, rather than the 1st as originally promised. Tegan promised to include extra sketches for the trouble, and to pay for shipping with tracking. (screenshot) September 3, 2018: The September 1 deadline came and went, and so did the September 2 deadline, so I wrote and submitted this post here. EXPLAIN: I still have not received anything after almost a full year of "today/tomorrow/this week/soon" promises. I still do not believe this badge ever existed, which leaves me at a loss regarding how to deal with Tegan's offer on August 31. I very specifically and directly, more than once, instructed Tegan not to draw this badge if it had not already been made, because I would rather have a refund at this point. Tegan never did answer the direct yes-or-no question of whether this badge ever existed. If it did not (which I very strongly suspect) but Tegan then threw something together this weekend to meet the deadline, that would directly go against my frequently-repeated wishes. One could argue that receiving the badge+bonus sketches+complimentary shipping with tracking would at least be something, and that was why I was persuaded to give Tegan one more day per the note on the 31st. Even now, a part of me is worried I'm going to click "Submit" on this and then received the finished product half an hour after I posted it, and end up looking silly for that. However, I look back on this entire history and... well, I'm sorry, but I simply can't believe Tegan anymore. Tegan implied I'd be getting the scan any second now, but Tegan has been implying that for months. At this point, I just want the matter resolved. By refund, preferably, but I might just have to take what I can get.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/1011083.html WHO: Rayd / Hytyle / Aprilycan WHERE: fur affinity WHAT: reference sheet WHEN: July 21 to yesterday morning EXPLAIN: user posted to FA forums in search of an artist for making a reference sheet. we agreed that I would be paid 60 during the process and remaining 40 upon completion. since being around 60% of the way through, I have been asking for partial payment; user has in response, acted like a victim by me asking for payment, suddenly reversing the affirming that my style works for them, that they like what I'm making, and claiming they hate it and therefore don't need to pay me. they have even said i'm witch hunting them, which is hilarious! since I've given up being paid the rent money i still need and have moved on to simply wanting to warn other people that this person is insincere and dishonest in their dealings. at first it seemed like a good fit. I gave them a choice of pose and got started. I asked them for feedback about the quality of linework and style. I started in on color and texture, adjusting when they had feedback, but the word "perfect" was thrown around a lot. Created multiple versions for comparison and customer design choice. Started in on the extra offers I included - poses with his outfit, offers to illustrate him using magic. Things people usually don't include in one reference sheet package. Around this time I started asking for payment and realized they most likely weren't planning on paying me. making a personal post to vent about what happened, they comment to harass me, while blocking me, meaning I technically can't reply to their weird victim posing. all said, I think some people are just best avoided at times. I don't know what's going on with this person, but I'd glad a platform exists to warn fellow artists. am I sad? yes. can I pay the rent without this income? not yet. am I going to waste my time harassing this person like they're harassing me? definitely not. but now I know I can check for names here if someone I'm working for seems fishy, and hope everyone stays safe out there.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/1005457.html WHO: Athena The Jackal WHERE: Biggest Little Fur Con 2017 Twitter: http://Twitter.com/athenathejackal Telegram: @athenathejackal FA: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/~athena~/ WHAT: headshot Perler bead badge WHEN: June 4, 2017 - present EXPLAIN: I realize some of my Twitter photos are out of order and I’m omitting a LOT of our arguing in-between some posts, but feel free to peruse her public Twitter for the full conversation as well as her attitude toward dealing with myself and others. I commissioned Athena for a Perler bead badge on June 4, 2017 at BLFC. I paid somewhere near $130 in cash, so I have zero paper trail. (A stupid move on my part, I know) At this point I have accepted I will not be getting a refund, and at this point I don’t even know when or if I’ll be getting my badge. We never really had good contact, but I’m a relatively patient person. As you can see from my Telegram posts, I let months sometimes slide in-between contact with her before trying to get something from her. On November 16 on Telegram, she said that my badge would be completed by MFF, and then shipped to me after the show. When nothing came about it, I asked again about my badge and on January 11 was told my badge would be done “at the end of next week”. https://drive.google.com/open?id=13RzS3kgroWv8RZOhmepHr4pBYtPpyO_L On January 10 on Twitter, she posted a batch of badges she recently completed — mine was not among them. I still have no clue what the size of her queue is, since she doesn’t have it publicly posted, so naturally I get worried. It takes her another solid TWO MONTHS from the original post to finally come forward about what’s happened to her. On March 15, she starts replying to messages, saying that her PayPal was hacked, and she had a bunch of personal drama going on. I totally get that real life sometimes takes over, and she did show another batch of badges March 31 that were finished. I don’t know how long it takes to make these badges, but I think I have waited long enough. https://drive.google.com/open?id=1-oUSM7y4zAeWTC7_hlrwYpTiLavLuaHa Little did I know her queue was over 200 people deep by the time I commissioned her at BLFC’17. My commission is “11th from the bottom.” https://drive.google.com/open?id=1J1h-7LTavLznLvLFpSIXHzML_sYy1mff She told me on Twitter she was doing badges in order of who’s angrier. I’m not good at being angry, and I haven’t been particularly vocal about her until recently, so apparently people on her queue have been shuffled around ahead of me. Of course, no one knows this because she has no public queue visible anywhere. I told her she should stick to her queue in order of who ordered first, and not jump around. Due to the insane wait I’ve already had (uninformed on wait due to no public queue) and her saying that she’s doing the badges out of order, I requested a refund. Instead of offering a solution for her to get my refund, she merely showed me the screenshots of her PayPal and bank statement a second time, telling me how she had bills coming up. In order for me to get my refund, she tells me that I have to find someone to take my spot, essentially advertise for her. I’m sorry, but finding my refund is not my job. I told her this, repeated that I wanted my refund, and said I would be taking my business elsewhere. I do not want the thing I paid for. I do not want to advertise for her. She threatened in a Tweet that she would rather just vanish instead of completing everyone’s commissions. https://drive.google.com/open?id=16xGdffhNCYBhTubJsy8lh8EjKj_G9Kpj She told a friend of mine that she didn’t owe me anything because “I didn’t sign a contract.” https://drive.google.com/open?id=1qXNPGxpGLRCOWAjriz-Q73NeWj3p_yyX https://drive.google.com/open?id=1ENjpL5krhTmkR-VwZGIxliFMRlM_ej-a It has been clear through her dealings that she will never refund me, nor does it seem like she’ll ever return to posting her Perler badges. She made a post back in all this hulaballoo that says she can make 1-2 badges a day https://drive.google.com/open?id=1M0IJ6qpuDbKvMkwnKknRY-Xff5n4Vnli but yet, since March 31, hasn’t posted a single new finished product. A Twitter user pointed me to her Facebook, where I messaged her privately to ask about her queue and my refund. She accepted and saw the message, but didn’t reply, which blatantly told me she’s stealing my money, and probably countless others as well. I am currently in the process of reviewing my county’s laws about a small claims court case. PROOF: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1-CRMnWk74TjWb1NF7NtTCujDcfI_HMUz

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/1004598.html WHO: Otter'n'Daughter (FA) / WaterdogWharf (FA) / Keryu (FA) / KeryuOkami (twitter) WHERE: Initially - https://www.furaffinity.net/user/otter.n.daughter/ Later - http://www.furaffinity.net/user/waterdogwharf Also - http://www.furaffinity.net/user/keryu WHEN: Payment took place from 6/14/2015 to 3/29/2016, the only visual progress was 11/29/2016 (referenced in emails below) EXPLAIN: The overall process started June 2015. Below is the string of emails regarding the quote, details and the agreed upon payments: https://imgur.com/a/6w2ywB1 As of this time, while I had the initial concept art for the sake of the quote, the full turnaround reference wouldn't be available for another five months. However they were made aware of this from the initial quote. (Referenced in the gallery above at 006 with the initial ref below it.) The email with the finished reference would explain that it was layered to view various details (ei. arms, legs and other pieces could be hidden to see the shapes): https://imgur.com/a/LCCwePu The final payment would be sent March 30, 2016: https://imgur.com/a/94JDLy6 Later on in June / July 2016, I would ask about cancellation. https://imgur.com/a/OkYfA45 Fast forward to October 30 and November 29, 2016, these would be the only signs of visual progress for my own suit. https://imgur.com/a/UO1Xk47 The DTD would finally be sent around February / March 2017. Unfortunately, correspondence that took place on Twitter before October 2017 was deleted because I had assumed that things were moving along. However there is a DM referenced in an email for May 15, 2017 whose contact was unanswered until June 15, 2017. https://imgur.com/a/1SEjIY2 October 23, 2017, I bring a proposition regarding the change of the suit design and offer the majority of the fur to be used: https://imgur.com/a/98Ih8Cp After that, I found the most success in contacting them through twitter and would follow up about once a month. https://imgur.com/a/IO8siPx And the last final emails recently sent: https://imgur.com/a/WELE6Ce As of the time of this submission, there has been no reply from the final email on July 4, 2018. However I will correct myself regarding the large July 1st email as the body suit for the previous customer is incorrect, that I’m aware of. This was the rest of a full suit commission, to which they had only recently received the bodysuit for, over two years after the head (and assuming partial of the full) was completed. The following gallery is to show posts documenting visual progress on their commission list in general, as well as public client posts that I’ve been able to search for. The purpose is only for timestamps for the completion of parts or projects altogether, how they correlate with Keryu’s public Trello page, and the time elapsed for the length of the project based on dates. https://imgur.com/a/mrG7Xcs Here is also collection of visual posts regarding from or around November 2016 up until recently. This will be broken down into categories: Auctions and Commission Openings Bases Premades Collaborative Premades Commissions or designs not listed on Trello I've probably missed a few things here and there, my apologies. I won’t deny that progress has been made on their list in general. However, with no way to gauge that other than whatever pops up on a search or the few posts there are, I have no confidence with this transaction any more. It wouldn’t have been so bad if there was some consistency in the queue, updates or progress actually occurring when said instead of just being pushed back further and further. Not to mention premades and unlisted work looking to be on priority. It also seems that they rarely do body suits themselves, if at all nowadays, or has them done by another maker. Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong as I’m only aware of the collaborative bodies. This post is not meant to be against the other makers either considering I don’t know how aware they are of Keryu’s workload or practices when agreeing to these collaborative, premade suits. Even more baffling, for a short time, they had a senior seamstress that worked with them on at least one body suit. (Referenced here: https://i.imgur.com/OMCqDGo.png ) More often than not, Keryu only makes heads, tails, hand paws, and at one point feet. However those haven’t been posted in roughly a year. Granted the majority of the commissions they’ve taken on are usually for heads or partials without feet. In the end, if you absolutely wanted a costume piece from this person, you’re likely better off getting a premade or a base and finishing it yourself. ------ Update - August 23, 2018 There has been no reply since the final email. I made a couple attempts to contact there after to request the dtd and fur sent back by email and twitter, including a mailing address and requesting a tracking number. No replies. Not surprisingly, they're open for more commissions: https://imgur.com/a/2EAyd4S I also attempted disputes on the payments. Paypal directed me to speak with the source of the funds for the transactions. Upon attempts between a credit card company and bank, they were too old to dispute, which was expected. However, something I did learn from the credit card company. Based upon what the rep told me, Visa and Mastercard type cards have up to 540 days to dispute transactions of which they have the ability to request funds from the merchant. But again, only if your dispute holds up.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/985732.html WHO: Corganda/Cori/Lei WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/corganda/ (also has http://www.furaffinity.net/user/lei http://www.furaffinity.net/user/corisketches and http://www.furaffinity.net/user/corcomics ) WHAT: Digital artwork WHEN: Initial date May 9th, 2015 02:11 PM, possibly before that. Is currently close to three years in waiting for longest owed pieces. EXPLAIN: Started with hosting YCH involving own character and drawn by artist. Artist provided initial cover image and sketch of updated cover image. Since then, have commissioned multiple pieces but have had minimal to no work done on them. Has reached over two years and no actual old owed pieces have been worked on. Artist has continued taking commissions for rent/bills/etc. and has made next to no effort in actually finishing owed work to artists. Have several specific regular customers that often pay up and get priority before other work is done. Artist does not allow any customer to view their Trello schedule ever, has not given any proper personal notification about delays (constantly posts “sympathy” journals on Fur Affinity) and has partner/manager respond to enquiries in rude and sometimes disrespectful means. Has REPEATEDLY stated they are not doing any comic-style commissions until queue is caught up to date, but has constantly done comic pages and is currently selling comic-style commissions. Manager/partner Nikki is the worst part of this. Her attitude towards customers has been atrocious. Has accused me of threatening them, not understanding their situation when I have made it abundantly clear that I have been tolerant and understanding. Accused me of doing “things” the past month when all I have done is contacted them about updates, owed work lists and even just any promise on having things sorted. PROOF: http://www.furaffinity.net/view/16500320/ - initial YCH comic piece with starting date of concern. NSFW WARNING https://i.imgur.com/B2xNiV5.png - Payment for YCH. (Since my character was the main one my cost was higher than the slots) https://i.imgur.com/IcG8H3l.png - email proof about artist “halting” on comic commissions. https://i.imgur.com/kSMKGwK.png - email sent requesting fix to my owed commissions and their “detailed” response (follow up email I sent given the fact they gave no care to respond properly like an artist or manager should - https://i.imgur.com/LhbxWPD.png ) https://i.imgur.com/V9Oi4hh.png - email received after above. Often has accused me of not “caring” or being “understanding” when I have expressed multiple times in various platforms (Discord/Skype/Telegram) about having concerns for their living conditions. Will also point out they’re assuming I’m threatening them in any sort of way, when all I’ve been asking is updates and actual discussion to rectify the issue. https://i.imgur.com/eHXQi9n.png - email sent asking for list of owed commissions. Apparently it takes time to find information and send it in an email. https://i.imgur.com/UtCKRIl.png - discord request about work on owed YCH comic piece. Was never informed of any part – schedule placement or stream date. Have never been able to determine placement on their work schedule because it is disabled to public viewing. https://i.imgur.com/4UnmBH6.png - Most recent email response. All I have done is try and get any sort of update on the progress which has never even happened, accused of “dumping” them because I have been getting artwork from other artists like a normal customer and not being in streams. Sadly am unable to provide any further evidence. Email logs do not provide as much, unable to gather information from Skype due to the conversation being wiped through updates and Discord information does not go back far enough. SUMMATION: This artist was a very trusted person to me. The fact they have constantly sunk themselves into a continuously expanding hole of financial issues and RL issues has put their work on the biggest of declines – and yet they still keep taking commissions. AVOID THIS ARTIST PLEASE. Spare yourself from what I and so many others are currently dealing with. RECENT UPDATES 1st March 2018 · Feb. 28th, 2018 at 1:16 PM Initial time and date of the Artist Beware post being uploaded. I am making a mention of this because of the following that has transcribed since: https://i.imgur.com/OkOXfNo.png - Corganda’s Manager emailing me with an “apology” half an hour after the Artist Beware went live. https://i.imgur.com/nd5Buwz.png - Roughly eleven hours later a follow-up email was sent to me. Manager has continued “apologizing” and wanting to discuss correcting things. At this point I am fully aware they have seen the Artist Beware, and are now trying to bait me into taking it down. https://i.imgur.com/ofCaQsj.png?1 - Note on FurAffinity from Manager again (using the artist’s account I might add), with a word-for-word copy of the above email with an additional bit of text. Very pathetic they resorted to this. https://i.imgur.com/KisRRfR.png - Roughly three hours later the manager sends ANOTHER email. This was sent while I was sleeping, and conveniently I knew I had to check my emails and I expected another one to be sent by them. At this point I’d like to also share the following: https://i.imgur.com/l0P93bC.png?1 - Journal the artist made after deleting a giant long-winded “apology” about the delays, changes to the account, and that they will be emailing waiting customers to discuss the backlog. And finally, what I also woke up to seeing (time being roughly 8am): https://i.imgur.com/zQbwAcD.png - The artist streaming as of right now. PLEASE NOTE – the pink fursona in the Stream thumbnail is mine. The artwork in question they are drawing is the actual YCH comic. This is entirely a ruse to bait me into interacting with them and taking down this post. https://i.imgur.com/GjVOBsP.png - Proof in-stream that they are deliberately working on my owed items as means of baiting me. NSFW WARNING JUST IN CASE. https://i.imgur.com/M2aRl0Q.png - They have sent me a note on fA with a link to the WIP of the initial comic. (Most recent addition to update, WIP upload has since been deleted.) I am fully aware they have been alerted to this, given the rapid nature of their emails. I have updated this because this sudden burst of communication is leaning heavily towards harassment. Any further updates I receive will be added onto this entry. UPDATE: 2nd March 2018 https://i.imgur.com/Jcdlqv8.png — I have begun to contact and inform the four winners of changes that are upcoming, regarding this issue. From the WIP that was posted and then taken down, only one of the winners seemed to have more visual representation in the comic, whereas the others were drawn as simply floating genitals and a small chibi emotive headshot. Everything about the WIP has shown that the original idea was in fact disregarded, and this was designed as a means to not only "complete" the overdue commission, but to do so in a manner that violated the original agreement set in stone and went against what was the original concept. After conferring with a trusted friend over this matter, I have sent a final email to the artist. https://i.imgur.com/Q9eIcz1.png UPDATE: 4th March 2018 While I stipulated previously I would consider the matter closed, and would post a final update when the full refund was received, unfortunately that has not been the case just yet. https://i.imgur.com/jjhjhcf.png This is the response to my previous email. Immediately, this has thrown red flags in my face, and honestly a slap of disrespect yet again. Going by the format of the email, I can only assume the manager has sent this reply. It happens to be set out in previous email formats by her. Firstly, the fact they had the audacity to create an incorrect WIP in the first place, upload it, and THEN take it down because it was "to be done in the original terms" is pathetic. If they had any intention of actually sticking to the original terms, they wouldn't have MADE an incorrect WIP, let alone publicly upload it. I have replied with the initial payment due, and this will soon be closed on the matter. There will be a final update when the refund has been completed. Tired of ads? Upgrade to account with Professional p

