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https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/885613.html WHO: Ninjakato http://ninjakato.deviantart.com/ ScarlingRagdoll666 http://www.furaffinity.net/user/scarlingragdoll666/ WHERE: They're mostly active on dA than FA WHAT: A long overdue trade with them that took place on FA. Communications eventually took place on dA through notes WHEN: A trade was agreed upon April 9th 2011. My half was finished relatively quickly, but their half is still unfinished. More info under cute PROOF: First initial trade contact was made on April 9th, 2011 https://www.dropbox.com/s/pluqssxagsbbnyu/proof%201.jpg?dl=0 (my FA here is Charu) My half of the trade was completed May 4th, 2011 http://www.furaffinity.net/view/5691889 Communications on FA were made. Unfortunately my notes on FA have been cleared out since then. They mostly contained information about what I'd like Ninjakato to draw for their half. Eventually I started to note her on dA as it appeared she was becoming less active on FA. Note pointing out I finished my half https://www.dropbox.com/s/wb27h1reywz2gyl/Proof%202.jpg?dl=0 There was a point she posted a journal asking her watchers if she had missed anything owed. However, I cannot find the journal anymore, but I did note her on dA https://www.dropbox.com/s/40volnp6m2yy3l0/proof 3.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/wu3kgjknydfs3cd/proof 4.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/ya85gjdo9qaamg3/proof 5.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/ckrzqijrjo2k7ky/proof 6.jpg?dl=0 After this communication had stopped until 2014 came around. I had stopped asking as Ninjakato seemed pretty busy in real life and I didn't want to be a bother. https://www.dropbox.com/s/f6cslbr0dkabp4m/proof 7.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/a3ax54y49okn5zq/proof 8.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/h5ynncfmdjut8iw/proof 9.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/9onvgxjz5fqg6h6/proof 10.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/at93e8bo9flkknj/proof 11.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/k30co67uueaqqo9/proof 12.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/roal3atboh43vj4/proof 13.jpg?dl=0 August 20, 2014 she had made a journal calling out to the person she owed a trade to (which was me). My ref links did not work so I had noted with fixed links. http://ninjakato.deviantart.com/journal/One-art-trade-477049101#comments https://www.dropbox.com/s/5nrarciibugpru9/proof 14.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/m8i4mljt8dawynv/proof 16.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/mauwqzmx0qii5vo/proof 17.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/woqc5v73w388obn/proof 18.jpg?dl=0 More time passed and I saw no sign of my half of the trade. I gave her another nudge about it. https://www.dropbox.com/s/b7uyt58myn7lyzi/proof 19.jpg?dl=0 I gave one more nudge just recently. The note had been opened but went unresponded. https://www.dropbox.com/s/1ge7uwcew3o6r5y/proof 20.jpg?dl=0 EXPLAIN: In the start of this NinjaKato was opening up for trades on FA. I was one of the ones picked to trade with her. Excited I began to work on my trade and posted to FA in a timely manner. Eagerly, but patiently, I waited for for mine to be finished. I knew very well NinjaKato was really busy with her real life and commissions, so I was in no rush to have it completed. As time passed and weeks turned to months. Months turned into years. We've had some communication throughout the time span, yet I was still mindful not to rush her. She was still posting art on dA of finished commissions and personal art. 2011 had turned to 2014 and I admit I should of poked her more often between those few years. But I was nervous to do so as she was posting frequent journals about difficulties in her life. As a artist I know very well commissions always take priority over trades, thus I didn't pressure her. Eventually I did poke her and communications had picked up once again. I had hope she'd finish it after I did remind her about it. A time of silence started again. NinjaKato was still posting personal art, newly finished YCHs and sometimes trades from others. I had given her one final poke on Nov 11th, 2015 and the note had been read. No response back. She continued to upload new art of personal sketches, redraws, YCHs, and adoptables. At this point I am not expecting to see my half and have accepted it. Primarily posting this beware to give a heads up that this artist may not always finish pieces they promise to do. EDIT: NinjaKato finished their half. This AB can be marked as resolved

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/922014.html WHERE: http://chirart.tumblr.com WHAT: digital sketch commission WHEN: Paid August 31, 2015 (in one of the emails I mention September, but I was mistaken; it was August). Was first told that commission would be finished January 2016. Most recent contact August 10, 2016; still have not received commission. PROOF: EXPLAIN: I commissioned a digital sketch on August 31, 2015. As one can see in the Terms of Service, the waiting period can be up to 4 months. I want to say it was around November that the artist also suffered an injury that kept her from being able to create art, and I didn't want to give the impression that I was in a hurry to get the piece while she was recovering. In December 2015 I contacted her to check on how the commission progress was coming along. I was told it would be done either by the end of that month or early in January 2016. By April I still saw no sign of the commission, so I asked if there was an ETA in sight, as one can see in one of the screenshots. The artist told me that she should be working on my commission "soon", since she would be working solely on commissions that month. I sent an email in June that never got a response, and again in July. After not getting a response I sent her an ask on Tumblr on August 10, 2016. It turns out that my emails ended up in her spam box, and she apologized profusely for this. She then told me she would get the commission done that day and send it to me that night, which is the only instance I've ever seen a definite time to expect a finished product. It is now the 14th of August, very close to a year after I first paid, and I have yet to see any sign of the commission. I feel it is also worth pointing out that the artist never initiated any conversations with me. I initiated every conversation, and I feel I have been largely left in the dark throughout this process. I sent a stern (still polite) email saying that I would like to have seen an explanation as to why the commission couldn't be finished in the given time. I don't mind waiting for a commission, but I expect better communication on the artist's part. I've also told the artist that I don't want to ask for a refund just yet, because I still have a small amount of faith that I will see the commission that I've been so eager to receive. I plan on updating this post once I receive a response. UPDATE: As of August 14, 2016 I *HAVE* received my commission, to my great relief. That being said, if you are patient you will get your commission eventually, but the communication quality leaves something to be desired. To reiterate, I don't mind having to wait for a commission and I understand that life happens, but I as a client I expect to be given a heads-up if my commission is going to take longer than expected.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/877734.html I bought a YCH from this person for $12, which isn't much. I paid them $15 because I thought their "skill" was impressive and that I should tip a bit. They got the piece done in a very good amount of time, but it was brought to my attention that the piece was traced from another artist's art. I was refunded the full amount very quickly, but they deny that they had traced. Other than that, they are a really nice person. It's just a shame to see talent go wasted by copying others. Their Profiles: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/lakeore/ http://lakeadopts.deviantart.com/ http://princedeanmon.tumblr.com/ (NSFW!!) YCH Posting: https://i.gyazo.com/096020fd94b9c73870ac1d51dc24008a.png Finished: https://i.gyazo.com/b67e895559cd8c30b3934a409b078d5b.png Comments: https://i.gyazo.com/80909a81f2aa53a7d27f41ad02b3f0c7.png Original Artist's Piece: http://www.furaffinity.net/view/15173282 Overlay: https://i.gyazo.com/5dabdf1918b7e76919a4bbe2b4ce8bf9.png Proof of Payment/Refund: https://i.gyazo.com/6c6e1af37595afd7bfee860f45b1d1ee.png "But I didn't trace!": https://i.gyazo.com/b1577ac2d9aeee1158377eb0a3be0e26.png Just wanted to give a heads up. I have no idea how credible their adopts/other art are, but I wouldn't trust it.