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/981816.html WHO: Sugar N’ Spice Costumes: Primarily CorpseCat aka Kittencheshire aka Prince Mocha aka Neo via Sugar N’ Spice Costume email contact. Other members of Sugar N’ Spice Costumes should be noted: Cackle aka Bullie and Fortune WHERE: Mainly dealt with them via Email and Telegram; their business is based on FA under Sugarandspice, http://fursuitcontact.wixsite.com/sugarandspicecostume, and http://www.sugarnspicecostumes.com/ however they do deal with business via Telegram WHAT: 2 Partial Fursuits WHEN: 1st payment was on April 24, 2016 with final payment on May 26, 2016. Trouble started around August which was two months before the original deadline. EXPLAIN: At first everything seemed fine and was going as planned; I asked about their turn around for suits and they state it’s about a month or so after 80% paid off (See capture here: https://imgur.com/w21eazp ). I ask if final payment was done in July if it would be done and shipped before October in which I was assured it would. We spoke about the suits periodically and on June 13th they stated they were ordering a base for the head as they work off of bases (See capture here: https://imgur.com/lGaKQkm https://imgur.com/ZbaBTgr ) and on July 14th I inquired if they had gotten the base for the head in which they then told me it takes 3-5 weeks to cast them let alone ship it plus the dealer had to deal with AnthroCon and another con (see capture here: https://imgur.com/r3vj5Lh ); at this stage I started worrying naturally as things sounded a little shady, but gave the benefit of the doubt. As time progressed I contacted back around August 5th to see how things were going on our partials with zero response until the following day on the 6th in which I heard nothing from them about it. On August 8th I asked again and received no message from them until the 12th in which they reassured it will be done by October as planned. (see capture here: https://imgur.com/PMdTcad ) and then proceeded to check in on the 30th of August and finally on September 3rd they show me they have the head; the previous screen cap shows this as well. Back and forth takes place and by October 1st they finally state that they are trying to get our suits done on time while dealing with other things and no word about it again until I contact them on the 11th which proceeded to fall on deaf ears until I got word on the 16th; however nothing was said about the suits. Needless to say the deadline, as it was for us to wear at a specific convention, came and went. On November 29th I asked casually if I could put some design changes in as they hadn’t been working on it just to see if I’d even get a response in which they said sure and would resculpt the head as if they were still working on it; though at this point it really red flagged me as no suit maker in their right mind would agree to something that would be significant in the way of change to simply resculpt it no problem (See capture here: https://imgur.com/f4gqaPr ). We converse from time to time between then and February 27th with no message about my two partials. I ask again on the 27th (See capture here: https://imgur.com/lsq0Btp ) and no message until March 15th of 2017. April 24th comes by and I ask about my partials with putting my foot down; they said progress is slow, but would be before Halloween in which that was the con we needed it for again (See capture here: https://imgur.com/N8xAvmp ). June 8th comes by and I am getting even more concern (See capture here: https://imgur.com/uie6Ep4 ) in which I state if we should even continue with it after all this time; they tell me if everything goes well it should be September 1st when they are done. Next time I talk to them in August I find out they switched to another Telegram handle and on August 25th I am getting really concerned as they’ve shown me no WIP images then they try reassuring me that they’ve made 2 partials in 3 days… Another red flag that I was pretty sure wasn’t possible (See capture here: https://imgur.com/U5zlvBG ). On September 29th I voice my concerns again with a more “putting my foot down” tone. They tell me they are working on it which considering all this time it should have been done three times over (See capture here: https://imgur.com/1niS9Vn ) and we even talk about shoe sizes (which I have captured here to show they then eventually give us the wrong shoe size: https://imgur.com/owCHbbp ). We speak periodically with no updates on the suits until October 11th where they ask me for a reference in regards to BOTH of the suits (See capture here: https://imgur.com/xVLbIRI ). On October 16th, mind you again all this time I have had no WIP shown of the partials, I finally put my foot down as the deadline has passed once more (See capture here: https://imgur.com/XcVI4VC ) and time goes on with no response until I ask how they are on the 18th where they tell me they’ll send screenshots soon. I ask again the following day for those screenshots of the partials with no response. I proceeded to bombard them with messages between the 19th to the 23rd in which they finally say they weren’t ignoring me, but was having issues with Telegram. They provide a picture of the feet (See capture here: https://imgur.com/4e0fgAb ). Another blackout and multiple demands later, between October 24th to October 29th, I finally threaten to get Paypal involved for a dispute (See capture here: https://imgur.com/kVSFHpB ). I then start emailing them over this and they proceed to tell me that it was lost in the mail and that they would remake them (See capture here: https://imgur.com/CxvrpwZ https://imgur.com/Pt6yUoz https://imgur.com/R1jp1Wz ); this would be the final red flag that told me they were scamming us as no artist would just simply say this and then just “oh well we will remake them no problem!” attitude. I give an ultimatum and they accept a November 10th final deadline and even state (in the previous capture) that they’d provide an extra gift for our trouble with all of this. Time progresses and no response nor reply to my email on November 11th. Finally I get pictures coming in here and there; we talk briefly from time to time. Eventually January comes around and they ship it. I receive both partials on January 12th with something interesting; the feet that were supposedly “lost in the mail” that were shown to me before AND the extra gifts mentioned were not even there which was the final straw that lead me to make an artist beware about this business/person. I also would like to add that you can clearly tell the partials were rushed and attention to detail was missing in which ear heights are miss-matched, heads were too small, feet too small, misaligned jaw, and other problems that should have never happened. Main purpose of this is to warn others that this is a common process with them as I was informed by others after my experience that I was not alone in how flip-floppy they are with their business with some not even receiving anything be it a refund or product. PROOF: The proof provided in this section are various screencaps of comparing the original “lost” suit images to that of what came in the mail. I only have the feet to provide, but those are exactly the same. This also contains the Quality Promised image to compare to the Quality Received. Shoe size issue (Told them one size and they send the wrong size): https://imgur.com/vcwBn31 Proof of first payment: https://imgur.com/3Tr0svb Proof of final payment: https://imgur.com/X43Qnxv Quality Promised (Notice uniformity, proper trim of the fur, and attention to detail): https://imgur.com/EmcnLXp Quality Received: >Head/cheek proportions are off - https://imgur.com/C4AoQrF >Misaligned jaw - https://imgur.com/h01lafA >One ear is larger and higher up than the other as well as horn being stuck on the top of the head rather than forehead area - https://imgur.com/cfjjPrg >Hair was too short so they threw on extra hair at the end of the head making it look messy and done in a hurry - https://imgur.com/5tzZg1w >Jackal ears misaligned and misshapen as well as eyebrows being misaligned https://imgur.com/zMSCpWk https://imgur.com/LgvX2Pw >Jackal face being misaligned and skewed - https://imgur.com/M101jk2 Lost feet compared to feet received (notice they are exactly the same; as in they were never “lost”): https://imgur.com/8Uyn1DG Received feet: https://imgur.com/9nHs987

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/977067.html Who: Mithacal Creatures - Alaska business license 1052001 Twitter: @Mithacal Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mithacalcreatures/ Website: https://www.mithacal.com/ FurBuy username: MithacalCreatures FurAffinity:http://www.furaffinity.net/user/Mitha/ Where: Furbid Auction - https://www.furbuy.com/auctions/1092553.html What: Fursuit head commission, won at auction. The auction was won for $575, and the agreed-upon price after enhancements, modifications, and shipping was $905. Custom features were to include custom eye cuts for better vision, whiskers, and a silicone nose. When: The auction was won on February 14, 2017, and lists a completion time of 5 weeks after full payment is received. Full payment was made on February 17, 2017, after some initial communication difficulties. Delivery of the head was delayed repeatedly. On July 12, after a disagreement about what features were included in the increased price, Mitha offered a full refund, then asked for a legal agreement to be signed as a pre-requisite for the refund. On July 13, Mitha refused to honor that offer, and said that only a 50% refund would be available. On July 17, after I had requested several days to decide what to do (which was also over a weekend), Mitha stated that she would be giving me a 50% refund in 14 days whether I wanted it or not. At that point, I filed a credit card dispute, which was resolved in my favor in September. Explanation & Evidence: The commission got off to a rough start when Mitha didn’t get my emails, but that’s on me. Eventually we made contact via Twitter, which is where we would do all of our subsequent communication. I sent Mitha a long explanation, including a web page with references and desired features. Screenshot 1 Mitha agreed to this, saying that she could “do everything I wanted” on my reference page. Screenshot 2 The features added $280 to the price of the head, which made the total with shipping $905. Screenshot 3 Payment was made immediately via credit card on her website, http://www.mithacal.com. Screenshot 4 Some additional discussion about fur kinds and colors followed, since I wanted to try making a body suit for the head and wanted to coordinate on the fur we were using. At the end of the discussion, I mentioned her move, something that she had been talking about on Twitter. No mention was made of it impacting the deadline. Screenshot 5 One month later, I check in. No progress, and we talk about fur choices, but don’t exit the conversation with an unambiguous decision. Screenshot 6 Another month goes by with no communication. It’s now April 23rd, with no WIPs. I check in again. Apparently Mitha thought that she was still waiting on fur choices, and after getting the go-ahead to use whatever she wanted, says that she’ll finish up the mask and will have updates in a week. Screenshot 7 At the time, she also asks me what color eyes I want. LED eyes weren’t part of my request list, but I had thought they were just something standard she did. Her last message says she needs to wait for them, but had said just before that she’d report progress in a week. Screenshot 7_1 Another month goes by, and it’s now May 30th. I have not yet heard anything from Mitha without me prompting her. She says she’s still waiting on the eyes from DVC. Screenshot 8 Amazingly, the eyes come in the same day! Or so she says. She also now says it will be another few weeks before there’s any progress to see. Screenshot 9 Screenshot 10 June 13th, and I finally get a communication from her asking me to choose eye backgrounds, and to say that the head is still a couple of weeks away from completion. Screenshot 11 June 21st , and I message her again for a status update, and to let her know that I was going to be out of town from July 1 – 10. She indicates that she’ll have the head shipped so that it arrives around July 10th. Screenshot 12 Screenshot 13 July 11th, and I haven’t heard anything from her, so I ping her again. Apparently there’s been a delay due to her wedding and honeymoon, which she didn’t mention anything about. I congratulate her, and ask for some WIPs, especially of the tear duct modifications. This is where things start to go very wrong. Screenshot 14 Mitha claims she never agreed to the modifications. I ask where she said that, because the last message I got from her about it, before I paid, was that it wouldn’t be a problem. She says she sent something saying she wasn’t capable of that kind of modification, and offers a refund if that’s a problem. I ask again to just point me where she said that, and after 24 hours of no response, I’m pretty fed up with the whole deal and agree to the refund. Screenshot 15 Mitha goes off, but agrees to the full refund. Fine, I just want to be done with this; I’ve seen scant evidence that my commission was even being worked on (nothing other than the eye backgrounds), and we’re now 5 months into what was promised in 5 weeks. Screenshot 16 And now things get really weird. Mitha wants me to sign some kind of contract – I was guessing a non-disparagement agreement – as part of the refund. But, instead of sending me something to sign and review, she sends me a contract that she signed, between herself and her dog breeder, over some dispute that they had. Real names redacted below, but they weren't in what she sent me: Screenshot 17 One, sending me this unredacted was probably a violation of her agreement with her breeder. Two, it’s really odd to send somebody a legal agreement that isn’t actually ready to be signed, and is in fact between her and another party, with all of those details. Because I've had some experience with contracts and NDAs, I’m going to get a lawyer to look at any contract I’m being asked to sign. I’m not trying to be aggressive here, and in most business environments when you say you need a lawyer to look at a legal document, that’s a sign of being sane and prudent, not that you're making a legal threat. Screenshot 18 The whole thing has taken a turn for the strange, and I’m asking her for options. I feel she’s had a really poor record of communicating with me, so I’m trying to be proactive about communication and expectations. Asking for a mailing address for legal communications is pretty standard business practice, and signing a non-disparagement clause is a lot different than a regular commercial transaction. As a registered business in the state of Alaska, she has to have a publicly-available mailing address, and it can be found very easily online at the Alaska Chamber of Commerce website (https://www.commerce.alaska.gov/cbp/main), so I'm not sure why it would be a problem. Screenshot 19 And then Mitha changes her mind, says she won’t be giving me a full refund, that only a 50% refund is on the table, and accuses me of threatening legal action, apparently because I uttered the word ‘lawyer’, after she asked me to sign a legally-binding document. Screenshot 20 I want to take some time to think about this, because none of my options here are good: I can lose $450, or I can maybe get a head that doesn’t have the features that I wanted, from a maker that I no longer trust. Since this is already months late, I didn’t think a few extra days would be an issue, especially over a weekend. July 14 was a Friday, July 17 is a Monday. Mitha feels differently, and by Monday evening is saying that she will give me a 50% refund whether I like it or not. Screenshot 21 I’m still not clear on what’s going on – do I still have to sign a document of some kind, even for the 50% refund? I’m not sure, and I don’t want to make a decision until we can hash this out. Mitha doesn’t want to wait though, and just after midnight on Monday she decides she’s going to keep half the money and not send me anything, no matter what I want. After 5 months of me waiting for her, she’s definitely not going to wait for me. Screenshot 22 To me, and to the lawyer that I had review all of this, this is a breach of contract on her part. What she’s saying here, as evidenced by all the previous tweets, is mostly false. She offered the refund first, I just took her up on it. She asked me to sign a legal document, I just wanted to do it safely by having a lawyer look at the contract. At this point, I’m pretty upset. Screenshot 23 Screenshot 24 After her message on July 18th, and blocking me on Twitter, I filed a dispute with the credit card company to get my money back. I’d received nothing, no WIPs beyond the eye backdrop photos, no proof of work done, and no product, and was only going to get half of a refund after waiting 5 months for something that Mitha agreed to do but later decided she couldn't, or wouldn't. Finally, on July 30th, Mitha unblocked me long enough to tell me that she was going to sue me in small claims court. To date, Mitha hasn’t served me with anything for a lawsuit, and the credit card company finalized the chargeback in September, so I have 100% of my money back. As things go, this could have been worse, but I think Mitha is somebody to avoid doing business with.