Amtrask reached out to me and requested I make them a plush on Nov 14th 2023. We went back and forth a bit discussing this. They wanted a plush that looked like their OC, a human named Max. I said I would do this for $250. They agreed. However they said they had issues with their bank card. I said this was fine and we agreed on split payments. Here's the story of our transaction. Amtrask commissioned a custom doll from me and has received it. They were pleased with the plush and said quote "Max finally arrived today, which was amazing and such a relief! He's gorgeous!". They also received the fabric they requested. The only request I received was to send them more of the fabric from my sewing supplies, which I never agreed to. I explained there was a misunderstanding and that I sent them fabric for their clothes. Amtrask was unable to accept this and demanded I send them more of my fabric. While making the plush, there were various stages that went through personal approval with the customer. Each step before I continued I would reach out to Amtrask and they would accept the work before I moved on. This was a long and lengthy process. I finished the body of the plush and it was approved by the customer. Then I moved onto the process of making clothes. The customer requested the clothes be made as removable so that they could play with them. Since these are handmade items, the plushies I make can definitely be cuddled and played with but they aren't suitable for rough play since they do not have safety labels or certifications. I suggested that the clothes be sewn on. They insisted I leave the clothes as is. The customer then asked if I could send the leftover material fabric so they could use it for their own personal sewing. Since we are at the stage of discussing the clothes, I thought this would be fine since the clothes did not meet their expectations, that way they could make their own clothes. I gave them a quote for the fabric and they agreed to buy it from me. It was sent and received with the plush they bought. Everything they paid for is accounted for. The only reason a claim was filed was because I did not send them more of my personal fabric, which I explained that I never agreed to do. Their next message again demanded I send them the minky fabric I used for the body. They claimed it was something I promised. Again I explained there had been a misunderstanding. This time I decided to block them as our business had been concluded. They were happy with what they received and only asked for more fabric from me where I was not going to be sending them additional fabrics. In retaliation this customer went on Etsy and began sending me aggressive messages. They begin demands for 1/3 of the payment for the plush be returned to them and the fabric they paid for to be refunded. I respond to them refusing the refund since they received the plush happily. The only problems you will see arise after I refuse to send them the remainder of my sewing supplies. I also make a request for them to stop contacting me. In retaliation for refusing the fabric and blocking them, the Paypal claim is then filed at this point. They file two separate claims against me. The first is for the fabric ($15.33) fraudulently stating that it never arrived. The second is for roughly 1/3 of the plush ($83.00) now claiming it was not as described. After I responded to the Paypal claims Amtrask sent me messages on Etsy attacking my character, questioning my character for responding to their Paypal claims. After not getting their way, Amtrask begins to refer to me by my legal name instead of my artist name. This is a tactic (in my opinion) to intimidate me. I do not go by my legal name online, I go by Starful on every platform. The only reason they have my legal name is because on Paypal it is required. I also believe Amtrask attempted to gaslight me, making me feel as though these events did not happen as I perceived them to. Except I have proof that they were satisfied and thankful during the process of creating their plush. I will also explain after I accepted the order and after Amtrask sent me several messages with revised references, they went on my Etsy store and purchased two small plushies from me. I will include those as well. This is why they decided to move to Etsy to begin harassing me after I blocked them. We had no previous communication on Etsy. This smaller order was in November. Unfortunately if you block someone on Etsy they can still continue to send you abusive messages as much as they'd like. Some additional details about our transaction. These weren't necessarily blacklist worthy to me, they just caused me a lot of unnecessary grief during the process of completing their plush order. After I accepted the commission, I explained that it would take me some time to fill. I wasn't exactly sure how long, but I explained I had other orders and that I would fill their order last. I gave an estimate but still explained I wasn't sure how long it would take. This is not the type of order I usually take after all. While I worked on other orders Amtrask began sending me their reference over and over. The pictures had very little difference between them, if at all. They would also delete their previous photo that they sent me so it was hard for me to compare. I did not save any of the reference photos to prevent myself from being confused, I have the first image they sent me as well as the final reference photo. You can decide for yourself if there are clear differences between the first and last image to warrant the amount of pings I received to my inbox. This plush was sent internationally. Amtrask requested that I upgrade the post, but it had slipped my mind at the time. After the plush was sent, there was a period where the tracking did not update for 4 days. Amtrask began to send me many messages concerned their package was taking a while and that it was lost. I reassured them to wait and apologized for not upgrading their post. I gave them the estimated date I had been given. In their response they projected their feelings onto me and were unreasonable. I tried to reassure them after this. I reached out to Etsy two days in a row on the phone calling to see if I could get information for them to comfort them. Even after the tracking was updated they expressed worry that the package would not be delivered. [removed cap was here] - admin

Who: Holomouse Where: https://x.com/MouseHolo When: Apr 1st, 2021 & April 9th 2021 What: 2 digital art commissions This has dragged on for almost 3 years due to a combination of life happenings, and the fact that I was on my way out of things I had been involved with for almost a decade, and it sat on the back of my mind for a long time because of that. No WIPS were ever shown to me after multiple claims that they would be done. Initially this was for a 2 character NSFW MLP commission, but subsequent offers were made that I accepted (regretfully). Much of the details of things are blacked out to maintain my privacy as best I can. My first commission inquiry was in March 2021, and I initially made contact on Discord to ask if they could provide with quotes so I could get the money to pay them with later: After that exchange, they provided a quote of $135 for a two fullbody character piece, and I told them that I would get back to them after my next paycheck: On April 1st 2021, I paid for the first commission: Proof of payment: On April 5th, Holomouse messaged me on Discord asking me for $20 and said they would pay me back in a few days. They cited personal matters stressing them out and needing some help. This is unrelated to the art I paid for, but I did end up giving them $20 as a gesture of kindness. This also started the trend of Holomouse coming to me in private begging for handouts and money, and this happened multiple times: On April 9th 2021, Holomouse messaged me on Discord and begged for money, but this came with the offer of another 2 character art piece at a discounted rate of $110. I accepted this offer and sent the payment to them on CashApp. Told them I would give them the commission prompt after they completed the first commission: Proof of 2nd payment: On April 16th, 2021, the first commission had no progress, but I gave them the prompt for the second commission: April 20th, 2021, Holomouse begged me for another $50, and I declined. On April 28th, 2021, I poked Holomouse on Discord to try and see if any progress was made on the commissions. They sent back with an excuse: May 7th 2021, Holomouse came to me and said that they would be starting work on my commissions soon, but also begged for $25 at the same time: The next day on May 8th, they sent me a big message with a screenshot of a note that mentioned paying me back and other personal matters that they needed to tend to: Another 20 days pass, and there is no progress to show. Holomouse messages me and begs for money again, and shares an image of their bank account being in the negative as an attempt to manipulate me into sending them money. I declined: Another week passes, and Holomouse comes to me wanting to reconfirm the details of the commissions. I told them to scrap the details of the 1st commission and that I would give them a new prompt. Also told them to take the prompt of the 2nd commission and work on that one first. I would give them details for the 2nd after the first one was completed: On June 17th 2021, I poked them and gave them details of the prompt for the commission idea that was scrapped. It took them another 2 weeks to respond to this message: Now we jump to December 27th 2021. I poke them on Discord for an update and did not get a reply for another