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/977213.html I am willing to have a Civil discussion with this Artist and hope we can reach a solution that we are both happy with. Who: Mithacal Creatures Where: www.mithacal.com Twitter:@mithacal What:Fursuit head, Refund. When: May 24th- Present Proof: Mithacal Creatures Beware https://imgur.com/gallery/ukVAP Explain: On May 24th Mithical and I agreed to a trade: I would shop for clothes for her, and in return for my time I would recieve a Custom Half Mask. (See Screen Shot 1) https://i.imgur.com/q2jv2hg.jpg During my part of the trade I inquired about upgrading to a full mask. She told me $200 worth of clothes since she does not need the money right now. (See screen shot 2) https://i.imgur.com/q2jv2hg.jpg My part of trade took roughly 2 weeks; she recieved her box of goodies and loved them. (See Screen shot 3) https://i.imgur.com/q2jv2hg.jpg For Mitha's part of the trade, she told me the completion time would be 1 month for the half mask. I agreed, and she added another 2 months for a full mask. I agreed to this as well. (see Screenshot one and 6) https://i.imgur.com/q2jv2hg.jpg https://i.imgur.com/mr5jBE5.jpg July: I discussed with Mitha on what my mask design would be. Previously, we agreed on a red fox with Antlers. I gave her the concept design. It was verbally agreed that my mask would have some artistic liberty. Those conversations happened in person during a camping trip we had in Homer. (Enter Screen shot here 4) https://i.imgur.com/mr5jBE5.jpg August 3rd-16th: I started to get worried and asked her for an update, or at least a start date for my mask, and never got an answer. (See Screen Shot 5) https://i.imgur.com/mr5jBE5.jpg Late August: I see on Twitter and instagram that she is open for commissions. Being curious and wanting some sort of response from her I asked on her instagram what her turnaround time is. She responded "your mask would be done before these peoples if thats what you are really asking" (See Screen shot 7) https://i.imgur.com/4dlNEYN.jpg I continued sending her messages asking about the start point of my mask as well as asking if I can get some reassurance from her if I was bothering her, and if she does have a start point in mind for my mask. Not once did I ask her "where is my mask". Each message was a couple of weeks apart. I just needed assurance that I hadn't been forgotten. September hits a couple weeks before Senshi con happens. Senshi con was the con we planned on attending with the mask, and the end time Mitha had told me I would have my mask. I start asking about the fur again wanting to match fur. I still have not received a single response from her. When I finally did, it was her sending me her address because I asked for it so I can send a piece of sample fur to her. She got the sample and told me it was wrong. I asked if she can send a picture of the right fur, but received no response. (Screen shot 😎 https://i.imgur.com/4dlNEYN.jpg Then on september 4th she says she is giving me a refund of the $200 extra I spent on her, due to her wanting to close her buisness. (Screen shot 9) https://i.imgur.com/4dlNEYN.jpg I asked for clarification, wondering if we can work something out, and if she will be compensating me for my time I spent shopping for her rather then spending that valuable time elsewhere. I also offered to take a premade artistic liberty head instead, trying to work something out with her. (Screen Shot 9) https://i.imgur.com/4dlNEYN.jpg I don't get I response from her until I post on one of her Facebook posts agreeing with her that being ignored sucks. (Screen Shot 10) https://i.imgur.com/WehJCAs.jpg She takes offense, telling me she doesn't do buisness stuff when she is away with family, then demands that I give her my mailing address so she can send a check since she no longer does Paypal. (Screen shot 11) https://i.imgur.com/WehJCAs.jpg I comply, and ask yet again for my compensation, as well as explaining that I was upset becuase I had asked for clarification about the refund the very same day she told me I was getting one. (Screen shot 11) https://i.imgur.com/WehJCAs.jpg She gets angry and demands my address again saying she has asked 3 times now. (Screen shot 11) https://i.imgur.com/WehJCAs.jpg Ignoring the fact I have already given it to her, I give it to her again and state that I had already done so. I pointed that fact out. Her response was to request when I write a beware that I don't add her actual number. At the time I told her I don't write bewares. (Screen shot 12 and screen shot 17) https://i.imgur.com/WehJCAs.jpg https://i.imgur.com/MkKptPy.jpg I ask on the September 11th, and again on the 25th, about my refund. No answer to either. September 26th she sends me a message stating she is waiting to recoup the money. Screen shot 13 https://i.imgur.com/bju69X6.jpg October 6th: I ask for her plan of action. Still no refund. October 8th: she sends me a message stating she still doesn't have money plus she accuses me of posting snide comments on her Instagram. My snide remarks consisted of the word interesting and that is it. She tells me it takes time to close a buisness. (Screen shot 14) https://i.imgur.com/bju69X6.jpg I ask for a time frame for my refund. At first she ignores me and says that the reason for my refund is because of how I talk to her. My response. (Screen shot 15) https://i.imgur.com/bju69X6.jpg October 31st: I tell Mitha I need the refund by November 15th, and that waiting 3 months for a refund is unacceptable. No response, but the message is marked as read. (Screen shot 16) https://i.imgur.com/Ua10fx6.jpg November 8th: I get told that my check will be sent shortly and that she will be free to talk to me when business slows down. (Screen shot 16) https://i.imgur.com/Ua10fx6.jpg Thats the last I have heard from her. Edit: I am in contact with the Artist and we are working on a resolution. I will update again when I have more information.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/975718.html EDIT: Paypal Customer Protection Refunded me the $50 that was owed. Artist never tried to talk to me or solve this problem thus this beware will still be kept up. WHO: Telegram: @BarkingEllie https://www.facebook.com/pg/DorkyDogSuits/ http://www.furaffinity.net/user/Ellieshepherd http://www.furaffinity.net/user/dorkydogsuits https://twitter.com/barkingellie?lang=es https://barkingellie.tumblr.com/ https://www.instagram.com/barkingellie/ WHERE: Telegram WHAT: A Fully Detailed Reference Sheet. Value of $100. Got Refunded $50. WHEN: April 30th I Got the offer from her, and after a few days we got a deal. May 10th is when I paid for the comission. ($100) with a plus of $50 that I did as donation. Problems started in August when she started to ignore me for long periods of time. EXPLAIN: Everything started fine, we discussed prices and options, etc. I would often check on her afterwards since I consider $100 to be quite a high price, though I was willing to pay a lot because of how complex the character is. This person denied giving me access to a ''to-do list'' at all cost. (seen in screencaps) She would often give excuses to explain why she ''doesn't'' have a to-do list. We had a few random days where we would have long chats about life and this one time she mentioned her friend and her run a fursuit business and her friend wanted to buy some fur supply and I donated $50 to help them buy it. I want to say, I am NOT interested into getting this $50 back since it was donation and plus has nothing to do with the actual comission. After August is when I started to feel discomfort towards the treatment amongst the artist and me. Being ignored for almost a whole month made me doubt about this comission so I asked again about the to-do list. Got again another explanation why it doesn't exist and decided to keep quiet for some time. During ALL this time I was given the same ''I will do it this upcoming week'' message over and over though NO sketches OR Work in progress were shown to me AT ALL. Once September arrived I gave her a final message asking for either a To-Do list, to see a WIP OR a Full Refund. Got a reply two days after that telling me they were doing the lineart. I got frustrated and asked why would they be doing the lineart already if I had not seen any work prior to that nor had I aproved it. Artist replied with a short message saying ''If you don't like it then it's not worth finishing it :)'' I got mad over this message and decided to ask for a full refund. She promised to do it 'next week'. I had to wait for a whole month until that happened. BUT I only got half of it refunded. Got a promise of the other half being done as soon as she gets her next payment. A whole month has passed and this person has been ignoring my messages since. Plus I got adviced by one close person to check her furaffinity and facebook (Dorky Dog Suits, her business page) since people have been starting to show up leaving comments about her ignoring them and not getting refunds either. PROOF: Transcript of the Conversation here in both spanish and english(translated): https://sta.sh/2qsuuicgafp?edit=1 All Screenshots of the Conversations both in the telegram group (decided to keep the name of the group hidden) and in private: https://sta.sh/21mm46gupc6e?edit=1 PS; Conversation Transcription was cut in certain parts because the topic that was discussed in those parts had nothing to do with the comission. It was all just simple daily life chatting.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/974901.html Where: Furaffinity.net/user/sharpe19 What: Premade head, to be upgraded with a matching tail. When: September 2016 Explain: Sharpe was taking offers on this premade suit nicknamed at the time Alchemy https://imgur.com/fdz80W1. Sharpe did make it known that a new hood (neck/ears) would be made for the winner which I thought was too cool to pass up. I sent them an email private offer of 1800 with the request of a payment plan on 9/19/2016 https://imgur.com/6n2vueu.This was the highest bid at that time, and the payment plan was welcomed! I also inquired about a design (this is prior to being the “chosen” buyer) which Sharpe seemed intrigued by. She asked if a deposit of 800 would be doable https://imgur.com/BCS4ls6 and that my offer is very interesting to her. At this time, I also asked if at this or a future time she would be willing to make me a tail and maybe hands/feet as well for extra funds of course. She agreed to a tail and to possibly add crystals as well! By this time, I was notified that I WAS the buyer (I’m not sure where that message is... I literally don’t have an email or a FA note so weird) and asked for her Paypal to send the first part of my deposit https://imgur.com/ryQN3in. By now I had made my first deposit payment of 600 and was going to get the remainder the following day. I was waiting on Paypal to clear funds of a sale of mine to finish my deposit to Sharpe https://imgur.com/DyhGIzK and was able to put the remaining 200 down on September 30th Some time passed (about a month) and I had sent another 750 to Sharpe while awaiting my first check from my new job https://imgur.com/HlCaOS3. NOW all was going extremely smoothly Sharpe was very quick to respond and lovely to work with. I had 0 issues with communication. I’m going to switch from email to FA notes as I was assuming photos would be uploaded to FA instead of sent via EMAIL (what my previous makers have done in the past). I let a few months go past, I was off FA for a small break, but decided to send a poke her way to see where we were at with the commission https://imgur.com/Qy5NYzz. Now this is about 6 months after the payments were made. I know sometimes life gets busy and I am VERY flexible when people are up front to me with what’s going on… but this response was honestly a little awkward for me https://imgur.com/opSPYdv it appeared she literally had no idea who I was. NOW that being said our primary form of communication was through email, and I’m not sure how others work but for me I document peoples Emails/FA/DA/FB whatever methods of communication I can just so I can keep in touch. But I brushed it off as just simple confusion as to who I was! It happens. https://imgur.com/r0J7p5B this is just me clearing up which commission I was and getting a few verbal updates. Sounds like the Hood didn’t turn out as well and needed to be redone-reworked before progressing. Sure no problem! Quality over speed in my opinion! https://imgur.com/DaoaH0p first talk of getting some updates. They never came but that’s ok life gets busy I suppose. Now were onto June of 2017 where I again asked if we had any updates https://imgur.com/1SGuIdv to which I was responded with a note that seemed promising and that work was almost complete (unless I’m reading into it wrong, to me it sounded like all it needed was airbrushing) https://imgur.com/JYUUm4S. This got me quite excited so I decided to let her work and try back later if she didn’t get back to me first. Well now were pushing the “Almost a year” mark and I am honestly starting to get antsy as I had conventions I was planning to wear this to and really didn’t expect it to take a full year to complete a hood replacement and a tail. https://imgur.com/mix1MqY I was a little confused by the response as I thought we were almost done with things and apparently it was just a first test run? Of the fur? https://imgur.com/1BtiaAr and at this point I had given up mentally that this project would get done. Sharpe was spending (I follow her on twitter) most of her time working on personal costumes/cosplays/projects and I felt like I was completely tossed on the backburner. This is when I asked a SECOND time (because she either ignored or didn’t read) for an estimated time of completion https://imgur.com/CisL4Jc.She said it would be Most likely August, but for sure before Halloween. Finally, a date set I can stop pestering her! https://imgur.com/Z5F4JO9 Well were officially at/past the one-year mark, august came and went and so I inquired one more time to be sure were on track for Halloween https://imgur.com/tyrNaxi to which they assured me we are https://imgur.com/HH4PmBV.To me, and please let me know if I’m wrong, I was under the assumption my suit would be IN HAND by Halloween when I asked if we were on track… Is that wrong of me to assume? Completed Payments https://imgur.com/AnCPEK6 So the original plan was 1800 but I did not complete my final payment of 250 dollars. I was holding on to it until the product had either photo proof, or completion proof or SOMETHING because I have been burned MORE than a handful of times. Well Halloween is tomorrow. I have 0 progress photos, proof of work, I literally have only her word. She messaged me asking for my address, however when I did ask for photos I was met with a really odd response of “Depending on how late you’re awake” https://imgur.com/wXg9Yilwhat?? What difference does it matter how late it is... why is it SO hard for Sharpe to provide me ANY proof of work?? At this point I just hope I can get my refund as I have ZERO desire for this character anymore. I’m not sure if it’s just my expectations or what but a year of waiting with no progress updates proof or anything really left a sour taste in my mouth. I’m a very patient person but I really feel like my commission was not taken seriously or professionally in the form of timelines/completion. It just seems like my commission didn’t/doesn’t matter and that I was only a quick paycheck for someone to use. As of 10/29/2017 I was relayed it would be shipping out "this weekend" (the weekend before halloween) however it was not, and I still have 0 photographic proof of ANY work. Sharpe is a really nice gal, super communicative and will respond very quickly. I just think her time management is lacking. Personal and new projects took priority over my paid commission. I just hope I can get my refund promptly. Beware is only warranted for lack of time management and prioritizing issues. She makes great work, and she’s very communicative. I missed out on every event I wanted to wear this piece to and actually ordered a new costume in the meantime as backup for Halloween as I had a feeling it again, wouldn’t be completed on time. I hope Sharpe steps up her game on her time management and prioritizing pieces. Update 11/8/2017: At this time Sharpe and I have agreed on a full refund, she will be selling the suit (this is the current listing link https://www.thedealersden.com/listing/alchemy/129915) and the profits will be coming to me. Im glad we could come to an agreement. I will update as soon as refund payments are made. Update: 11/16/2017: I have received the first payment of 450 dollars, with an agreement on a payment plan that will total just over 1300 dollars in a matter of 5 weeks. I am currently at work, and unable to get a screenshot but I will update this post promptly.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/964727.html Artist Beware - QuartzYellow WHO: Pollypolly1323, Babygurlpolly, QuartzYellow, SirenaDiamond WHERE: Pollypolly1323 (Second Life) Hope7614 (Discord) Babygurlpolly (Twitter) picarto.tv/QuartzYellow (Picarto.TV) bugaboosplayhouse.tumblr.com (Tumblr) www.furaffinity.net/user/babygurlpolly (Fur Affinity) https://www.patreon.com/QuartzCreations (Patreon) Kaida#9639 (NEW Discord where shes resuming operation) SirenaDiamond (Deviantart) NiraIshani (InkBunny) WHAT: Scamming of money, lateness on delivering artwork and unfinished commission. WHEN: Timeline: February 1st, 2017 to August 5th 2017 PROOF: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/s92p2d73wobf9y5/AACwGV9iTe8KQW8x2VwBEnlNa?dl=0 (For FULL screens) 1-3) Me ordering the commission, asking what I wanted from her, and getting a price, of $30 USD 1, https://www.dropbox.com/s/1ku4qbepjicrkq3/1) asking for com.png?dl=0 2, https://www.dropbox.com/s/9mhtobltvcu6tgl/2) asking for com 2.png?dl=0 3, https://www.dropbox.com/s/5hgbw5z4qnafs9e/3) Pricing the comm.png?dl=0 4) Me asking if I can split the payment up, I had $20 then. She agrees. 4, https://www.dropbox.com/s/f2qpoy7dg4hcllb/4) me explaining if I can send 20 to start.png?dl=0 5-7) Were having issues sending the initial $20, but it goes through. 5, https://www.dropbox.com/s/kdw5jmib1ql81c5/5) Having issues sending first 20.png?dl=0 6, https://www.dropbox.com/s/4glx4mkqv08ne27/6) Having issues sending first 20 2.png?dl=0 7,https://www.dropbox.com/s/8u8x18iyhxrfvbe/7%29%20Having%20issues%20sending%20first%2020%203.png?dl=0 5.5) She states herself she has multiple paypal accounts, 4 in total. https://www.dropbox.com/s/thtdo13hpdb0uc8/8) her showing me she got the 20.png?dl=0 😎 She obtains the first 20, with a confirmation to me. https://www.dropbox.com/s/thtdo13hpdb0uc8/8) her showing me she got the 20.png?dl=0 -A few days pass- 9) She hounds me for the last 10, even-though I've explained when I'm paid. https://www.dropbox.com/s/8c2ycypi1mmiz7l/9) her hounding me for final 10 days later after I told her.png?dl=0 -Little more time- 10-12) I have the final 10 and even reconfirm to her what paypal I need to send it too. in 12 I show the confirmation of it sending to that. 10, https://www.dropbox.com/s/ktj3gypdvbafaib/10) Having last 10 ready.png?dl=0 11, https://www.dropbox.com/s/9p9ml3hybt5467f/11) Having last 10 ready 2.png?dl=0 12, https://www.dropbox.com/s/3v4hv7x8cmbsmwl/12) Having last 10 ready 3.png?dl=0 13 and 14) She claims she never got it. I show the confirmation and transaction ID to show I did, on 13 13, https://www.dropbox.com/s/okzj8qn0cl9p5qw/13) her saying she didnt get it.png?dl=0 14, https://www.dropbox.com/s/5bwuoqqqbg09ddk/14) her saying she didnt get it 2.png?dl=0 15) She introduces the idea of me paying an extra 10, and paying me back so I don't lose money https://www.dropbox.com/s/g9fibm2uncz4us8/15) Her introducing the idea sending an extra 10 and paying me back.png?dl=0 16-21) Waiting on it to go through with no results. I even reconfirm that I sent it to her paypals with a screen on 18 16, https://www.dropbox.com/s/2yu4twizhi83zub/16) Waiting for her to refresh.png?dl=0 17, https://www.dropbox.com/s/yo4ixads7q88rcb/17) showing me nothing sent%2C but without showing me the paypal shes on.png?dl=0 18, https://www.dropbox.com/s/jv5ueud2fyyz10l/18) showing me nothing sent%2C but without showing me the paypal shes on 2.png?dl=0 19, https://www.dropbox.com/s/0gfi4lozt34rb49/19) showing me nothing sent%2C but without showing me the paypal shes on 3.png?dl=0 20, https://www.dropbox.com/s/a6wpj8hbb0bdujo/20) showing me nothing sent%2C but without showing me the paypal shes on 4.png?dl=0 21, https://www.dropbox.com/s/kggoxfy0ka0hkou/21) showing me nothing sent%2C but without showing me the paypal shes on 5.png?dl=0 22-23) I tell her of a plan to wait a few days, then going with the paying extra 10 like she had asked. 22, https://www.dropbox.com/s/y9tnasd6w6ojzte/22) going with her plan.png?dl=0 23, https://www.dropbox.com/s/78q9apmhevfqm64/23) going with her plan 2.png?dl=0 At this point, I was pulled into a group with her Fiance, I sadly no longer have access to this, but in that time she told me to send it to his paypal, (Korokizma, the second invoice states so) She then told me we were golden to start from here. Keeping the "I'll pay you back" talk in mind. By Request, Here is his permission of inclusion to being here. https://www.dropbox.com/s/1t81tt9v6tyrdo7/Permission of Inclusion by Koro.png?dl=0 She apparently forgot about what I wanted and I had to remind her. As pictures 24 and 25 show. 24. https://www.dropbox.com/s/p4rjawhvr2am3xk/24) her forgetting the comm by asking me what it was again.png?dl=0 25, https://www.dropbox.com/s/i8q9j6q65waprdq/25) her forgetting the comm by asking me what it was again 2.png?dl=0 Ever since then, I've asked her twice in a voice call for any updates. Nothing. Her fiance is also an artist, and a friend of mine. He's asked her to do so for my own sake, she seemed to ignore it all when he did or gets flustered with anger. If needed, I have asked if he would make a comment on his behalf to prove my claims. She has now told me her new tablet is broken.. again. While I don't have the original picture of her telling me her tablet broke the first time, since it was part of that group I was pulled into. The last Photo in the dropbox shows of it breaking the second time, sorry for lack of context, again I can have backups to this claim within the comments section if mods permit. https://www.dropbox.com/s/vx1nqce98ljm9xw/tablet broken proof.png?dl=0 of her tablet being broken My two invoices with her First, https://www.dropbox.com/s/qqwy6v9s84yke13/Initial Payment to Polly.png?dl=0 Second, https://www.dropbox.com/s/w5u5xm0rigfhtfu/Secondary Payment.png?dl=0 In all good consciousness, I cannot recommend anyone commission her with this in mind. Due to the constant dodging, waiting, and general lack of interest she has in getting her work done. UPDATE: She has since done my commission and apologized, after we gave her a good kick in the rear to become a better person. She has also thrown in extra art due to me waiting, and her dodging the questions.. That being said, Only time will show if she changes her attitude, and this beware will remain as a reminder of what she -has- done. So that way if someone decides to buy, they can double check her here. UPDATE 2: She may concurrently be resuming her shady actions, due to her once more piling up on her commissions with little work after weeks of getting them. Her ex has commented below with these notions. I would advise to demand work done with a watermark if you're insistent on her work, to pay when complete so she doesn't take money without anything done. UPDATE 3: She now has a new discord, and has resumed scamming others. Due to this, I'm adding it to the top of the page and in the comments below to confirm she has resumed activities I shall link another article as of 8/20/18 Update 4 She as opened a new DA, can confirm this as she admits it's herself in a journal https://www.deviantart.com/sirenadiamond/journal/Confession-760632890 added this to here for reference so she can't hide Update 5 Added a new Inkbunny, since shes trying to change her name. However her information still shows it's her. https://inkbunny.net/NiraIshani