week. Things started to get very chaotic after this point, so my attempts at keeping up with this matter become much more delayed going forward: On February 11th, 2022 I messaged them and asked when they would be able to start working on the commissions. I got a response, but it was another fake out: Another 3 months passed, and on May 26th 2022 I poked them to try and get an update. This went nowhere: We get to September 21st 2022 and I poked them yet again. Took them 3 days to respond, and also went nowhere: More time passes and this sits for months with no updates. On February 12th 2023, Holomouse sends to me and says that they will be starting soon, and also wanted me to reconfirm what I had wanted. Blacked out section was a Discord screenshot of previous exchanges between the two of us: I changed the prompts for the art I wanted from Holo, and gave them references so they could start working. The references and details of these prompts are blacked out to maintain my privacy: Several months pass after this, and after confronting them on twitter I was mad because they had taken commissions and completed them several times in the times that I was waiting for the art that I paid them to do. They had deleted Twitter posts of their offerings, and also posts of them begging for money to the public. This is a screenshot of me responding to a deleted post of them offering new commissions to their followers. Note the username that it is a reply to: I had already contacted their other customers and clients that Holo had completed work for, and also clients that had waited for months for Holo to do art for them. There were several others affected, but this post is about my experience with Holomouse and not theirs. Needless to say, it was a big problem. After confronting on Twitter, this moved to Discord in private. They try to tell me that they will be starting to work on the art soon, and I was having none of that. This all went down on September 14th 2023. At the same time, I was trying to be merciful and set up a way for them to work with me and make it easier on themselves. They could pay me back partially with some art, pay fully in art, or pay me back fully. In their replies they mention that they owed back $2000 to other customers... We set up a payment plan to pay me back $300, and Holo also took an extra step and said they would fulfill the art while paying back the money they owed me: The next day, I gave them a prompt for art they said they would do as repayment: 3 days later they message and ask for a few clarifying details, and I provide those: September 23rd 2023, I message them asking if they will be sending the first $50 as a part of the payment plan, and I received an excuse: I message again after another jump in time, and get a delayed response: On November 16th 2023, I finally get the first $50 back: After this, I continue to get ghosted, and so I gave them an ultimatum after discovering from one of their other customers that they refunded them $95. The whole time I was coordinating with other clients of theirs to try and pressure them at the same time as one another, but this did not work out. Holomouse had already started to pay me back, and then decided to tell me that they are prioritizing other clients money before mine. I informed them that I would be making a beware post to this site, and they acknowledged this. As of now, they still owe me back $250, and they have scrubbed their Twitter account of recent examples of begging and some posts of commission offers. There are screenshots of many of these posts, but they have a fuzzy time format so they do not hold much merit. Holomouse has started to become active again on Twitter and has also started to stream on Twitch. I still want my money back and it will hopefully make its way back to me eventually. Holomouse is still likely going to continue to beg for money on Twitter, Twitch, and in private, but I hope this makes it clear how irresponsible and manipulative they are.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/829508.html It's really disheartening to have to come forward with this report, but after having patience and trying to negotiate with the artist, I have begun to feel like I had no choice on this matter, especially after many people have instructed me to come forward. I apologize for this post being very long; I wanted to make sure I included all the details I possibly could. Who/Where: Fursuit Maker: Frostcat-Studio / Ritz_Bitz / Ritz_Tweeting When I originally considered looking into getting my first fursuit, I had only heard of this maker through the recommendation of a mutual friend. From looking at their gallery, they seemed to have very nice work and I was given the impression that they could provide me with similar work. What: One Partial Fursuit ($1200) I had originally contacted Ritz for a fursuit in June of 2014 and on June 27th we agreed to a price of $1200 to make my partial, which included a large tail and also a set of wings. Here you can see Ritz had offered to add a magnetic feature to the wings so they could be worn under a shirt with a harness and I was charged and extra $170 for this addition. ->The email can be viewed here <- (Our conversation is very casual as we had been united through a mutual friend) On September 20th 2014, I confirmed my slot and placed my 50% down payment. -> Link for Proof <- (Ritz real name has been blanked) Then, on November 25th 2014 I paid my remaining $600. (The screen shot shows a total of an additional $1200 as I also paid off the remaining $600 on the mutual friend's balance to help them out. That amount is not related to my entry) -> Link for final Payment Proof <- Explain: At first, Ritz kept very good communication when working on my fursuit and seemed interested in making it "just right". She replied to my inquires often and kept reliable contact with me, even sending me work in progress images from time to time. While I would get pictures, I never really was sure what I was looking at in terms of what she had been doing; I was never given any explanation and was issued vague descriptions, which is possibly my fault for not speaking up on but I had never commissioned a suit before and felt I should place my trust in the maker to do their job. The first red flag that came to me was when she would inquire about my second payment and instead of contacting me directly, she would ask the mutual friend to remind me on her behalf. This really struck me as odd given the mutual friend was not working for Ritz and my contact information was established prior. I ended up ignoring my gut on this issue given the mutual friend was close to both of us and since this was a friendly transaction, I considered it to just be another casual aspect of the entire affair. Ritz proposed the completion date (By Further Confusion 2015) and said that having it complete by this time would be no issue, so I planned to attend this convention so I could have a good time fursuiting for the first time. Overall, the anticipation building for this costume was immense as I would be flying in from Florida to attend the convention in California just to have a chance to wear it for the first time. On January 4th (approximately 10 days before the convention), I was shown images of my completed fursuit via Twitter and Skype. The images were not close ups or anything, so from first appearances I was excited. While it wasn't the quality I had expected, I was still excited to have a costume regardless. I should take responsibility for my qualms with the quality as when browsing her gallery I had not noticed the suits that stood out to me were all built on headbases made by other fursuit makers when mine would be built from scratch; That being said my expectations for what I would receive were not completely accurate and it was my fault for not researching further. Regardless, I told her I was happy with it visually and was eager to wear a fursuit for the first time. Overtime, I ended up coming into a disagreement with the mutual friend who had connected Ritz and I for the commission and we began to grow apart. I didn't think it would effect my commission with Ritz in anyway, but later on I would find it was quite the opposite. (This is only important to note as it will become relevant later on.) Originally, the suit was going to be shipped to the mutual friend and delivered to me at the convention however due to (what I can only assume to be) rising tension, the mutual friend opted not to deliver the costume to me. Given I was flying in from across the country, I asked a friend from Southern California to have it shipped to them instead since they would be driving to the convention. The friends who ended up having the fursuit shipped to them did not open the box in any way until they found me at the convention and I opened it myself. January 15th When I made it to the convention, I met up with my friends from Southern California (I was also rooming with them) and they had my fursuit box in the hotel room waiting for me. At first glace, I was already very upset. The box was very poorly packaged and looked very ragged. I would have thought it could have been mangled by the postal service but it seemed the degrading box was actually taped up in areas where it was falling apart and that tape was laid beneath the original packing where the shipping information was. It was very clear that Ritz reused a battered and trashed box to ship my $1200 product and my concern began to grow before I had even seen the costume. Upon opening the box, the first thing that was staring at me was a foot paw that was falling apart. The box had just been opened and the suit was