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/956264.html WHO: Remix Angel Dragon / Nightwolf Costumes WHERE: Facebook –business page apparently deleted; tags/links to business page are broken, did most business through personal page FurAffinity - http://www.furaffinity.net/user/nightwolfcostumes (business, has been cleared out and no submissions are in gallery) Furry Network https://beta.furrynetwork.com/nightwolf/ Twitter https://twitter.com/remix_dragon WHAT: Full digitigrade fursuit valued at over $1800 USD , fleece hat valued at $25 WHEN: Dec. 2014 (when first payment was sent) to present (suit was paid in full May 2015) Read below the cut EXPLAIN: I first commissioned Remix for a fleece hat of my Dutch Angel Dragon character back in September 2014. In December that same year she opened for fullsuit commissions so once again, after seeing her previous work decided to commission her. It was agreed upon that the fleece hat I had previously ordered would be sent along with the suit once it was done (however, I had never seen any shots of a WIP or even a finished hat). We agreed on a payment plan of 25% each month until the suit was paid off. January 2015 I sent her a payment of $450 USD(via Friends and Family to avoid the conversion fee, I was told -strike one on me) then mailed a DTD, a pair of shoes and a hand tracing. As soon as the next month rolled around I was messaged for the next round of payments, but I had to adult (to put it simply) and told her they may have to wait, in which I was then told if I didn’t pay I’d lose my commission spot but that she also wasn’t going to do that. I was able to pay her toward the end of February when things ironed out. Paid her again April 2015 and asked about a possible completion date of Anthrocon 2015. Was told she would start working in May after the last payment was sent. The last payment was sent in May 2015, and work began. We talked back and forth about furs and measurements. It was revealed that the suit would not be completed for AC ’15 but I told her I was fine waiting. September rolls around and we’re still waiting on fur. No other WIPs, such as foam work, were shown. She also asked to keep our conversations between her business page and myself instead of her personal one, but this transition never happened and we continued talking for another year on her personal page. Communication stopped Nov. 2015. After that I’d heard nothing from her again until April 2016. In the meantime she was posting other suit work and finished costumes, as well as sharing excitement over having a character of hers made by a popular maker. April 26 I am finally shown my first WIP picture: the handpaws. In May 2016 I received another WIP photo of the tail. After that I was told she couldn’t finish the bodysuit because my DTD had somehow fallen apart and was full of holes, thus requiring me to send and make another one. I didn’t hear anything for a couple months while the artist went to Eurofurence, despite seeing her post a redo of her own personal suit as well as more work. I messaged them August 20th to ask for updates and was told they were still settling in from the con and wanted another week. I reconfirmed sending a new DTD and was promised extras because of the wait. September 2016 I am notified that they received the DTD, but still no new WIPs. Finally, in October 2016 they send me an invite link to a telegram chat they had created to keep all their customers informed. This is the last time we spoke over Facebook messenger. After the move to Telegram I no longer received any updates regarding my suit, but the artist continued to show off work on other suits, her own suit being made by a popular maker and mention things going on in her home life. She mentions she will have four more hands in the studio to help her with suit work. November she posts another finished head and mentions she will change my sculpt to match that one- keep in mind I have yet to even see any WIP shots of a head at this point. Halfway through November she posts more suit updates but no mention of mine, just alludes that everything they have been working on will be shipped out. There's talk of having everything shipped in time for Christmas, yet still no mention of my commission. Updates in January are sporadic, she's posting that she's sick and disappears for days at a time or even a week. January 23rd she tells us things have gotten worse since she worked instead of bedrest so she's stopping for a while. February she lets us know more about her health, and because of this she is stopping all work, and no refunds are going to be given to anyone. She calls in another person to speak on her behalf and again states there will be no refunds, and to sympathize with her as it is a very difficult time for her, we have options, take them or leave them. I stated my case to this new person, first in the chat then in PM, explaining that while I understand the severity of the situation I can’t just walk away from that kind of money, especially where no other WIPs had been sent since May so I couldn’t even be sure the suit was that close to being finished. I even offered a partials refund of $1200 to cover the material costs and labor already put in and her “spokesperson” stated no, no refunds at all, and “this is the risk you take when commissioning”. They finally do agree on a $1200 refund, as a payment plan, and that they would ship me the parts finished and the remaining fur that I could then take to another maker. I was told I would get a track and trace (tracking number) when it shipped, and the first refund payment was due to start in April 2017. Towards the end of February I reached out to this person again for an update and was told they'd get back to me. I haven't heard from them since. It is now nearing May 2017, and I haven’t received a tracking number, my package, or even a cent of a refund payment. Inquiries to Remix herself are met with “I don’t have the money to refund you, I am ill,” and when asked about the package I am told her father shipped it and she would get it from him as soon as she could. I never have, and my messages are now going on ignored. The Telegram group for her business is now shut down and any business pages relating to Nightwolf Costumes are now wiped clean. Meanwhile, Remix posts actively on Twitter about her upcoming fursuit from a large maker, which as of this writing has been finished and is being shipped to her. She is also very active in a telegram chat for Dutch Angel Dragons, that I am also part of. I warned her about writing an artist’s beware if I wasn’t given the tracking number, and I have yet to get a response from her other than “I’m ill”, so here we go. I know I have a slim to none chance of ever seeing my full refund back, or even the fur. I know I shouldn’t have sent the money without an invoice, or without ticking Goods and Services. I learned the hard way, and I’m hoping others don’t make the same mistake I did. I'm posting this to not only warn people about what happens when invoices and paper trails aren't made, but to also stay away from this person, even if they get back in the business. PROOF: All aforementioned and linked screenshots. ADDING: At the beginning of May Remix reached out to me and asked for my email and phone number – she was referring me to a third party to get this resolved as soon as possible. As of this writing I have heard nothing from her or this third party. I reached out to her May 14th asking if she’d heard anything from that third party and I have heard nothing since. 5/26/2017-ADDING MORE: A rather lengthy response from the maker: here here here here here here here here here here here here I've also been called out on Twitter by Skypro herself, my name isn't used but it's passive agressive enough that I can figure out it;s about me. Note that not once in this entire beware have I ever said I'm insisting Remix finish building my suit. All I've asked for is my refund and the supplies to take my commission to a different maker. Proof is here. 5/27/2017 Woke up this morning to a messge from Remix, with photo proof she has shipped two boxes to me, and a refund via Paypal of $1,080 ($120 was witheld to pay for shipping). I had tried to be reasonable and suggest a payment plan again to make it easier on her but she refunded the full amount. I'd consider this mostly resolved, once I get the boxes in the mail and find what she sent is as she described (all the work she was able to finish, plus the remainder of the materials) I'd say this could be completely resolved. 6/8/17 I came home from work to find that two boxes had been delivered, but they required a signature to be turned over to me (they had been delivered at 9 am, I didn't get home till 6 and I live alone). I was away all weekend so I was only able to pick them up today. Frankly, I'm disappointed. I was told I would be getting handpaws, a tail, feetpaws, and a half sewn bodysuit, plus my fleece hat and materials to finish the suit. Instead I got no hat, handpaws that barely fit my hands despite the hand tracing I sent her, a pair of foamed feetpaws with only one showing the carving process, a tail that isn't even backed and closed up (basically unwearable), and a barely even sewn bodysuit, many pieces still have pins holding them together. I also received both DTDs back (one was cut up to make the fur patterns) and almost all the fur used to make her (I don't have the brown or the green used in the tail). I'm disappointed, largely because I was led to believe more work had been done than this when I agreed to a partial refund but also because any quotes to try to get this finished are going to be through the roof, there's still so much work to do.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/956024.html MOD COMMENT mithical has deleted the post therefore we are reposting the screencap we've taken. Screencaps of comments will come shortly after. How/why the post was originally deleted is NOT the topic of this post. Please stay on topic of the Beware itself. Thank you. WHO: Zephyr The Floof (Customer of Mithacal Creatures) WHERE: Initial contact about customer wanting a commission was on Twitter @Mithacal WHAT: A custom made digitgrade fullsuit WHEN: Commission Date 12-24-16. Dispute filed 5-3-17. EXPLAIN: This customer approached us (Mithacal Creatures) on 12-24-16 to inquire about commissioning a realistic style fullsuit of her dragon character. After purchasing materials including a resin base which we had completed work in preparation for furring, she (Zephyr) changed her mind about what she wanted and asked that we change her suit to a toony style one. After some back and forth about the cost of additional materials (which she initially did not want to pay) she agreed to the additional $290 to cover new fur and toony base, eyes etc. Zephyr had been in frequent contact with us regarding the state of her commission as well as general conversation and was well aware of the production timeline and completion state of her commission when she suddenly and without notice filed a fraudulent non-receipt dispute on PayPal. We had initially agreed to a completion time in late 2017, which was pushed back to early 2018 (March at the latest) as a result of the style change. Zephyr made no effort to ask for a refund and had previously showed no complaint nor concern for her commission, in fact she had stated just the day before the dispute that she was looking forward to seeing it done... Following her dispute filing with PayPal, she ignored our attempts to contact her via text and Twitter. When she finally did answer us she said she "had an emergency" come up and said "I knew you wouldn't give me my money back" so filed a non-receipt dispute despite knowing full well that the project was not yet finished. She admits to this in fact, both to us and on her Twitter account. Her dispute had nothing to do with her being dissatisfied in any way with our work or communication, it had everything to do with finding the easiest way to get some fast cash. Knowing that we could not provide tracking numbers to PayPal a decision in her favor was almost guaranteed. She used PayPal's policies to her advantage to scam both us and PayPal, to the point of calling them and declaring that our dispute had "been settled amicably" and cancelling her claim. This effectively shut down the investigation into her account and review of our evidence that we had requested of PayPal. There was nothing "Amicable" about the settlement of the claim at all, as she has in fact stolen our time and labor put into her commission to date as well as the materials cost invested and blocked all attempts at communication. Additionally this buyer after using a "family emergency" as an excuse for needing money, she in fact immediately began commissioning a number of artists for new artwork of her characters as soon as the refund hit her PayPal account. Her behavior has been immature, fraudulent, and extremely disingenuous. Accept commissions at your own risk, especially given that just a month prior to her dispute she said she would never do such a thing and that it was "wrong" to do that to an artist when showing support to us following an issue with an unrelated customer. http://sta.sh/01bjus6wtj1s This is the buyers Twitter account following her blocking us from communicating with her following the dispute filing. http://sta.sh/21iujrp12kky?edit=1 These show the buyer asking for a basic quote and acknowledging the 50% NON-REFUNDABLE deposit required. http://sta.sh/01yob8jv6s4y Here is the buyer agreeing to an early 2018 completion time before sending the deposit of $1900. http://sta.sh/024shatfi0e9 This screenshot shows the buyer texting us the day before the dispute was filed. Everything seemed fine, then she finally answered us and said she was "asking for a refund" (Never asked, if forcing one through a PayPal chargeback is "asking" then someone needs to learn some serious communication skills...) due to a "serious family issue". She later spent this refund on more art. The "slander" she speaks of was simply a beware post on Twitter showing the exact same screenshots as those shown here. http://sta.sh/219jghos82qr?edit=1 This series of screenshots shows us and the buyer discussing the dispute and completion time which after showing her proof she admits was not until next year. http://sta.sh/02a13fp98aji This is the buyer showing support for us a month prior to filing a dispute when we had an unrelated issue with another buyer. She also shows intent to continue with her monthly payments for the remaining balance due, just days after sending her payment for April, the last one we received. http://sta.sh/2mu5glqiy9g?edit=1 Buyer on her Twitter telling someone else that we in fact had not been late completing her commission, this posted days after filing a PayPal dispute. http://sta.sh/21udk4q4y9ay?edit=1 These show Zephyr commissioning art on 5-10-17 following her "family emergency" and claiming a desperate need for money. This happened to be the day a partial refund from PayPal for $211.11 was credited to her account... http://sta.sh/02641usqyh0k Proof of being blocked by her on Twitter Thank you for reading and please beware of this customer. SCREENCAP OF BEWARE: https://www.dropbox.com/s/70z6ztbb4c1isb8/Community_Moderation_-_2017-05-21_16.20.01.png?dl=0 SCREENCAP OF SOME COMMENTS: https://www.awesomescreenshot.com/image/2520217/638739d4042d0d55d34ad144035c5961

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/949564.html WHO: purqleguy WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/purqleguy WHAT: Fursuit head, one time payment. WHEN: April of 2016 was when I bought the head, the deadline was supposed to be July 2016. At the time of writing this (3/24/17) it has been almost a full year past the deadline, and he will not respond to my emails asking about the tracking number of the package he told me he shipped (he said he shipped it a month ago.) PROOF: Emails: http://imgur.com/a/txDnh Paypal transaction: http://imgur.com/x5G4jo5 I don't remember why I sent it in two parts, but it was sent on the same day as you can see. EXPLAIN: Long story so I put it under the cut In early 2016 I had plans to go to Youmacon with a friend that year. So I was on the hunt for a fursuit head commission that I could wear to the con. A big problem I was running into was that at the time I was 17 and a lot of people didn't accept fursuit commissions from minors. I was turning 18 next month, and was hoping I could use that to hold a spot with someone. I found a commission ad for purqleguy on furaffinity, that he was selling cheap heads as an emergency money maker. I like helping people out, they were cheap and I liked his work, so I bought one. (Initial emails: http://imgur.com/onQQ1kU http://imgur.com/v2yLQUO (a big chunk of the convo has been cut out here, since it was mostly just talk of what material I wanted the horns to be made out of and isn't relevent to my case.) The initial agreement was I wanted it completed by early July. He told me that was doable, and he thought he could have it done even earlier than that. (Email: http://imgur.com/8Ca1JUy ) I got one update ten days after the payment (April 30th) showing me the completed face of the foam base. ( http://imgur.com/0LsBJAh ) After that the only updates I got were from me emailing him to ask. ( Email, note the date, continuing to talk about this in the next paragraph: http://imgur.com/vXC831l ) At the very begining of July, I sent him an email, hoping to confirm that he would have it finished by my deadline. He did not send me photos, but he told me he hadn't begun furring it. Keep in mind, I had not heard from him in a month, and seeing as he sent no photos and said he was sewing the fur pieces, I am to assume he had not made any progress on my head since I last contacted him. He promised to send photos the following day, he did not. His excuse was he went on a mountain trip, (for over a month?) and that's why he wasn't able to contact me. I didn't get on him about this but he should have told me he was going to be away and would not be able to update me. I told him as long as I got it by October then I would be fine with not meeting my July deadline. A few weeks later, I contacted him again, asking if he could send some images of the fur pieces he supposedly cut so I knew he wasn't lying. (Emails: http://imgur.com/jrmTg8d ) He did not reply until early the next month (August) with update pictures. Once again, he told me that a huge thing came up he couldn't work on my suit. He did not tell me that this was happening, this is the second time he had to pause on my suit because of life events without telling me. At this time I told him I was extending the deadline, as I had cancelled my Youmacon trip. (Email: http://imgur.com/8w63Gwg ) For a little bit after that, he did start updating me regularly, and then suddenly stopped without warning. Again. (Emails he sent me, I didn't screenshot the emails themself since it wasn't really much relevent to my case. Just some progress photos and comments on them. These are mostly to prove the dates and that he sent them. http://imgur.com/Z0k4iNL ) He stopped sending me emails until late December, I asked him for an update because the last he checked with me he told me he was almost done. (Email: http://imgur.com/nRJNrrI ) He told me he was going to put in the piercings and then he'd ship it off to me. I did not get any correspondance until February. I sent another email asking for an update, and his exact respond was "[your head] has been packed up for a while now!". He had my head packed up, I'm estimating for at least a month, and he did not ship it off to me. He told me he shipped it February 23rd. (This is the last email he has sent to me, so there won't be any more embedded in this post: http://imgur.com/fvTwOBD ) It has been a full month since he told me he shipped it (I am writing this on March 24th), and I have not recieved the head. He did not give me a tracking number, he did not give me an official confirmation he shipped it. On the 22nd he told me he was going to ship it out the following day, he did not confirm he shipped it but I was hoping he did. I don't know where to fit this into my story here, but it should also be mentioned some updates he didn't even send to me. I had to dig up his instagram account and looked at some photos he had posted to there (ones he didn't send me). I have sent 2 emails at this point asking for a tracking number, in the 2nd I said if he didn't give me a tracking number I was demanding a full refund. I was willing to give this maker a little bit of leeway since he told me he was a minor (didn't give me an exact age, I was guessing 16-17), but this is unacceptable. Do not buy from this artist until maybe he learns his lesson and gives some better customer service. Until then I'm hoping to get that refund I'm demanding and am going to a more high-profile maker with some good reviews. UPDATE; After having to hunt down this guy's tumblr to send him a message asking what was up I FINALLY recieved the head. And the condition is terrible. Here's a photo of the head, it looks fine from the outside but the construction is horrendous. http://imgur.com/Y1NGstB From the outside, notice; no piercings. My character has a nosering and two ear piercings. I even TOLD the maker how he could make the piercings, and he said he couldn't find green paint and I said he could cover it in fleece if he had to. I was very lenient with that because I know green spray paint exists online, but at this point I was tired of fighting with him so I was letting him do whatever he wanted. He didn't even do that, he just put no piercings in at all. From the construction; god where do I even start? I'm guessing he used matrice's head making method, but he did not ventilate the head AT ALL. The mouth is open and that's about it. The foam piece between the head base and the muzzle wasn't cut out, as from my understanding is standard for foam heads, and I had to cut it out myself. He was expecting me to get all my ventilation from the eyes and slightly open mouth, in an all black foam head. The horns don't look anything like I wanted them too, I gave him a link to an etsy store (I believe it was DVC) who had resin ram horns that looked how I wanted but he said he didn't want to use them. There isn't even ridge lines (I'm not sure what the lines on ram horns are called, sorry) on the horns. It's super easy to embrodier something like that on, he didn't even bother. The pink hair piece is tiny, and isn't even pinned down in anyway. If I move too much it flips up. My character I asked some artistic liberties to be taken since my actual fursona has his hair covering his eyes, but I need to see so I asked to make it a little smaller.but not THAT small! The jaw looked like it was about to rip off when I got it, and I had to put some more hot glue in it as I was paranoid it would fall off. And the neck mane has foam under it to make it stand up, which isn't that bad in itself, except he didn't cover the bottom with fabric or more fur, the foam is on display whenever I move my head. I will admit the eyes could've been a little bit tricky to work with, since I asked for slit pupil goat eyes, but the vision isn't very good. The pupils aren't even placed where they would be over my actual eyes, and they're pretty thin. I waited almost a year for a horribly made head. I am not happy. I basically wasted 300$, since I don't want to talk to this guy anymore to get a refund. I'm going to a more reputable maker to get a new head since I'm in the market for a bodysuit anyway.