already damaged in quite visible ways. Thankfully, I had a room full of witnesses that helped me gather pictures of the unboxing. Here is a visual collection of the damages that we discovered. -> The footpaws were separating from the shoes (That I had to purchase myself and ship to her) before they were ever worn. -> The bottom Jaw and horns were crooked and the head was barely foamed so it would lose it's shape when not worn. -> The seam in the fur on the direct center of the muzzle was popped despite never having been worn yet. -> The balaclava was not attached with only a few tiny dabs of hot glue and separated from the foam and also has various holes in it. -> In fact, the Balaclava had MANY holes in it. -> The fur on the hand paws was poorly shaved and some of the claws were upside down. -> The shave job was uneven and jagged. -> And in some places, the fur was shaved all the way down to the backing. Now, as you can imagine, I was not very pleased to open the box and discover the suit was in such a mess after never being worn. Some of the mistakes I saw were very common from beginner suit makers however I was given the impression that Ritz was NOT a new maker and had enough experience to warrant the $1200 price tag (which could buy a partial from many makers who would not have made these mistakes). On top of all these issues, I discovered that the set of wings I had ordered for this costume did not feature any magnetic attachments at all. Instead, the wings were sewn directly into a harness made from elastic straps, making it impossible to wear them without having the harness worn on top of my clothes. This was also very upsetting given Ritz had offered to make this feature for me and charged me an additional $170 for it, yet never once mentioned to me during the construction process that they would no longer be doing the magnet idea. I immediately decided to contact Ritz as she was at the convention and perhaps she could do enough quick fixes so I could at least wear my fursuit; I did fly in from across the country just to wear it around afterall. I didn't mind waiting on fixing the other issues, but I at least wanted some help fixing the shoes. I decided to contact our mutual friend to get in touch with Ritz because I had no other way to reach her at the time. We met up and I explained what the problems were and she agreed to get the feet fixed. We went to Ritz's hotel room and she did a quick hot glue job on the paws with me standing there. It was not very thorough but it seemed like it was enough to keep them together for the time being. I also had the chance to ask about the missing magnets and she explained that there were no magnets strong enough to hold the wings in place (which isn't true since you can order some that can hold up to 75lbs!) so she opted to sew them to the harness without informing me to meet the tight deadline. After Ritz "fixed" the feet, I went back to my hotel room and decided to wear my suit as it was to try and enjoy the convention. The next morning, I went to participate in the fursuit parade and that was when the fur on my foot paws began to separate again; this time on both feet. Additionally, the buckram connected to the plastic to make the eyes began to separate and peel from the plastic. This was also when I noticed that the plastic has been hastily cut and there were strands of of debris going into the space where my actual eyes were. After the parade, I found Ritz again to show her what was happening with my brand new suit and she seemed very disinterested in my issues. When I brought attention to the issue with the eye popping out, both Ritz and the mutual friend (whom was with her the entire con) began to give me sass and snark about not being "too rough" with the costume then walked off without making any attempt to help me with the situation. I was pretty appalled at this reaction given I paid so much money for a costume to wear and was basically being told not to wear it if I didn't want it to fall apart. I had been just wearing the suit like any normal person would, I wasn't jabbing the eyes in with my finger or anything for goodness sake. It was at this point the mutual friend decided to get involved and began sending me text messages that said I was being rude and "mean" to Ritz for contacting her about these issues and the issues in question were not her fault. Why was the suit maker's friend getting involved and handling this situation? This had nothing to do with them so why were they acting as a messenger for Ritz? At this point, I was given the very strong impression that Ritz no longer wanted to provide me with any help for the costume, so in order to make it wearable I asked for the help of my friends (I was rooming with) to help me do minor repairs. I was forced to go out and buy a glue gun and ask a friend to cut time from her convention experience to keep the suit intact. During the time we spent fixing it, we also began to see even more issues with the craftsmanship. -> The zipper on the back of the head was glued to the fur instead of sewn and began to separate. -> The horns were discovered to have no foam to anchor them, explaining why they were crooked. I think the majority of my convention time was spent with a friend trying to repair this costume. We were absolutely sure not to modify anything, just attempt to repair the poor craftsmanship. After a certain point, my friend explained to me that we should stop repairing it all together because the state it was in just couldn't be saved at a convention. I attempted to contact Ritz once more via twitter DMs to try and show her the state of the suit before the end of the convention but she unfortunately decided to start ignoring me. I was polite and kind because I wasn't mad as much desperate to fix these issues. It was such a frustrating experience because I just wanted some resolution for this costume that I spent a large sum of money on and the person who sold it to me made me feel like they had zero concern for the situation now that the money was already in their hands. To make things worse, a few hours later Ritz began tweeting about me to try and detract from my issues, implying that I was picking on them because I had a disagreement with the mutual friend. This was just the end to my willingness to work with this fursuit maker anymore and I ended up sitting in tears while friends comforted me. One of my friends began discussing things with Ritz on twitter because it very strongly felt that she would not be dealing with me beyond this point and Ritz began stating that the problems with the costume were not actually there nor her fault and began to explain that the situation had very much been influenced by my falling out with the mutual friend. My friend then decided to take the conversation with her in private and they discussed the situation because Ritz still would not talk directly to me. During the private conversation with my friend, Ritz admitted to rushing my fursuit and stated that she could not afford to refund the costume but would work out a plan after the convention to make things right. She also stated that it was "shitty" or me to not want repairs at this point and called it unreasonable. I may be unreasonable for not wanting repairs, but I don't trust this individual with my money anyone given these problems would not exist if the care needed was put in to begin with not to mention the constant avoidance with my problems. I did not feel this person wanted to fix things correctly. After Ritz had conversation with my friend, it was decided that after the convention she would absolutely talk to me about the problems with the costume and find a resolution. (I can provide screen shots of this entire conversation if necessary, however I opted to leave them out initially as so my friend would not be dragged into the issue. I firmly believe this should have stayed between Ritz and myself and the constant involvement from third parties has really caused more drama than needed.) January 20th (2015) Two days after the convention, Ritz contacts me on Skype and begins trying to work out a situation from the suit. She begins by offering me two options; One is to send the suit back for repairs or I can send the suit to be stripped and turned into a different character that she can sell. She tells me that I can not be refunded 30% of the fursuit cost as the cost of the materials can not be returned. Despite finding that option to be very unfair (given I would be returning the suit to her so she could recoup her losses and the reason for refund was not a cancellation but rather the product was broken and the fault was hers), I agreed and stated that after all that had happened and the personal involvement of her friend causing tension I did not want it refurbished; I just wanted a refund. She also explains to me that she -can not refund me at all- until I return the suit and she resells it, thus leaving my money weighing on the uncertainty of weather or not the suit sells and if it does, would it sell for the $800 she says I am owed? She insists she will not refund money until I send the suit back, however that was understandable and we agreed. She also mentions at the same time that she will send $200 refund in "good faith" (that I have never since seen). I am kind and understanding with her and even apologetic for the situation that unfolded despite being at no fault myself. I wanted to make things right and I felt bad that she had spent the last few days tweeting about never wanting to make suits again. I felt guilty for the distress I put her through so I even said I would think about letting her repair the suit after she pushed that