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/944483.html WHO: Cuttleb0ne WHERE: twitter.com/cuttleb0ne WHAT: A plantigrade fullbody fursuit WHEN: Quote sent 12/28/15 Down payment sent 01/13/16 PROOF: Proof of all current payment Only wip I've ever recieved EXPLAIN: Cuttlebone quoted me $2,500 for a fursuit of my saber character with a payment plan of a 30% down payment and the remaining 70% due on completion. I was very excited for this commission so I sent the down payment on the 13th and told him that my only deadline was this coming MFF in December, expecting that this would be plenty of time to get things done. For a while things were going smoothly, I sent my DTD and some extra payments because I was nervous about making sure I could pay him all off on time, since I wasn't quite sure when he would be complete. I would ask for updates periodically, as there hadn't been any progress on the suit other than him sending me a picture of fur samples in June. He suddenly stopped responding to my inquiries from September to November link . When I finally got an update (no progress) I told him I didn't mind if just a partial were done by MFF, trying not to cause stress. He did not respond again until the weekend of MFF, telling me he had no progress, but was going to give me a schedule of when the parts would be done, hoping to finish the suit before the end of the year, I never got that schedule link . I asked for another update on January 12th and got no response, noticing that he was active on twitter I got a little flustered and sent a message saying that I was tired of having to fish for updates and that if he didn't want to do business with me anymore to let me know and we would talk about refunding. We agreed to continue the commission , but I stated that I would need weekly updates even if no progress had been made. He complied for about a week until I got no response from Jan 23rd to Feb 12th link and I had to threaten an AB and Paypal chargeback to get him to respond. I have currently been waiting since the 18th for a reply from him link . In conclusion, do not commission this maker if you don't want to have to threaten an AB to get a response. UPDATE 02/28 After letting him know about this AB and a dispute on one of my older payments (since it was the last day I could do it), along with firmly asking for a refund when I had previously asked him to decide whether he wanted to refund or continue, he replied and apologized for the unpleasant experience I had. He said he was unable to work on the suit due to not having access to materials. I confronted him about some suspicions I had that he was making premade suits, and he confirmed, stating that they were to refund other customers (and myself now). Currently I am waiting for a payment plan for the refund.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/942850.html WHO: SugarNSpiceCostumes or as she goes by on social media, Corpse Cat WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/sugarnspicecostumes/ WHAT: The product was a full fursuit, $1,918. 2 full bodies, 2 sets of feet paws (indoor/outdoor), 1 set of hand paws and of course a head and tail. The quality of the suit was to be the same as the ones advertised on her FA page WHEN: I made the first payment for the suit in 2015, she claims that she started it in April 4th of 2016. I was the only suit she was working on (so she told me, which I have screenshots of and will display) PROOF: This is a small section of screenshots. To screenshot our ENTIRE chat it would be too many links, but this is times where she's ignored me, times where's she's lied to me, and times where we discussed the product quality, when it would be completed, and the price/payments. I blurred out her paypal and the addresses that are there All payments. The last one was refunded by Paypal but the rest of the purchases are over a year old and I can't refund them http://imgur.com/brixFYe The original advertisement in the Dealer's Den http://imgur.com/4hVMoGx Talking about prices/payment plan http://imgur.com/EeHH6Hg http://imgur.com/ZkHGTX1 The date I finished enough payments for her to start on my suit, she already had all of the materials and she had my DTD http://imgur.com/pqNzufp The first progress update I got, then being ignored for a few days while she comes online and offline of telegram, but still ignoring me http://imgur.com/g02hjo7 http://imgur.com/iHv3vYn A small update she gave me with no pictures, then being ignored again. She's never sent me a picture of the 2 body suits, 2 feet paws or the tails http://imgur.com/OilUrwR Her reading my messages and still ignoring them even after going online and offline repeatedly http://imgur.com/HDg8Ni8 Her finally responding, but with more excuses. She changed her settings on telegram so I couldn't see her last time online so I got a little upset. She was active in her SoCal Furries telegram chat while ignoring me. She got a side job and had even less time for my suit http://imgur.com/h7t93TH http://imgur.com/aPxIUio Her ignoring me again and giving me ridiculous excuses like "Yea sorry I'm out grocery shopping for a week"... http://imgur.com/BDoTuHh http://imgur.com/zxVLIit Gave me a picture of my paws with fur and pads, I came back a week later asking what's new and ignored again. Another case of coming online and offline and being active in other chats during the time http://imgur.com/uib5pY1 For a while she kept giving me the excuse "I put your suit back in my shop and I can't get to my shop right now". Then she said she would go to the shop and instead ignored me the entire day and did nothing http://imgur.com/ELxjWZk After being ignored for a long while I just asked for my money back and got this. This is what I will be using when I open the small claims file because she explicitly says she will give me either my suit or money by a specific date. I of course have neither right now http://imgur.com/HMMbDK2 Still saying she can't get into her shop, but she said she finished it and needed my address to ship it. It was never shipped http://imgur.com/4rcOCB3 The 2 partial suits she made for MFF while ignoring me and telling me that my suit is finished but never sending pictures of the body, or mailing the suit http://imgur.com/Rn9GSw9 http://imgur.com/G0wWW2T Constant struggles to get her attention http://imgur.com/xcaOOk7 Final proof of her ignoring me and blaming it on being "Spacey" http://imgur.com/uke09GA Ignored again even after she told me she won't ignore me anymore, and another fake deadline where she didn't finish it http://imgur.com/QPCAJwR She told me she had the box with the suit in her new apartment after she moved and just needed to "find it" before she could ship it. Apparently it takes a week to find a box http://imgur.com/Pd3NI8r http://imgur.com/P58ZBz4 http://imgur.com/QeoT2do Another excuse. She got a tooth pulled and said she can't ship the box, even though she has a roommate who could do it for her http://imgur.com/u6weqDm I had to bother her roommate in order to get her to respond and stop ignoring me again http://imgur.com/N11eRkI Lying about the suit being shipped and the USPS "losing her package" but the package was never brought into the USPS. She bought a $22 shipping label and never brought the item in http://imgur.com/VwWsT7I The unused shipping label/tracking number http://imgur.com/AN6blhe Her threatening to put a cease and desist on me just for posting about this on twitter http://imgur.com/XfeRG2g http://imgur.com/rPWbWqn Some screenshots look different because they were taken on my computer and not my phone EXPLAIN: I payed her in full and she never delivered the product, but the thing is that she lied to me long enough and gave me enough fake deadlines that I ran out of time with Paypal, my only option now is to go to Small Claims Court. I've threatened with that and she just keeps giving me these lies, and even bought a $22 USPS tracking number and sent it to me saying "I shipped your suit" but never brought the "package" in to USPS, so it's still not in use to this day. There are constant times where I had to threaten to take my money back on Paypal in order to get her to respond. In the end, she's still ignoring me, my only response from her is her telling me on Twitter that she'll give me a cease and desist because I posted about this on my Twitter. After all of this she still swears up and down that she shipped the package and says she has an open claim with USPS about the "lost package" but has no proof of that, and still has no proof of the "$2400 in insurance" she bought on the package, because she sent me a receipt for a $22 shipping label but the insurance alone on a package that large and that heavy is $34. On top of all of this, when she was supposed to be working on my suit, she went off and made 2 partials for MFF (they're in the screenshots) during the same week she said it would be shipped to me. Then she ignored me for another 7 days until I threatened with a refund again. After she started ignoring me I started to get a little more aggressive, as you can see in some of the screenshots. Eventually she told me "I was ignoring you because I'm spacey"... that makes no sense, no one should ignore their customers especially if you owe them money/a product. I took back $440 because that is all I could get back from the payments. The rest is over a year old and Paypal won't touch it. Just getting her to give updates was a pain, and I really do hope that no one has to go through this again like I did, this is the reason I'm making this Artist Beware, not as revenge or in anger. She's still open for commissions and keeps taking on suits while apparently working on mine. It's obvious she's either doing them instead of mine, or stealing other people's money as well. UPDATE: After speaking with Vitai Slade to get her removed from Dealer's Den, she "found" the unshipped package inside of her apartment and took it into USPS once and for all. After all of this mess and drama, the suit is the right quality and there are no missing parts. Glad it's finally all over http://imgur.com/a/wKPpS http://imgur.com/a/3cF4t The suit! http://imgur.com/a/xf2zI http://imgur.com/a/kOYlx

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/929598.html WHO: Worms & Bones WHERE: Homepage: http://www.wormsandbones.com/ Deviantart: http://wormsandbones.deviantart.com/ WHAT: $600 CAD for a one-of-a-kind art doll based on a werewolf character of mine. WHEN: So arrangements for this commission first started back around late September, 2014, but confirmation happened in November 2015. Details were exchanged from February-March 2015. I paid in two installments. The first installment was March 10, 2015. References were provided on March 21. The second installment was paid on April 8, 2015. Provided below are screen shots of all the email exchanges we've had. What's important to note here is that I've had to email them sometimes two or three times in order to get a response, though to their credit they did always eventually respond. I sent the emails a week, sometimes two weeks, apart (in between months of waiting) as I was trying not to be worrisome. But conversely, I was becoming worried about the lack of communication. The first email I sent asking for an update was on June 3, 2015 with a followup on the 10th. I sent another inquiry on August 15, followed by another follow up on the 29th. I received a reply the following day. This pattern continues for some time, with me checking in every two to three or four months. I was unclear as to how long a commission was actually going to take as no where in their TOS does it state that they can take a year or longer to complete and at no point in the email exchange did they offer an ETA. I eventually became too anxious at their lack of communication and finally sent an email stating as such on December 7th basically expressing this anxiety and the concern over how long it was taking as I had received my previous customs from them in 2-5 months. I assumed that a commission to take maybe 8-9 in between customs and whatever else, especially since Worms & Bones have previously provided great customer care and a superior product. As requested, they did provide me with a rundown on events that was happening/had happened over the past few months to explain why it was taking so long. Up to this point I had only received one WIP (on Sept 1). I received a second Dec. 7, which was included in the response email I got after my inquiry about the length of time it was taking. Needless to say, communication hasn't really improved. It's still taking a week or more for them to respond to my emails. I've received only 3 WIPs emails. I last requested on update on Sept. 13 as well as a possible ETA. Their response was pretty much the same as their last update - still waiting on their caster and were going fur shopping since they didn't have the right kind. It is now Oct. 11 and I haven't heard anything else. Although I just recently noticed they have put up a warning in the Contact section of their website that they maybe slow to respond. So at least they tell you that now. PROOF: November 30-December 1, 2014 - First discussion of taking on the commission. Feb. 27, 2015 - Worms & Bones confirms that they can take on the commission. March 21 - More Details Exchanged. This screenshot also shows me confirming that I paid the invoice. March 10 - First installment paid. March 21 - Details Finalized. April 8 - They sent me the 2nd Invoice. April 8 - Final installment paid. June 3 and June 12- First inquiry emails sent. This screenshot shows their response on the 12. Aug 15, 29, 30 - Second inquiry email sent. This screenshot shows the exchange for that month. Sept. 1 - First WIP. They emailed ME this time. I was sure things were going to be moving forward finally but two months later... November 23 - 3rd Inquiry. Dec. 7th - 3rd Inquiry follow up. This shows the exchange between the two of us during that time. I should point out that their responses are professional and friendly, and they do acknowledge that their commissions take a long time to complete (like, over-a-year-long, I suppose) - information I really wish I had known beforehand. They also provided a 2nd WIP. Dec. 7th - My response to that last email (Couldn't fit all of it on the same screenshot.) Feb 10, 17 2016 - 4th inquiry sent about a detail on the WIPs. So far, so good with their response here. I was pleased that they just responded even if they didn't have a WIP to show me. April 23rd, May 5 - 5th inquiry. This screenshot shows the exchange from that time period. Also 3rd and last visual WIP. July 17, 20 - 6th inquiry and their response. Sept. 13, 19 2016 - Asked for another update and a possible ETA, but no mention of it in their response. I have yet to hear anything about more about the furs and today is Oct. 11. EXPLAIN: I really hesitated to post this beware because Worms & Bones have never been rude to me and do eventually reply to my emails, but their basic customer service could use some improvement. This Beware is mostly in regards to that. So, perhaps it was the fact that I received their customs pretty quickly, and that the previous transactions had been pretty straight forward and the exchange pretty quick. And perhaps that I had mentioned in at least two earlier emails that I would "wait forever" (though I seriously didn't think I'd be waiting for over a year for it). And maybe it feels like I've been waiting longer than I have because details were first set in 2014. I tend to wait a week or more before sending followup emails because I'm aware that people have lives and they apparently make customs for a living. Which brings me to the other part of my complaint; in between all these emails, with very little WIPs to show on my $600 commission, they've produced many more customs for other customers as well as literal armfuls of customs for sale at conventions and at least three personal projects. All of which you can see on their tumblr. Let me just say here that I am NOT upset that they've got personal projects but it's just that on top of all the other work they've done for other customers - even potential customers that haven't even paid them money yet - and I haven't even seen what my werewolf's feet look like with the dew claws attached and it's been over a year. I also don't think I should feel awful every time I send off an email asking them for an update. I feel like I'm harassing them every time I do. Furthermore, there is no mention on their website at how long commissions can take. The only thing it is mentioned is that they seldom accept commissions but no reason as to why. Which I guess isn't important, usually, but if it's a super long wait time, then I think it should be mentioned. So whether or not I receive my doll any time soon, I still think people should be aware of how long it will take to receive their product. At least they do now have a notice in their Contact Me section of their website stating that they are slow to respond to emails. They did not have this notice when I first commissioned them and I'm not sure when it appeared. I also want to point out that, and I'm sure it's easy to see in the screen shots, that they have been nothing but polite when we have communicated and I genuinely believe that they aren't doing this on purpose. I suppose this Beware is more a warning about the lack of information these artists provide regarding the process of their services, at least in regards to commissions. So if you get a custom from them, you probably don't have to worry about this happening to you, but beware if you ever manage to score a commission. Considering it's been almost a month since they went fur shopping, I'm really starting to doubt I'm going to get what I paid for. UPDATE: Worms and Bones has finished the commission, and although I have not received it physically yet, given their previous track record of successfully shipping out items, I have no doubts I will get it eventually. I deem this resolved! UPDATE: I have Autumn firmly in hand. As usual the quality is wonderful and it's very satisfying to finally have it here. As mentioned above, Worms & Bones are overall pretty good to work with. It's mostly just their communication skills that could use some improvement. And be prepared for a long wait - especially if you're commissioning them!

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/908926.html WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/bakasnowbunny/ and https://mobile.twitter.com/BakaSnowBunny WHAT: Partial fursuit commission, later refunded. WHEN: February 22nd; payment was held until March 14th. http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736210837000.jpg Refund issued on May 20th. http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736230758000.jpg PROOF: PayPal transactions are above. Unfortunately my Gmail isn't letting me retrieve the emails sent from February to March. I updated them weekly as I was working on other commissions for clients whose payments were received before hers. I'll explain what went down in those emails below. Initial reference sheet given: http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682757348300.jpg Colors change from pink to purple (were pink on the reference sheet, later change to purple when the design changes) http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682780450500.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682799660500.png She asks about the color again 2 days after ordering the fur, which she had approved then. The new reference comes up a few days after this but I can't seem to find that e-mail. http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682770468700.png Having the nose moved: http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682757572500.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682773362000.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682799789500.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682743573300.png (in reference to where the nose was first) Her asking about the dots above the eyes when I mention the ones UNDER the eyes (so maybe there's another dot not on the reference sheet?): http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682743277600.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682713249500.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682759983300.png Me refunding her, starting with the tail issues: http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736274181200.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736210648100.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736214488700.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736215937600.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736241789200.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736254110500.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736269066900.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736260942300.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736269846400.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736220547700.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736285150000.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736288180900.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736249328300.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736264931200.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736286129200.jpg Twitter posts: http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736274107100.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736299628000.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736297296300.jpg Her boyfriend sent me notes on FA, again blaming me for her depression: http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736275769200.jpg FurAffinity journal about me: http://www.ezimba.com/work/160525C/ezimba13736275402700.jpg EXPLAIN: In late March I started working on my clients fursuit. I should have refunded them then, because despite saying that she was patient she would ask for changes (the nose, for instance, was moved 4 times), questioned how I did things compared to others (not as a compliment, as if I was doing it wrong) and she gave me odd measurements (I have it recorded that her hip to heel measurement is 44" and the head size changed three times). I was sent two different reference sheets, which changed in late March again. I was incredibly patient until we got to the tail, in which the furs she picked out herself were apparently not long enough, and she questioned how I made it. At this point I put my foot down and decided to refund her. She threw a fit at work, blamed me for her depression, sent her boyfriend after me, posted about me on Twitter and then later made a journal after the supplies arrived. She would not give me her PayPal address or shipping address so I had to find them through PayPal myself; she switched off receiving payments while I looked too (as there was a period of time where she wouldn't answer my emails). She was taking PWYW commissions during this time so that's how I know she switched it off on me. I sent her everything I had involving the commission: fabric, the base, feet, tail, claws, patterns, etc. I was more than halfway done with the commission when it was refunded which is why this situation is difficult. A week after canceling her father decided to contact me on behalf of the commission. He sends me very threatening e-mails and demands a larger refund than what I had given her. He even gives me his phone number and asks me to call him (which I don't do; the phone number was sent in a side e-mail that I did not include because it solely contained the number alone). http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682752279400.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682791641300.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682783556000.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682771676200.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682776155700.png He also forwards me the first set of measurements I was sent which I have left some notes on. http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682757783500.png There is an error somewhere where I mention her shoe size is US women's 8 instead of 10 1/2. I have it marked that I got her 10 1/2 shoes. http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682740583600.jpg http://www.ezimba.com/work/160531C/ezimba12682788472100.png (The purchase through eBay) Do not work with this individual. It's unfortunately one of those situations where you just can't please someone, no matter how hard you try. EDIT June 1st 4:30PM: More tweets about me. http://www.ezimba.com/work/160602C/ezimba12682785868100.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160602C/ezimba12682749512500.png http://www.ezimba.com/work/160602C/ezimba12682723872100.png EDIT June 4th 6:45PM: Found this in my spam as I was looking for an e-mail from another artist that accidentally went there. My parents are fully aware of the matter and will not be contacting him as they helped me with the number crunching with the refund and relaying of e-mails with him. http://www.ezimba.com/work/160605C/ezimba12682792641600.png EDIT June 9th 7:00PM: Came home to see that the client (or her father) issued a chargeback on my account. http://www.ezimba.com/work/160610C/ezimba12682772759100.png EDIT July 27: A second chargeback has been issued by the father. http://www.ezimba.com/work/160728C/ezimba19677183466200.png

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/906397.html WHO: Gideon Hoss WHERE: Anthrocon Pittsburgh, PA, July 9th-12th, 2015 http://www.furaffinity.net/user/gideon / http://www.gideonscorral.com/ WHAT: traditional "con sketch" for $40 WHEN: Friday, July 10th, 12:45PM Pittsburgh time EXPLAIN: As soon as the dealer's room opened, I rushed in to get several commissions for a friend of mine in Sweden, knowing that sketch slots fill up fast. One of my friend’s requests was NSFW sketch of his zebra/dog character (Gideon is well known for his hyper-genetila pictures.) After securing commissions from several other artists first, I arrived at his both around 12:30pm. I purchased a sketch commission slot for $40, along with one of his CD compilations for $10. I gave him my friend’s character references, along with a description of what he wanted, and paid the $50 at that time using my PayPal debit card (see receipts above). I was told he would complete the sketch that night and it would be available for pick up the next morning. The next day (Saturday), I went to his booth to pick up the sketch, but was told he didn’t have enough time to complete it, and that he would try to get it done that night for me. Ok, fine. Things happen, sketches take longer then they expect, etc. Again, when I went to his booth the next day, I was again told that he did not complete it, but he would try to get it done before the end of the con. We exchanged phone numbers so that he could text me when it was ready. Instead, later that evening he texted me to say he did not complete it, but would do so when he got home and mail it to me. I waited several weeks with no messages from him, so I sent him a text message inquiring about the status of the sketch, but he never responded. I tried several more text messages after that over the following weeks, and again received no response. I was able to locate his email address on his website and attempted to contact him that way, but again received no response. As it turns out, my friend was going to be attending Eurofurence in August 2015, and Gideon was to have a booth there. They exchanges several emails and made arrangements to meet to pick it up, but Gideon never showed up at the arranged time. After that con, he again failed to contact us. Both my friend and I attempted to email him every couple weeks or so after that, and he yet again didn’t respond. In September, I again tried contact him as I saw that he was going to be at the Rainfurrest convention in Seattle later that month and could make arrangements to pick up the sketch, as I was going to be in the area visiting friends. Again, I received no response from him. In November, I tried to contact him via his Furaffinity.com account. Needless to say, I was very surprised when he actually *DID* respond. He claimed he was not receiving our emails (which I find very hard to believe since they seemed to work just fine when we could “pin him down” at a con, but whatever.) After a few exchanges on the fur affinity message system, he stopped responding yet again. My friend and I both attempted to contact him several times in December and January, to which we again received no response. At some point I also left him negative feedback on his credit card merchant account, citing the long overdue delivery and lack of response, and yet again he never replied. At this point, it’s now been over 7 months since the con it was originally supposed to be done at, and we’ve been given him more than enough chances to correct the situation. My friend is heart set on getting this sketch from Gideon, so I would very much like to receive it, and soon. At this point, if he has any intention of completing it, I feel he should mail the sketch to my friend in Sweden at his cost: Has he actually completed it at Anthrocon as originally promised, I would have been able to send it in a package of other “con goodies” I got for my friend – an additional sheet of paper probably would not have raised the postage any more. If he has no intention of completing it in a reasonable time, I want a $40 refund. I’m sorry, but there is no excuse for this lack of customer service on his part. A paying customer should NOT have to try to hunt down an artist like this, only to be given empty promises or be completely ignored. It makes me wonder how many other people he’s done this to that maybe gave up after a few tries. My friend was actually considering getting a full colored commission from him at some point, but after this experience, I don’t think that’s going to happen anymore. PROOF:

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/898979.html WHO: kgosiarts / reverseinversefursuits WHERE: Kgosiarts @ FA (old account) Reverseinverse Fursuits @ FA (current account) Facebook page WHAT: Fursuit partial (faun legs) WHEN: Feb. 15 2015 to Nov. 3 2015 PROOF: Initial contact Agreement on details and payment Payment sent DTD is sent and arrives Issue with fur order Asking for an update Flood happens Contact stops Sent messages over FA (read, not replied) Contact on Facebook: One, two, three, four EXPLAIN: A long, long time ago… Back in Febuary of 2015, I was browsing through the forums of a boffer game I used to play in and came across a post made by Kgosi offering faun legs along with a special offer. I sent them an email expressing interest in the faun legs/special sale and had a couple questions about fursuit stuff because I had zero experience with fursuit stuff. Kgosi responded quickly, answered all my questions, and we agreed on a bi-color set of faun legs with resin hooves. Due to a small medical issue, Kgosi agreed to build the feet/hooves around a pair of boots I had and would install a hidden zipper in the back so I could easily take them on and off. I paid right away and sent out the DTD a couple days later. Kgosi lives about two to three hours from me, so the DTD arrived in no time at all. Progress on the legs apparently began only to hit a snag when the fur Kgosi bought over Etsy specifically for my faun legs was "destroyed in the mail." Kgosi was refunded, and progress resumed when they got new fur from somewhere else. I heard absolutely nothing from them until July of 2015 when I contacted them asking for an update. Kgosi responded, claiming a flood in their work area damaged the legs; however, the boots and DTD were in a tote at the time and thus survived, and they were already "half way done" the replacement set of legs which would be sent in about two weeks. Two weeks later, nothing. I sent Kgosi another email in August and received no reply. Eventually I made an account on FA and sent them a note that was read but never replied to. I sent another note later and once again, it was read and ignored. So I contacted them on Facebook and they finally replied, stating the legs had been sent in June. I showed them a screenshot of their email from July about the flood, and Kgosi replied saying they no longer had the emails so I forwarded the entire email thread. (Which is the blank email in the "Contact stops" screencap.) After some back and forth, they said they contacted their local post office and was told the package had been sent and was past reimbursement. So I asked for the tracking number and called my post office, and the helpful gentleman on the phone said the tracking number didn't exist. Remember how I said Kgosi lived about two to three hours away? I figured there was no way in hell a huge box going to a place a couple hours away would just vanish, and so I called the post office by Kgosi's known residence and was told the tracking number didn't work because it had "too many numbers." I sent Kgosi a final message on Facebook with this information and requested another tracking number, along with any evidence that these legs I bought actually once existed. The message was read and never responded to. During all the waiting, the fur mishap, the "flood", Kgosi was actively posting finished projects on their FA account. (Which lead me to believe I was being strung along the entire time because they post pictures of every piece of work they finish.) They originally had a Trello page with a list of their commissions and commission statuses, but it's been long since deleted. I do remember the list being pretty long, though. According to some messages left on their old FA account and their Facebook page, I'm not the only one who was waiting forever for work from them. I doubt I was the only one who paid to be scammed, either. I did try to contact Paypal like people suggested to do in my advice post, but I couldn't get through to an actual person and it was too late to get my money back at the time. More so now. I know this is all partially my fault as I let so much time pass between messages, updates, etc. and got snippy towards the end. I didn't ask for any WIP shots either. I had no idea how to handle a fursuit commission, but now I know better. Unfortunately, this experience has left me incredibly wary of fursuit makers.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/872392.html WHO: Apocalypse ReFurred, Thysyrael WHERE: Facebook Apocalypse ReFurred page and via messages WHAT: A pair of resin/ polymorph pastic clawed hand paws and feet paws with promise of quick turn around by April 4th. WHEN: March 18th 2015. – Commission placed. March 22nd – Fur I supplied arrived at maker’s address. March 24th – Commission paid for in full. April 3rd – Photo of hand paws WIP received, April 4th – Original deadline. April 16th – Photo received of feet paws in ductape wrap, ready for furring. ( Several different life problems occurred for the artist, such as pet passing, theft etc. throughout the months. I can try to give specific dates for these if required) 6th September – After no updates, I ask again for one or for a partial refund and what’s been made to be sent to me so I can complete myself or resell. 7th September – Refunded and items sent to me 11th September – Items recieved PROOF: ( Me in purple, her in green) Facebook messages part 1 Facebook messages part 2 Paypal receipt Message mentioning the polymorph plastic I missed Items themselves; Overall paw shape ( My ref for character, notice the paws are more lizard or simian shaped) Animal hair 1, 2, 3 Unglued edges Hand paws Claws They look like Fimo to me EXPLAIN: Back in March, I was preparing for a convention on April 4th when I found that my fursuit feet and paws where in very rough condition from general use. I asked about on the UK Furry Facebook groups for a maker or someone seller paws and a maker came forward. I looked at their stuff and while they weren’t high end makers, their paws looked fine and they offered to complete it within the admittedly tight deadline. I already had some fur left over from when I tried to make the fursuit and we agreed for a lower price ( £80) if I sent this fur over. A day before the deadline ( April 4th ) I received a phone photo of the hand paws. They looked a little rough, but I assumed it was just the camera quality. I later received a photo of ductape covered feet paws. They looks a little odd and I asked if the tape was pulling the toes apart, giving them a wider look. She assured me they were fine so I continued with the commission a little apprehensive. Then a myriad of personal and family problems for the maker reared up, from a pet passing away, to a parent being very ill and then robbery. There were also problems with the dye not adhering to the resin claws that I’d asked for. She said she would contact the maker and complain. Every so often, I’d ask for updates and get told that there was a problem and she couldn’t send photos. After the April 4th deadline, I’d hoped that the paws would be ready for Confuzzled in May. No such luck, I ended up going suitless which was kinda sad. 7 months later, I was promised an update within 2 weeks. No update came and I was fed up. I asked for a partial refund ( as some of the commission was complete) and for what was made to be sent to me. She agreed and the £5 refund along with the unattached claws and paws where sent to me. The paws arrived quickly but in very poor condition, which I’ll detail in sections; Feet Paws – They are way too wide and off model, looking more like duck feet. There is glue blobs, holes between the fur and the sole, but the worse thing is the smell. They stink badly of dog so much that it’s as if the animal has sat on the foam or fur. I reported this to the maker ( as some of my family suffer from allergies), she explained that the fur and foam was kept away from the animals and the only way they’d smell is if she’d passed it on from petting the animals. However, there is white and brown animal fur on the paws as well as general fluff. This hair cannot be from when I supplied the fur as we have no pets. Hand Paws – very roughly made, though they are incomplete, they too are smelly. They also fit ill. Claws– These are not polymorph plastic, but instead hand sculpted Fimo clay and have finger prints and dirt in the clay. I googled the plastic, which appears to be a shiney, usually white product similar to glue gun glue. In the end, I am very disappointed. I don’t think I can even sell these items without thorough repair and cleaning. She seems to be a young maker and as such, isn’t very professional yet. Edit: Update 2/10/2015 I contacted the maker a couple of days ago about the animal fur with pictures. I asked her again if the animal had been in contact with the paws and she said the fur ( which is clearly animal with colouring and tapering... plus, y know, the stink!) was faux fur from another suit she was making.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/870876.html thesyko / lesyko (FA) - vonwerehog (DA) http://www.furaffinity.net/user/thesyko/ http://www.furaffinity.net/user/lesyko/ http://vonwerehog.deviantart.com/ WHERE: FA/DA WHAT: Egg adoptables http://www.furaffinity.net/view/15463996/ http://www.furaffinity.net/view/15472989/ http://www.furaffinity.net/view/15515024/ http://lesyko.deviantart.com/…/2-Dollar-Egg-Adoption-506776… WHEN: 8 months ago PROOF: http://sta.sh/21rmjg9525if?edit=1 EXPLAIN: -Do not buy adoptables o commission her, you may be scammed- This user was selling adoptables (on Fur Affinity) a long time ago, I purchased 3 and waited for their art, but never got it. They were reported on the previous site, but I found her on DA and I asked them for a refund, but they just ignored me, I were insisting to contact with them. They were very rude, and said "I was in the hospital, I cannot give you a refund because I don't have a job, etc..." A few moths later, I asked they again, and their response was "You'll have your refund ond july 2nd" A month has passed and still nothing, so I noted them again, because I REALLY NEED the money right now... They ignored and blocked me... This user stills drawing and taking commissions... By the way, there are more upset customers by her