option on me constantly (despite saying I did not want it). She additionally admits to her friend's presence having effected her business with me and even the way she treated me as a customer, which sent even more red flags to me, but she genuinely seemed like she wanted to make things right so I did my best to return it. Her main concern throughout the entire conversation was her name and reputation, which seemed very off-putting given I felt her main concern should have been to fix the situation with my costume. -> Conversation can be found here <- January 30th (2015) About ten days after our conversation, I gave Ritz my final decision. I took note to how stressed she was over the decision and gave her time to come down from the ordeal. I politely explained to her that I did not feel comfortable sending her the suit and waiting for her to resell it before I would receive any money. I stated that I would gladly return the suit after I was refunded and left it at that. -> Link to Conversation <- The Next day, Ritz replies to me stating that she can not refund me for the amount I am owed until I return the suit in parts for her to resell and asks for a week to figure something out. She explains that she will use her tax refund to pay me the money I am owed and I reassure her that I can wait for a refund as long as it needs to be. My main concern is still that I do not want to return the goods until I am compensated for them. This is when her contact slows to a grinding halt. She openly begins to dodge my communication and puts me on the back burner and does not contact me in any way unless I put an effort into contacting her. February 12th I end up contacting her as it has been nearly two weeks since her last contact with me. Again, I am civil and I calmly ask what the game plan is for the situation. On February 14th I get a reply in which she states that her tax refund was small and she would not be able to refund me from that money. She also goes back on her word in stating that she would refund me and takes an aggressive tone, calling our agreed upon solution to be "unfair" and says that my failure to trust her is preventing me from getting my money back. Now, I'm going to throw some personal opinion in here but...how am I being unfair? She agreed to refund me and suddenly is changing her tune and even going as far as to insinuate that this situation is my fault for "not trusting her". The problem is, I already trusted her with $1200 to deliver a product to me in functioning order. She not only failed to do that, but she also insulted me, ignored me and went as far as to try and claim her faulty craftsmanship (which she admitted to) was -my- fault. Yes, I do not trust her with giving me my money back and I will not relinquish the costume until I am given a refund. I am not asking for both the suit and a refund, I am asking to be compensated -before- I give up the costume. The artist's financial issues are not my concern, what is my concern is the money that she had taken from me and will not return. -> This reply can be viewed here <- She has dodged contact with me and has put me in a situation where I am not sure if I am going to have this situation resolved. On February 17th, I contacted her asking for her to talk to me when I was online as I didn't enjoy playing message tag when the subject was so important. I tried once more on the 18th to reach out and beg for conversation on the topic and reaffirmed my stance about her taking back the product to resell. I even went as far as to offer my phone number to try and resolve the issue but she had left me in the dark, all while spending time on twitter and talking to other people on skype. I am fully aware I am being ignored and it's gotten to the point where I am getting ready to file a charge back on paypal if this doesn't get resolved soon. -> Proof of contact attempts <- (screen shots were taken on 2/18/2015) 2/21 - Ritz contacted me in response to my final message in which I explained that I felt that I didn't believe it was fair to charge me for materials when I would be returning the suit for her to recoup that loss and because the issue with the costume was not due to cancellation or error on my end. I admit that I did change my mind in terms of the refund I was willing to accept though the advice of many friends and other artists swayed my mind. I did agree that taking a partial refund for having zero product on an issue that was no fault of my own felt very wrong, but I may be out of line for having brought that up and changing my stance I take responsibility for that. She responded aggressively, again cursing at me and using profanity. I was given a "final option" in which I was told I will wait until she gets her tax refund after I return the broken merchandise she had given me before I will receive any financial compensation. I don't feel that this is ever a way an artist or suit maker should ever talk to or treat a client, but maybe I am bitter and misinterpreted her reply as more rude than it actually was. I politely asked her to calm down because her abrasive reply felt very flustered and asked her to give me a phone call so we can figure things out. She explains that she can't handle phone calls due to anxiety so despite it being a difficult work around for me (my work generally keeps me very busy) I understand her position and tell her I can easily wait for her to finish helping a friend move out. She asks me if I would "actually want to resolve this civilly" which struck me as rude given I don't feel I have been anything but? - > Conversation <- As of now, it is 2/27/15 and we have not resolved the issue at all. I feel like I am constantly being fed excuses, ignored and just treated very poorly in general and as a customer that paid $1200 for a costume that is barely wearable, I feel like this shouldn't be the case? I just feel like I'm stuck in a run around and I can't help but think I'm not doing the wrong thing? This is the first time I've ever commissioned a fursuit so perhaps my inexperience is what keeps this situation from being resolved? I'd be happy to take fault if I knew what I was doing wrong! I'm hoping that in posting this entry, I can warn people about this maker's shady business practices, lack of professionalism and lack of concern for their customers. I'm also hoping this may be the final nudge needed to get Ritz to acknowledge me and resolve the situation before I file for a charge back on Paypal. $1200 is quite a sum of money to be over drafted and I would absolutely prefer not to financially break this artist. I just want resolution, I want her to give me a game plan and show concern for the situation and give me a refund for the broken product she gave me. EDIT: 3/4/2015 On the day this entry had been posted, Ritz returned from attending an Anime convention and contacted me. She has posted the caps herself below, however just to be sure, here is the gist of what was said: -> Conversation <- While yes, she did offer to refund me $800, she also went on to bring up unexpected bills she mentioned on twitter and debts which made me feel extremely guilty in accepting any money from her when her personal life needed the money so much more. As I have said countless times, I am not out to be a bully in any way; I just want a refund for the broken costume I was given. Later in the day while I was at work, Ritz confronts me on skype with this: I wasn't even aware the entry had been posted at that point as I was on patrol at work (I am a police officer) and she begins getting aggressive on me, stating that she thought this was resolved and saying she was insulted. For one thing, this post was made days prior when I had not yet received any contact, secondly I would never consider this issue to be revolved until the money is in my hands and the fursuit was in hers. At this point, she offers me a NDA Contract because she no longer "trusts" me for having made this entry. Ritz is well aware that I have now requested a full $1200 for my refund because as others have mentioned here, I should not take a material cost loss when the issues with the transaction were not my own. The contract is incredibly damaging for me in which is states that I am unable to speak of the event in public or to third parties and states that Ritz may deduct from my refund if she is unable to sell the broken suit she crafted. I have screen capped the contract issued to me (I had to censor our names) and would like AB's input. -> The NDA/Contract I was offered <- (Ritz is the first party where as I am the second) I do not feel comfortable having to sign a contract to have the money I am owed returned to me; I feel like this is a form of blackmail in order to try and silence me if I want the money I am owed back, furthermore the amount offered is not what I am requesting. I want a full refund and that is what I am standing firm on, especially if Ritz is going to refurbish and sell the broken merchandise I was sold. I do not feel fit signing a binding legal agreement that states I am unable to make "any other online postings about the other party" I am additionally saddened by Ritz response here in the community claiming I have falsified any documentation in this entry and went as far as to accuse me of Libel and Slander within the proposed contract. I have not fabricated any of the content within this journal nor would I have had to should I received a functioning product to begin with. I also asked a few friends to review the contract that was presented to me, to which Ritz stated I should never do unless I approach a lawyer. I am in disbelief I was scolded for asking for input before signing a binding legal