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/856045.html WHO: Rubbertex Raccoon, Rubbertex Cooper WHERE: FurAffinity. He has a website as well but it doesn't seem to be operational. WHAT: Partial Fursuit. When I last heard from him back in January neither of us could find the initial Skype conversation hashing out specific details, but we both remember the price was $750 and that sending smaller payments was already, as such I had sent about $100 every couple of weeks when I was paid. There was also a $41 comic but that was resolved in April after waiting several years on that as well. Most of that follows the same story as the fursuit. WHEN: The original conversation I remember was held in October before Midwest Furfest 2012. The first payment/deposit was sent on October 31st, with the rest of the payments following when I could afford to make a payment, which was originally agreed upon that several smaller payments would be alright. I first started to become uneasy when I was told that he would have the fursuit done by Further Confusion '14 (roughly a year and change after he first agreed to take it) and getting a hold of him to ask if the fursuit would be done in time was becoming an issue. Due to flying to California, if I could take the fursuit home as a carry on bag rather than shipping it, I would have preferred that to save us both the shipping costs. PROOF: As mentioned before, neither of us can seem to find the chat log from when we first agreed to it. I've got logs from before October and after October, but none during that month and I'm not entirely sure why. I've got screenshots of afterwards, but this is the closest I've got to an agreement on the suit http://i.gyazo.com/9e0299d70cd46ceb647ac6d2c5230953.png For the comic: https://dl.dropbox.com/s/x69zsz5l26we5tw/9360d0db4dc965cb5386435c8d72d13e.png?dl=0 EXPLAIN: Rubbertex and I were chatting on Skype, and the conversation has drifted towards me being dissatisfied with my current suit. He mentioned that he built suits himself, and showed me some examples. If I recall correctly, he then offered to make me a partial for "the friend discount" of $750 which I agreed and we started talking about payment and specifics. The original date that I was told was that he would have it done by MWFF, which I thought that, while impressive, wouldn't happen, but he assured me he could have it done by then. By November 1st he apparently already had the head and feet foamed, and he already had black and white fur and just needed to order the brown. He said he would have it by the 16th but ended up getting sick for a few weeks and by the time MWFF rolled around I didn't have the suit. I wasn't too bothered since I had only paid him the deposit at that time, and didn't expect it to be done so soon anyways. Fast forward about a year, I hadn't been saying much and sending him payments when my income could afford the breathing room, which was about $100 every month or so. Due to not hearing anything about it being finished or near finished since the note linked above, I admittedly wasn't in too much of a hurry to get it paid off. I had been monitoring his journals and he had a Google Drive spreadsheet with progress on all his commissions set up. It hadn't been updated in a while, but it was listed as being "Currently going through final sewing up. Need approval on toony or follow me eyes for the suit head." for a while, so I got into contact with him, I believe through AIM, and told him about the eyes since I hadn't heard anything from him about it. For a while, I had been contacting him through Twitter DMs whenever I had sent a payment, then as it got closer to being paid off I started sending him emails to give him more details about things like shipping address and dates. The "last" payment was on November 13, 2013, just before Midwest Furfest again, but I had no plans of going so I didn't ask for any other updates. When I had concrete plans made for going to Further Confusion 2014, I started emailing him asking about if it would be completed on time. On December 5th I was told he would have it done in time. About a month of not hearing any sort of updates aside from occasional journals filled with bad news and I was trying to find out if it would be complete or not cause the day that I left for FC was fast approaching. https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/k6c0renm70ka7ht/ac729cc3a9da620c09e416d6e9a21621.png?dl=0 https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/66dcxtw4kind73n/9f6fa591d23922573a47d7eb10364c49.png?dl=0 https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/3kwc46xnlm3uhng/e7c6365bf7c5c34b1e14cfdea865c097.png?dl=0 At FC when I ran into him, he had told me that the suit wasn't able to be finished because he ran out of black/white fur. I found that excuse highly unlikely, but I was there to have fun with friends so I just bit my tongue and let it go. Keep in mind that up to this point, I have still not seen a single photo of anything regarding my suit, so I was going off of the faith that the Google Doc that hadn't been updated in months was still current, along with him having several cases of getting sick, a car accident, his bank account being compromised a couple of times, and general stress and anxiety making him unable to work. I had tried to remain patient and understanding about all of this, but my sympathy was running low when it seemed to be one excuse after another about general lack of communication or why work wasn't being done. After the con I had sent several emails, and only got a response to two in the next 4 months. For a period of time, he had his FA page disabled, which had me more than a little worried, so I continued to try and contact him via email. https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/5ul8xkiwxsc0fdv/fefcbd7984badc5348ea4abc9a0bc441.png It turned out that he had the FA note system on the wrong tab or something? I find that hard to believe since it would still notify you of new notes until they were read, but again, I bit my tongue and didn't raise a fuss. Another 6 months pass, no response to several emails/notes/FA Shouts/Comments/etc any form of contact I could think of that was more than commenting on a random journal which didn't seem to have much luck most of the time anyway. He posted another life update journal and I thought there was a general tone of him taking on new commissions, so I spoke up and said something, cause at this point I still hadn't received any recent updates and was also still waiting on the comic commission which he had posted several times before that it was completed and just needed to be emailed out. That prompted this conversation. https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/ub40cqmdhwut6m6/08f62da4d8990a3205ad3403683e9cea.png?dl=0 I had been in contact with him for the last year and a half, and he claimed he was trying to use an entirely different email than the one I had been using the entire time prior to this conversation. Again, I found that extremely hard to believe, but bit my tongue. He also told me again, that he would have them done by FC 2015 which was about 2 months away. A couple weeks later, he started to take stream commissions, while he still had his entire backlog from May of 2012 to work through that from what I had gathered from contacting a couple of other people in that same backlog, they were in the same boat. A couple of people commented on the streaming journals asking about their work that was in the backlog, but he ignored the comments and deleted the journals. A couple weeks after that comment, I decided that I was done waiting and to give him a final chance. https://dl.dropbox.com/s/a2x2j48n3umupjs/13e9f9f9e0d3c9f372e107bea70c5257.png?dl=0 I had sent several emails to him asking for updates in the time between that one and FC asking for some sort of update. Around early December/January he started to use Twitter again after being on hiatus from there for a while. The couple weeks prior to FC he mentioned working on a "puppy" and a "beagle" and one of my friends who was in a stream of his told me that he saw Rubbertex working on my suit. When I tried to reply to his tweets asking if the suit in question was mine, I never got a reply, nor to the email asking if he even saw those tweets. FC comes around, and I still haven't heard anything. I ran into him several times due to us having several of the same social circles, but he was actively avoiding me, and since I didn't want to make a scene I didn't confront him about it. I sent him a few Twitter messages, since I saw him actively posting on there and responding to people, so I figured that would get a response, but they went ignored. After I got home, I waited a few days for a response to any of the messages I had sent him. Afterwards I decided to give him one last final chance, and sent this email. https://dl.dropbox.com/s/rw2l8xf8sx836a7/Email.png?dl=0 Shortly after sending it, I went to Paypal Support to ask how I would go about getting a refund on something I had paid for that was well beyond their usual Buyer Protection date. I was informed that if I wanted a refund for this all, assuming that he wouldn't cooperate, that I would need to go through the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) which is a branch of the FBI and the National White Collar Crime Center (NW3C). I informed Rubbertex of what I was told to do via Twitter DMs, and that finally prompted the response from the email. I haven't heard a response from in to any emails I've sent since that last one 4 months ago. The only contact I've gotten out of him was when I went into one of his streams and he showed me the comic that he was finally working on, and posted in April '15. Other than that, I haven't heard a word from him about any sort of progress on my suit, but he's still active on FA. I know that stress, anxiety, and depression can all suck big time, but it has been two and a half years since he agreed to do a partial fursuit, and it took me threatening legal action to even get photos from him that he had something started on it. I'm not entirely thrilled that I'll only get a %50 refund considering that his main excuse for it not being done on time has been that he's ran out of materials, so I don't really buy that he's spent all $300 of that on materials for my suit. At the same time, I'm doubting that the suit will be completed in the foreseeable future. UPDATE: Sent an email on July 4th saying I was done waiting. Recieved a response on the following Monday that he would refund, but he's also got other refunds to do first. Also in posting a link to this, word reached other people in his queue, and from the ones who responded, they all said they're in pretty much the same boat. Waiting several years, months of no contact, excuse after excuse, etc. A few are heavily contemplating legal action. UPDATE 2: Still waiting on a refund, I was told on September 3rd that I was next in his refund queue, and upon sending an email a month later about the refund, because I had been going on the assumption that I was only getting half, was told that I would be getting a full refund. There were other things mentioned, but that starts to get off topic of the refund.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/851017.html This is something very difficult for me to do, but it needs to be done. This happened over the span of a couple years, so much is undocumented up until issues arose as I did not think it would be a problem. However, I feel there is more than enough after the fact. After much advice, I’ve decided to come forward and make a post here about this, mostly to warn people. I took my time writing this as I know there is no action I can take at this point and am very busy. WHO: Ritz_Bitz / Frostcat-Studio (and FA) / Ritz_Tweeting WHERE: Online, texts, emails, twitter, and at Further Confusion 2015 WHAT: One full fursuit (~$950) WHEN: Discussions starting in 2012, first purchase of materials March 4th, 2013, payment from a sponsor on November 25th, 2014, agreement of $200 of payment finalized with attendance at Further Confusion where the suit was delivered, and serious troubles starting shortly after. PROOF: Many images linked throughout explanation. EXPLAIN: This originally started as one of my best friends offering to build me a fursuit for a “friend” price. I had worn one of her suits once and got hooked on the fun it was. Over the years the details swapped around and much was discussed in person when I had lived nearby. Nothing was really set in stone for a long time and it was purely talk. March 4th, 2013 I purchased an order of fur and fleece for the project at Ritz’s request and had it shipped to her. I can't remember what happened, but she had to backburner the project. The fur sat around for almost 2 years before the project could finally be worked on, so there is a large time gap. (At some point I had also sent her DTDs of my feet for sockpaws, a pair of thick, long socks for the sockpaws, a tracing of my hand for the gloves, and extra fleece I had from a previous project based around my character.) June 2014 After attending Califur 2014 with my good friend (who I will refer to as Bob for this,) he started talking about how much he had wanted a fursuit after trying one of his friends’ suits on at the convention. He was hoping to purchase a fursuit and get it by Further Confusion that next year, and I referred him to Ritz as she was also doing my fursuit. When he found out my suit was on backburner, he offered to sponsor some of the cost for the project so it could be put into her paid queue so we could suit at Further Confusion together. I spoke to Ritz and she agreed to reserve space for Bob’s suit as well as mine and a guarantee for completion by the convention in January. I was happy to be helping her get some bills paid and to be helping Bob get a quality suit. Ritz had always told me steps she took to ensure her suits were durable and of high quality craftsmanship, so I had much trust in her work. June 27th, 2014 Bob contacted Ritz about a quote for his suit, also mentioning to her his intentions to sponsor a portion of my suit’s cost. Everything seemed pretty cut and dry at this point and Ritz waited for the payment so she could start the process of constructing the suit. Ritz confirmed that she can complete the suit by Further Confusion and states she planned to start work on my suit in August. September 20th, 2014 Bob placed a down payment to secure the slots. November 4th, 2014 I text Ritz asking when she will be needing my DTD. She answers asking it be sent the start of December. November 15th, 2014 Ritz has started constructing the head. She sends me a text asking about the eye color and shows me an early WIP of the foam sculpting, followed by more complete WIPs of the sculpt and what she planned for it. I was surprised she got the snout acceptably shaped in her style off the bat as it’s the most often misinterpreted part of my character. I praised her for this and asked one small request to the brow which she said wasn’t difficult to add, and informs me of things most people worry about in case I start to worry about similar things. November 16th, 2014 I receive an image of the progress she made as well as the change to the brow that I had requested. I was very pleased with the shape and happy it worked out so quickly with only that one minor change needed. November 20th, 2014 Ritz texts me asking that I bug Bob about making the second payment. It was weird that it was my job to ask him, but I overlooked this as this was a friendly transaction I had helped to arrange. We discussed the confusion, making jokingly grumbling about it as was custom of us when we spoke. We continued on to negotiate $200 of the suit payment to be taken out of what she would owe me for room and dealer’s table costs at Further Confusion. November 21st, 2014 Ritz texts me asking about the ears for the suit. It’s a little difficult to communicate, but I was happy with the shape and aware she only had two hands so just curious about the final curvature at the top. I jotted on the notepad what I meant and it was understood and she says it’s not hard. (This was laden with a very inappropriate joke and I have censored it out.) She also reminds me to send my DTD within the next two weeks. November 25th, 2014 Ritz contacts me asking about more details for the head. At the end I tell her she has my trust in recreating the mouth due to color limitations of fleece. November 29th, 2014 Ritz contacts me while at the store purchasing fleece for the mouth. We figure it out and even settle on the wings ahead of time to just be white due to the lack of proper shades available. I inform her I’ll be making my DTD the next day and shipping it out soon. November 30th, 2014 I ask her if she needs me to retape the dummy before sending it and inform her the lines were cut a little weird. (They were slightly wobbly in a few areas, but I had no issue matching it all back up for retaping.) December 1st, 2014 After seeing Ritz tweet pictures of the finished head, I contact her to question if it’s too late to add the fur tuft my character always has. I was a little upset that she didn’t offer a solution, but it was just a fur tuft. I wasn’t going to make a big deal about it. It still looked good, which I made sure to communicate to her. I also inform her I’m sending the DTD the next day. December 8th/ 9th, 2014 I ask if she received the DTD in the mail yet. The next day she responds that she has. December 14th, 2014 Ritz texts me during conversation about how big the tail for another suit is, using my head and DTD as comparison. My DTD appears to be partially stuffed and looks fine. December 16th, 2014 Ritz texts me informing my my DTD split at the seams during the stuffing process. She claims every seam that was cut split apart because I didn’t use long enough strips of tape. I felt bad because I knew it would be annoying to retape. She says it can be repaired (it’s just taping seams back together) and she was working on it. This is very important for an issue later, as she tells me she’s going to stuff and pattern one half and mirror the pattern. December 20th, 2014 Ritz texts me asking if I want the feet separate or attached. We’d discussed it previously, but it was so long before I understood many things were forgotten. January 1st, 2015 After seeing tweets of the completed sockpaws, I text her in private to ask her if it’s too late to add larger claws. Again, this is something we’d discussed many times in person down to the shape and how she planned construction, but I understand forgetting. She’s clearly upset at the mere question of the possibility, so I immediately try to reassure her I’m just curious and not trying to upset her. I was very concerned as a friend that my question may have been upsetting to her, but from a client’s standpoint I knew it was very wrong and I began to worry about voicing my opinion on anything being wrong with this very expensive product. January 12th, 2015 After seeing only one WIP of the wings being completed on her twitter since the sockpaws were complete, I am now texted with the completed suit only a few days before the promised deadline. She first informs me that the magnetic wings wouldn’t work and that she had to sew them into the bodysuit. Not a big deal. However, I instantly noticed the padding on the legs looked… odd and lumpy. I also became worried that the bodysuit fit her as I’m a very small person. From the backview you can also tell the ears were not evenly shaven and have bumps in the structure already. It was days before the convention and I knew bringing up the issues would cause a very tense upset, so I kept quiet and informed her I was happy with the suit and we began talking about the fun we’d have at the convention that weekend. January 15th, 2015 The first day of Further Confusion for us, as soon as we set up in the dealer’s den, we went up to the room eager to suit up and go have fun. Ritz begins to help me put the suit on for the first time and issues already arise. The bodysuit is extremely baggy on me, which was odd considering I’d gained a lot of holiday weight since I had made the DTD. When it came time to put the sockpaws on, I noticed there was a hole in the inner sock, but shrugged it off considering it was difficult to get my feet into the paws. I had provided her with DTDs of my feet, so this was also confusing. We discussed it and since she only patterned the right foot and flipped it, it being my smaller foot caused the sizing issue for my left foot. The worst problem came when I tried to put the gloves on. They couldn’t fit past my second knuckles. She immediately became upset and, again, I took the blame upon myself and said it wasn’t her fault and that I probably traced my hand wrong. She gladly accepted this and it became the new “fact” of what went wrong. When putting the head on, I noticed a part of the zipper was separated from the fur of the head. An easy fix. We quickly discussed the issues. She explained she was extremely busy with personal suit projects she wanted to get done for Denver Comic Con and didn’t have the time to do these repairs and make new gloves. I felt bad and said I could probably handle it with the small amount of sewing experience I have. This seemed to clear things up and we went out suiting. I tried not to pay attention to the flaws and just enjoy the con. January 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, 2015 We only suited up once more after that, and I wore the suit as a partial a third time out with her because the padding in the thighs of the suit were unsecured and chafed me to no end when I walked. Nothing stayed in place how it was intended because the suit was so baggy. Meanwhile, tensions rose during the con due to Bob’s suit having issues. Ritz was extremely upset by this so I absolutely couldn’t bring myself to say anything negative about my suit. In fact, I rushed to defend her despite having my own issues with my suit. Sunday night when we were going to suit a final time, tensions blew up, drama happened, and we cancelled our plans and stayed in the room. The con ended and I took my entire suit home with me with plans to try to repair it myself and save Ritz the time. January 21st, 2015 After coming home and getting unpacked, I finally had time to look over the suit and prepare myself for the work I had to do. I realized there was far more than I could handle and I was not experienced enough to fix most of it. A list of the issues in full is provided after my next piece of information. February 14th, 2015 The issues in my fursuit worried me. I wasn’t sure what was normal and what wasn’t. I attended the local furmeet this day and brought the head and paws (having issues easier to see in person) and asked some friends with more experience on the issues as well as asking advice on how to handle this delicate situation between my friend and myself. I briefly wore these to demonstrate some of the issues and interact with two young children. I got the advice I needed and confirmation that the flaws in my suit were not acceptable and not my responsibility to fix as she was paid to produce a suit in working condition that I could wear and enjoy. Many told me how clear it was that she rushed it and took shortcuts, which is no surprise given the circumstances. I needed to approach her on the issue and hope for the best. I couldn’t keep pretending it was okay, and I started preparing myself to for this rather difficult step. The Problems - The excess amount of fabric on the bodysuit is around 10-14 inches on the midsection. This can only mean when she patterned the half of the DTD and flipped it, she overshot the middle point. Even overshooting this by a few inches can cause excess (2-4x the length of the overshoot) and wouldn’t have been an issue had she taken the time to fully retape the DTD. The thighs have an excess as well, though not as bad. - I discovered the zipper on the head was glued on instead of sewn. This is why part of it was already separated when I received it. - The shaving on the head was very choppy. I had actually taken time to hand trim the face to smooth it out, but there was little I could do for the ears. - The ears were glued directly to the balaclava with no foam to anchor them or keep them stable. This causes them to flop around pretty badly. - Instead of being sewn to the rest of the fur of the head, the ears were poorly glued on. There are small open gaps at the side of each ear on both sides, as well as at the front of the ears near the fleece. - There are crinkles in the fleece on the ears where it was glued to the inside material. - The ears are anchored off-center. - The balaclava was spottily glued to the inside of the head and was already pulling off bits of foam. It is glued in such a way that it overlaps a portion of the buckram from the inside, unnecessarily limiting the vision further. - The gloves do not fit past the second knuckle of my hand. They’re also not hemmed at the edges so the fleece was left raw cut. - On top of the sizing issues, the sockpaws had a hole in the inner sock when I received them from being cut sloppily. - The sockpaws weren’t hemmed. In fact, the fleece was glued to the sock at the top. It began to fall apart with the small amount of wear they saw at the con. - The magnets she’d promised me and stated she could not get to work were left in the wings and sealed over with giant globs of glue. You can still see them and the gluey mess is left uncovered to get at the wearer’s back. - The wings were glued together and you can see the wire in some spots by peeking into the open spaces in the glue seams. (Originally we were planning on realistic wings with wiring, feathers, and vinyl. I told her “Just do simple plush wings like Telephone’s since it’s easier” later on. While the wings she made are cute and a creative middle-point, they’re going to fall apart because glue doesn’t last very long.) - The elastic loops on the tail were not sewn very securely for such a large, heavy tail and had begun to fall apart at the convention along with a small hole. February 15th, 2015 I have a short, rather comical discussion with another previous client of Ritz’s who also discloses that many parts of their suit are glued together. I feel this is necessary to disclose to help support my discontent with the quality of my suit prior to the next events as I am accused of "retaliation" later on. March 2nd, 2015 Unfortunately, I’d been very busy with life, so I had not yet been able to approach Ritz before this point. I don’t like to bring drama into this discussion of business, but this severely complicated the smooth resolution of things. We had not been speaking much as Ritz had blamed me for the drama at the convention and I was giving her breathing space. On this day, she reacted negatively to a tweet I had made on Twitter (she brings it up later) and the resulting misunderstanding caused her to remove me on social media. I contacted her concerned about her and trying to resolve the issue, only to be ignored. (I can provide screenshots, but would rather not as this is just drama.) In a panic, I discussed parting out the suit as a last resort as I was certain I would now not be given the repairs I deserved. It did not help when I saw photos proving similar quality work on other suits, leaving me more upset at what had been given to me. After speaking to many people and getting advice on this new situation, I removed the comments out of courtesy (despite never once mentioning her specifically) and went forward with their suggestions to attempt getting a rightful refurbish. March 6th, 2015 At the advice of many, I contacted Ritz with my intentions. I tweeted at her asking for an email to discuss repairs with her, being clear it shouldn’t be my responsibility. She replied with the preferred email. At that point I began to write a thorough email to her. This took me about a week to get finished up. March 13th, 2015 I finally sent my email. I noted not only the issues with her craftsmanship, but also with the customer service she gave me that led to increasing problems in the work that had upset me and led me to be quiet for so long. I leave the option open to negotiate a refurbish or simply work out a refund as it seems like it would be easier with her busy schedule that caused the burden of refurbishing to be placed on me in the first place. March 14th, 2015 I woke up to a rather hostile email back from Ritz. She immediately accused me of retaliation, being unreasonable, and picky. Our correspondence is plain to see and everyone I’ve asked said I was very kind. She accuses me of getting a suit “for free” even though she received a $600 payment from Bob, a $200 traded payment from me, as well as my purchasing $160 of materials. She then blames me for all the problems she possibly can, while ignoring half the issues that she can’t try to blame me for. She blamed the bagginess on my DTD, which she now attacks me for. I spoke to numerous suitmakers and they said 10-14 inches is definitely not due to retaping seams. (Also note the 2 day gap between the lightly stuffed DTD image and her telling me it split apart as vs. her story now.) The fact she still continued and even brought up personal drama with other clients as well as further wild accusations that, even if true, have nothing to do with the quality of my suit, is baffling. I’m not sure if she was trying to guilt trip me or try to scare me out of pressing the issue to resolution, but it was absolutely uncalled for. She even accuses me of being the reason someone was bringing up issues on another suit she worked on. The fact she finished it up with blatantly insulting me was the icing on the cake. I was also a little disturbed that, despite our cessation of contact on social media, she had still been checking my accounts. I immediately wrote her a response, on my phone, to address this unbelievable reply she had sent me. Admittedly blunt, but necessary, and deciding at this point I cannot handle a refurbishing process due to her hostility and request a refund. As she showed aggression about Bob having paid in a portion, I made it clear I could contact him to work things out how she’d like. March 17th, 2015 As I’ve yet to receive a response, I sent Ritz an email to remind her and request she handle the situation civilly. I make note that Bob is aware of the situation and we all just want to resolve this. March 29th, 2015 I had to duck out to handle life for a bit and figured giving her time to cool off was good. Sadly, I saw signal boosts that she was selling her leftover furs. I saw some of the very same fur used on my suit and contacted her immediately. It seemed like the 6 yards she told me to purchase was a lot and it was likely some of it was mine. At this point I was notably frazzled by this ordeal. She surprisingly responded, again accusing me of things I am not guilty of and bringing other clients and drama into dealings about a fursuit she did not make properly. She seems to even agree with the fact that the quality is bad and that I should be fine that I only spent $200 on it. Her logic in thinking because I only paid $200 along with $160 in materials means she doesn’t have to give anything back, despite that she took the $600 from Bob, and that is what he would get back, not me, in a refund. She claims it was wrong to take Bob’s money, yet she seems fine keeping it despite not doing her job properly for it. All she has done is avoided owning up and fixing mistakes she made on an expensive product while hiding behind excuses that drama somehow nullifies her responsibility in business. I made a final response to her as well, and that was where it ended between us. Currently: I have been refused repairs or a refund on a suit that was paid for and delivered in poor quality. It’s very clear Ritz has done a good job to avoid everything wrong with the suit she made for me and justify not fixing the issue and attacking me. She blames me for all that she can and resorts to bringing up drama instead of addressing why half my suit is glued together. I feel she has been trying to take advantage of the fact Bob sponsored part of the suit cost and her sudden grudge against me to avoid dealing with resolving the matter. She took a large sum of money for a product of a certain quality and did not deliver, and I’m honestly upset with how she’s treated me in this ordeal. The suit needs entirely new hands and feet, major tailoring of the bodysuit that includes redoing the legs entirely, redoing the tail's backing and elastic loops, completely redoing the ears and refurring the head with a new balaclava. Most suitmakers have told me it's not "refurbishing" so much as making an entirely new suit with some scraps. I basically don't know what to do aside from hope nobody else runs into the same troubles as I have with this suitmaker, but any advice would be welcome if anything can possibly be done at this point. June 16, 2015 Update I just took the head out of the storage box for the first time since photographing everything months ago. I've been getting advice on how to salvage as much as I can from the head to go towards making a new one, so I was needing to take a closer look at some things. A small clatter and objects falling out confused me, until I realized that the teeth have started to fall out with even this small amount of age and absolutely no use. The teeth are sculpey, I believe, and left unfinished. Some bases of the silver molars were unpainted, the rest of the teeth are just straight sculpey or whatever they are made of, no paint, and are all starting to separate from the beds of hot glue. This just adds to the poor quality product I was given and the work I am left to cover out of my pocket to fix. I honestly don't have anymore words to describe how I feel right now. February 2016 Update This disheartens me to have to even add to so long after the fact of this all happening, but I would like to update this to add a further warning to Ritz's poor business behavior if you happen to get on her bad side as I have with this ordeal. I placed an advertisement up on Furaffinity, in which I used a commission she had gotten from me as it was in my top 10 favorited pieces in my gallery and a great example. My Terms of Service states that I am allowed to use the work I create for people for portfolio and other purposes, and thus I had the legal right to use the image in an advertisement as it's a form of portfolio. I assumed this would not be an issue as I have personally gotten over the drama and moved on past this all quite a while ago, and had assumed she had done the same. She, however, saw this as an opportunity to attack me by approaching the advertisement organizer stating that her character was in my advertisement without her permission, essentially wanting it removed. This was orchestrated with a friend of hers whom also had commission work in my advertisement, also demanding the removal of their commission despite them having both agreed to and being bound by my Terms of Service. This alone was a nuisance, but in having to handle the issue, I saw that she had been publicly trash talking me, clearly stating her intention to try to cause a problem for me for the sake of causing a problem. At this point she obviously holds a grudge against me and I am being bullied for having spoken out about her practices, showing also that she has absolutely no respect to my Terms of Service that was agreed to. I am attempting to resolve the issue with the advertising organizer, but will be forced to avoid exercising my legal rights to display the artwork I created involving her characters in the future all because I want to avoid her malicious acts to attempt revenge for speaking up. August 19, 2016 Update After being urged by friends and seeking advice from the community on if I should add further updates, I'm sadly here again. While I'm relatively wary to share due to more fear of retaliation, I don't believe this will ever stop regardless of anything I do. I am urged to warn people the extent of the poor behavior that I have been subjected to for over a year since posting. Occasionally third parties will inform me of things that have been said and I honestly ignore 90% of things, but I had the displeasure seeing one instance myself. I have been ruthlessly slandered since the posting, and at this point been brought aware of possible threats of either legal action against me or potential harm to my person. (If it escalates any further I will contact law enforcement, but at current there is not enough to hold up considering the distance involved.) I have had absolutely ZERO contact with Ritz since the last email shown in the original posting here. Even during her attack on my advertisement, I did not say a word to her, only spoke to the advertising department at FA. I am going to point out ahead of time, it is EXTREMELY easy to figure out who is being spoken about (me) in all of these instances even if names aren't attached cause a simple google search nets you all the info you need. I already know I'm mentioned frequently by name otherwise anyhow. Onto the point, what I saw for myself... Was on Wednesday, June 22 in a Facebook group for Fursuiters and Fursuit Makers. A notification popped up onto my phone for a sale posting that was receiving many comments. I'm going to be 100% honest I was wildly curious as I'd heard she quit suitmaking (I'm only human), and I saw this exchange brewing that had apparently been what sparked it into popularity. I avoided the desire to jump in and say something cause NOPE I have zero desire to speak to her. I just screencapped away cause I couldn't believe what I was reading and figured it'd be taken down, which it was. Color guide for censoring (cause identifying photos/names): Black = Not involved or moderator names Ritz commented to alert Blue = Ritz Red = Some fursuiter who spoke up Yellow = Ritz's IRL friend https://www.dropbox.com/s/7nixak1x72bdqmb/Group1.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/j3j2m8mw22mswoo/2.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/oeibrn7q6amudni/3.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/b189gvqz44ge3r5/4.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/y3527bkjzuev7qx/5.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/voe431whjd9eul3/6.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/feofjf0gk1tkdqy/7.jpg?dl=0 I don't even need to make commentary on how messed up this was. You all can think for yourselves. I avoided updating with it at the time despite people telling me to. I didn't want to deal with it. I didn't think it was that bad. Now here's what broke me on trying to ignore things. I was shown these earlier this week. Despite being from May, it opened my eyes to how serious things really were this whole time as I attempted to ignore it all. This is only HALF of a conversation someone had with Ritz's locked twitter, but it's very clear what's going on. I was shown this for obvious reasons. This was shortly before BLFC, which we both happened to be attending (I avoided her at all costs, and was apparently wise to do so.) Censoring: Blue = Ritz's locked twitter handle, Purple = Ritz's friend (Remember to read bottom to top in each for chronological order cause it's twitter.) https://www.dropbox.com/s/v36ao3uyd8d10r4/21.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/accjt9cl35ieovk/22.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/yf7mwvzbbwgyhc1/23.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/n8hq2cioflujxoz/24.png?dl=0 Let me point this out there. Whatever is being said on the other side of this conversation, her friend thinks I should be scared of her. This is NOT okay, and relatively alarming considering things I know about her that are not for me to share publicly. The suggestion of a restraining order despite that I have not had ANY contact with her whatsoever even despite her attempted harassment, is outlandish. Furthermore, the clear discussion of potential legal action because I caused her loss of income due to this beware posting is even more unsettling. This is bonkers. I don't even care about the disgusting and immature names they casually call me when this other stuff is going on. People are right, they need to know what she's doing because this is, and has been, crazy. Exercise caution when doing business with her, because you never know when you'll end up like me.