contract and that made me feel like Ritz knowingly attempted to shaft me. Additionally, while discussing the public image Ritz has gained from this entryI was suddenly confronted with Ritz's fiance (who could not bother to spell my name correctly). I expressed to him that I have no interest in talking to him about the transaction and want Ritz to be present. She returns and demands I resolve this tonight -> Conversation <- At this phase, I am done playing games with Ritz. I am tired of being treated like a bully or a bad guy when I have done all I can to be agreeable and helpful with this situation. My job requires a very taxing amount of my time and I can't be bothered to jump through hoops anymore. I have issues Ritz a final statement and that is where I am leaving it. I will not be accepting any amount under the original $1200 I have paid and if a resolution is not reached within the week, I will be filing a charge back OR if that fails I will be taking legal action. Ritz has proven to me that her reputation takes precedence above her clients and that is why I can not be bothered to be involved in her personal financial matters or give leniency anymore. -> My final statement to her about the matter <- At this point, this issue is not resolved despite Ritz claiming it to be so on social media. Edit 2: Ritz has now hidden her twitter from public view due to her initiating issues with people discussing this entry and claiming she was harassed. I do not support anyone causing her trouble on social media and I have not encouraged any of that behavior. Edit 3: Approximately one hour after I had amended this entry with the NDA they proposed to me, Ritz contacted me again and negotiated a refund. Her reply was as unprofessional as the rest and was of course not without an attempted guilt trip. She assumed my commentary about conventions and ski trips were about money when in reality it was about her lack of contact with me (in the cases where I was told she was too busy to negotiate with me). After accusing me of harassment and reminding me about her tax refund, I was asked to give her my paypal and complied. Despite constantly being told that she could not afford to refund me in full, I was suddenly sent the full amount of $1200. This left me a bit unsettled, however I wasn't going to ask any more when I got what I had requested. I have informed her that I would alter the entry and mark the situation as resolved. I will also be shipping the fursuit back to her this week and will edit the entry one last time to prove I have made good on my end of the bargain. I want to thank the Artist's Beware community for it's insight and help on dealing with this situation. This community is a valuable resource and I am glad to have been able to use it. As far as this entry goes, while it is now resolved I would still consider it a more than valid beware. I think the entry speaks for itself and down to the very end this maker could not handle a professional attitude. I also want to note that this suit will be refurbished and relisted for sale, so buyer beware in the future. I am very disappointed that things between this maker and I had to come to this. I was very polite and willing to work with them to accommodate their own situations if they would help me with mine and that refusal just made it impossible. Ultimately, it was not the desire to right a wrong that got me my refund, it was the desire to salvage their reputation that finally made a nearly two month long ordeal come to a close. If the maker had just shown the same concern for me as a client as they did for their reputation, this post wouldn't have had to be made. EDIT: 3/6/2015: The fursuit has been shipped to Ritz. I can provide a tracking number to the entry if needed and also visual documentation was taken to provide proof the suit was shipped in the most protective way possible, including the individual parts being bagged to prevent weather damage to eliminate any claims proper care was not taken.

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.

Oct. 28th, 2011 at 9:34 AM nnoitorah This is further to my advice post here: http://artists-beware.livejournal.com/530250.html WHO: Bambiboo3 / Happy Tails WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/bambiboo3/ WHAT: Premade fursuit head and tail, as seen here: http://www.furbuy.com/auctions/1026446.html WHEN: Auction ended on 12th October 2011. PROOF: Here's a screencap of my communications with Bambiboo3 from winning the auction. A little explanation first though: I do not live in the USA. I had asked Bambiboo3 prior to bidding if she would ship internationally and she said no. Thus I asked if she would ship this to my very good friend of many years who lives in NC, she agreed, and I placed a bid. My intention from there was to either take a trip over soon and collect the partial or arrange for it to be delivered myself, either way, I made clear to Bambiboo3 that the final part of the delivery would be entirely my responsibility. This isn't really relevant to the beware at all but it might clear up any confusion. Here are photos of the package: NB: anything linking to address details has been edited out, as has Bambiboo3's surname as I have not seen this posted publicly. EXPLAIN: On October 12th I won Bambiboo3's auction for a premade fursuit head and tail over on Furbuy. I emailed her asking for a quote on shipping, which she told me would be $35, for a total of $435. I Paypal'd over $435. She replies to me stating that: "you forgot to add the paypal charges so it came in $17.27 short. If you dont mind sending that last bit that would be great" I was a little taken aback as nowhere on the auction had it mentioned a Paypal fee, and I knew this to be against Paypal rules. I also was taken aback that it was implied I'd "forgotten" it, as if I should have known to add this, or she'd told me to add it. I replied to her stating as much and her response was basically that she asked for $435, but that's not what she ended up with after the fee - thus I should make up the rest. At this point I admit my communications (seen above) got a little irate and not as well phrased as they could have been, I was feeling unwell at the time and was not expecting these difficulties. I asked a number of friends online what I should do (I really did want the head and she was saying she'd relist it) or whether it was fair, to which they said it was not. One of them told me it was against Furbuy policy so I contacted them too, asking about that. They responded that it was definitely not acceptable, and thus I replied telling Bambiboo3 so, and she decided to drop the charge. So some days pass and the head arrives with my friend on October 26th. She immediately contacts me by IM to let me know and unpacks it to check everything is in order. The head, I am told, is just fine and is nice quality. She did say to me though, "how much did you say you paid for shipping again?"...to which I replied $35. She advised me it was stickered with $10.74 and a 70 cent Delivery Confirmation - making my bill over $20 higher than the actual shipping cost. I was also told it was packaged in an old blender box and packed with wadded up grocery bags, and you can see that in the photos above, meaning that none of that was spent on packaging, either. Again annoyed, I emailed Bambiboo3 asking about this discrepancy. That was over 24 hours ago, and with all other emails being answered promptly and seeing as she's been faving things on FA, I assume she doesn't have a good simple answer for this. I may be jumping the gun but at this point I can only recommend against dealing with her. I know this head didn't go for as much as she would like - she was looking at around $700 for head and tail before putting it on Furbuy - but my impression is that she just tries to frisk the customer for anything she can get. EDIT - seeing that Bambiboo has been faving art and posting FA journals, I decided to send her another email: Hey again, I see you have been active on FurAffinity so I guess you either did not receive or are ignoring my last email outright. At this point I want to make you aware that I posted about our transaction to "artists_beware" because I am really not impressed with this. - Sarah I feel like I'm probably not going to get anything back at this point, but I think her (most likely) ignoring my last email is really the icing on the cake here. EDIT 2 - Bambiboo3 has replied to my last email quickly. The conversation is as follows (screencaps available if needed, but it's quicker this way for now): I havent recieved an email O.o when did you send it? My response: The email was sent on the 27th just after midnight your time. Here's a copypaste: -last email as shown above- Bambiboo: Wow im sorry , no the first one didnt come through. So the package was shipped parcel? >.< Oh jeaz i apologize it was supposed to be sent express because i wanted to get it out to you as soon as possible since i was a couple days late getting it out. I dont have a drivers license myself so i have someone send the packages out for me they must have mixed up the packages i gave them that day. If you give me your paypal address ill refund that right away. Me: If you would like to refund I suggest you go to your Paypal and open up our transaction, from there you have an option to issue a partial refund. I would prefer it refunded in this way for my records if you could. It would be much appreciated and I will edit the LJ post to reflect this. Thanks, Sarah She has now issued me a refund. I honestly can't say I am convinced by the excuses but I am happy to have a refund and consider the postage part of the beware resolved.

Disclaimer: the screenshots I have are the best I can get from discord chats where I talked with others about the commission months ago. Commissioner blocked me (see attachment 1) immediately after my saying I wasn't content with my commission compared to others they've done, thus I cannot get any other screenshots than those I have here. -- Proper: Our first contact about the commission was right after they posted they were open for commissions and (of I remember right) in need of help financially. I had talked with them previously, as they made a nice little $10 pinup of my lizard boy (Attachment 2), and I even made them a little art as thanks in return. They seemed nice, so why not help them out and see what they can do for a full piece? April 7th, I paid the $140 (attachment 3) for a full shaded piece with a background and showed them all my references for my Y/veltal and U/mbreon characters performing missionary position and its supposed to be romantic. I will note that shaded characters is worth more than background (attachment 4), and the background ended up being the subject in the end piece. After the start of our commission, they seemed to go pretty fast! They got me the first sketch within 3 days, which came in the form of just a fully lined "background". (attachment 5) Took me off-guard because that never happens, getting the background (lined) before even seeing a sketch of any sort, especially the subjects. Thought maybe the subjects would go on the couch or floor or something (since I didn't specify where, which was in retrospect may have been my first mistake, and they wouldn't tell me what they were about to do). I figured I would wait it out and see what they do. Waited quite a while, a month went by, another month...I was beginning to wonder, so I asked if there was any progress. Each time I asked, they simply answered "no progress". Meanwhile on Twitter I had noticed them saying they were too depressed to work or some such thing, then it turned to them being in art school all of a sudden. And whenever they were in the mood, they'd spit out about 5 pinup commissions at a given time. By the time I even got an update (which I will touch on in a moment), there had to have been about 30 to 40 commissions finished by them. That is not an exaggeration. I confronted them about it and after a few times of trying, they did indeed confirm that they took many MANY commissions at once, and it's been piling up ever since. And yet they are still asking for commissions and taking over a year to finish what I assume to be most of them. Moving on, the first update I got since the lined background was on February 11th, 2020 (attachment 6) I voiced my concern that the subjects weren't in the foreground and were instead in the background (attachment 7) while also trying to be nice because they were supposedly my friend, and the fact they'd been going through a lot (allegedly). Their only response was "this is what it looks like zoomed in" (attachment 8 ) which is a big yikes because, not only was it low res if you did zoom in, but it's also the fact it's not the focus, is a big no-no. I voiced my concerns again, and she left me on read. February 13th, another update. They only showed that they had colored and shaded the "background" which I thought looked pretty dang good, all things considered. (attachment 9) But no sign of whether Chio decided to move the characters anywhere else. Figured I would wait and see. Fast forward to APRIL 15TH with no prior WIPs, the characters were lined and flat colored already. I was so done and tired at this point and just wanted it done that I just couldn't bear to say anything. Other than just shade them, because obviously there was nothing I could do at this point. They had already got it set in stone without my permission. (attachment 10) Their reaction to "shading" the characters? (like I had bloody paid for) They darken the room. (attachment 11) So I figure, well, if you're going to do that, maybe can shade it nice with some glow effects from the U/mbreon that bounce off the Y/veltal and the walls and all? No. All that happens is that they add a glow around the markings. (attachment 12) Nothing spectacular. I paid full price for this. And the BACKGROUND is the FOREGROUND, and the characters aren't even shaded. Full piece: (attachment 13) Friend asking if full piece is a wip: (attachment 14) Proof of talking with my friends about this even early on when I found out it was in the background: (attachment 15) Other examples of art released at the same time that is better: (attachment 16) I'm sorry, but that is a failure to do what you have to do. Failure to communicate and make sure. Failure to get things done. Failure on the level of taking on way too many commissions and getting none done for an eternity. And then screwing up a full piece, which should be considered having /more/ care and effort put into it than your average pinup. Tl;dr -Takes too many commissions, and thus takes over a year to do your art -Not good at communication on commissions to make sure its what the commissioner wants -Overly sensitive if you say anything negative at all There were no WIPs before this.

May 21, 2014 https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/768071.html WHO: Raikhan / deli-cat WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/view/6003987/ http://raikhan.sofurry.com/ https://inkbunny.net/Raikhan http://deli-cat.tumblr.com/ WHEN: July 2012 - April 2014 PROOF AND EXPLAIN: Throughout the passed two years, I asked for updates and got either completely ignored for months at a time or received multiple "excuses" such as files got corrupted, or my mother has cancer. I stated multiple times that if the artist was unable to perform the duties to draw my commission I would be happy to just find someone else to do it and just get a refund. https://www.dropbox.com/s/7oxd1cfcocf53v8/excuse1.PNG https://www.dropbox.com/s/achlq8wuhsbqjod/excuse2.PNG https://www.dropbox.com/s/rov32ghc3rmvtn0/excuse3.PNG https://www.dropbox.com/s/62szgoanvjtfrp7/excuse4.PNG 7/1/2012 I query about price of the commission of 2 characters split payments agreement for progression on the commission for every payment https://www.dropbox.com/s/22gqwr147t04i2z/progression%20per%20payment.PNG 7/3/2012 Added additional character and renegotioated price. I organized the commission information in one large note with all the details needed for the art. https://www.dropbox.com/s/n228mpjp6ll4bs9/Commission%20Details.PNG 7/5/2012 Sent $50 payment https://www.dropbox.com/s/onn6hp93kqf3tfa/paypal%20transactions.PNG (this screenshot shows both my payments to her and the refund from her.) 8/9/2012 I am told that the sketch and color blocking is completed and asked if i want to see a WIP which I reply yes https://www.dropbox.com/s/ws91t9u4amgbf8u/sketch%20done.PNG 9/27/2012 I finally receive the WIP I was told was complete on 8/9/2012 I also sent another $50 payment https://www.dropbox.com/s/onn6hp93kqf3tfa/paypal%20transactions.PNG (same link as above, has all the transaction with the artist) https://www.dropbox.com/s/ucua4nluxjy9oa7/sketch.PNG https://www.dropbox.com/s/6lwj317ju5udo8u/sketch.jpg 5/11/2013 "color scheme" update https://www.dropbox.com/s/xy8aaexfi1p8z5v/matsi%20wip.jpg 5/11/2013 Last Contact until April 2nd 2014 when I posted into her shoutbox(she deleted these so I don't have screenshots of them) Here are 3 of the notes I sent to here one every few months asking for updates (since it took nearly 3 months just to get the sketches and because the poor communication I really wanted updated WiP before I sent the final payment because at this point I was already feeling like it was not going to ever be completed and I didn't want to lose even more money on it...) https://www.dropbox.com/s/zoj0h6sglel8gnh/ignored%20note1.PNG https://www.dropbox.com/s/93td92s9i13gpec/ignored%20note2.PNG https://www.dropbox.com/s/yq3jwg5b41en0vs/ignored%20note2%20still%20unread.PNG (you can see in this one that she STILL hasn't even read this note...) https://www.dropbox.com/s/pacvqiexnpcfr8m/ignored%20note3.PNG 4/2/2014 I get a response; stating that I never paid the full amount(I hadn't sent the 3/3 payment because I had no contact and received no updated WIP of the art, which should have been fully colored but not yet shaded... Also that I "never told her that the character had 3 heads and 4 arms" Artist stated she would be sending me a refund sometime within the next month minus time spent on the art, which she claimed was 2 hours(which certainly isnt 2/3 of the ~10 hrs I was charged total for the commission, going by the artists commission prices. Screenshot of her 4 shouts on my page: https://www.dropbox.com/s/lf2hsw8wv90tfhh/FA%20shouts.PNG The refund conversation went as follows... sadly I do not have screenshots of what I posted onto her page because she deleted them every time she replied: Her saying "You never paid the full amount and didn't mention that your char has 3 heads and 4 arms 😕 But I am done here, give me your paypal, I'll send you a refund." Me saying something about how I DID in fact say the character had 3 heads and 4 arms, and you can see that in the screenshots above where she even says something about how she wants to make sure the arms are positioned well.... and I also mentioned that I didn't make the final payment because she was ignoring me and not sending me a WiP where the picture was progressed enough to receive the 3rd payment. Her Saying The last WIP I provided was the main char almost done, atmosphere in, starting on bg. So much for WIP's not happening... Me asking When I will get the refund her saying "Mid of April minus the hours spent on it." Me asking hour many hours that was Her saying "2" 4/23/2014 I receive a "refund" from the artist of 50.56EUR, which is neither the currency the artist lists for what she charges for commission nor what I paid in, the transaction was also sent as a "payment for goods/services". this costed me several dollars in Paypal fees for being "a purchase" AND to convert the currency into USD, so instead of receiving a $70 refund from the $100 I paid, I wind up with $65. (I feel like this was very inappropriate, and that if you accept and list your prices in USD, the refunds should be in USD as well! And to send it in such a way that it charges me fees as if she was buying something from me instead of refunding my payments is nonsense.) https://www.dropbox.com/s/zrpdmno6yrrq5yt/currency.PNG I am happy that I at least got some of my money back, for over a year I thought I would just have no art and no refund...but I feel entitled to the remaining amount refunded and I feel scammed. I am posting this, not expecting to get anything more for me, but to warn others so that they do not have to experience the same thing I did from this artist!

In September of 2023 I contacted koenvgraphics with an inquiry to get a logo made. I was quoted $700 for the logo, including a few revisions. I indicated that I wanted to proceed with the commission, and was directed to pay via Wise. I made the payment, and had been told to expect three weeks for turnaround time. In November of 2023 I emailed koenvgraphics asking for an update on my commission. This email was ignored. Meanwhile, I would regularly see koenvgraphics posting pictures of other icons they had made. I then sent them a message via twitter, which was again ignored. Eventually, in February of 2024, I responded to one of their twitter posts with an inquiry about my commission. I was immediately contacted. Koenvgraphics stated they had been going through a really hard time (understandable) and said they would still do the logo if I wanted. I indicated that I still wanted the logo and they agreed to do it. A few days after they agreed to do the logo again, they messaged me stating they were sick and asking that I understand why they haven't made it yet. I tell them that it's ok, and go back to patiently waiting. At this point it is March and koenvgraphics continues to post and repost various icons to twitter, but I have heard nothing else from them. I feel like they have intentionally scammed me. I post again a few times (admittedly in anger, and probably not the best way to handle the situation) under their posts once more. This time, I'm asking for a refund. My posts go ignored. I then send a direct message via twitter asking for a refund, which is again, ignored. I do acknowledge that I probably should have sent them another private message first, before jumping to posting publicly. However, they did take my money and then not do the work, and they have been at least keeping up the appearance that they are continuing to work.

On December 31, 2018, I commissioned Bree Drake for a full body badge while we were both vending at NYFB. I have screenshot proof of this transaction, despite the fact that it was a verbal, at-con, cash transaction, because I sent them a digital copy of my ref sheet via telegram:, at which time they asked me to confirm the type of commission I had purchased from them. On January 10th, I was contacted via telegram with an update as to the status of my badge, at which time Bree informed me they would be starting work on my badge soon after having some personal issues. Two months later, on March 18th, 2019, I attempted contact on Telegram for an update. My message was read, but not responded to, meaning that Bree elected to actively ignore my message there. She has not been active on telegram since July. Shortly thereafter, on March 21st, I sent her Facebook Page for her studio a message, asking the same question. At this point I was concerned because I was not listed anywhere on her Trello and had not even received the promised WIP. As you can see, some point after this exchange Bree deleted her business page, leaving me unable to contact her here either. As of September 6, 2019, I have not received a badge, a WIP, any further contact (nor can I contact her, as all her accounts seem to have gone dark as of March 2019), or any attempt at a refund.

Explanation: Prepaid for two full-body shaded commissions through Discord, paid through PayPal. And then a second comission of a full-body and 2 stickers, also prepaid. None of these were received. Additionally an art trade and friendship piece was agreed upon. I drew her art, and she never reciprocated. Dates: Jul 18th, 2023 (first commission) and July 26th, 2023 (second commission). Proof of Payments This transation from July 18th is for the first comission for two full-body shaded pieces. Original Terms of Service (They were updated months later after I agreed to this) The TOS stated art would typically be delivered within 3 months. At the time of posting this it has been 8 months. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Correspondences July 18th - Original comission correspondence ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- July 24th - Checking in to see if money was received and comission started ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- July 26 - Second commission money was sent ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- June 26th, 2023 - Art trade and friendship piece agreed I delivered my art trade piece A friendship piece was promised ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sept 9th, 2023 - Friendship piece discussed ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Evidence of many others complaining about Creamii's queue and being confronted by Nev of Danger Den I express my concern for her queue size At this point, I am expressing my desire for a refund. In the end we ended up having the call. It was positive and I was supportive and understanding of personal issues they were going through at the time. They continued to promise to work on and deliver my commissions. Dec 11th, 2023 - She contacted me to work on my commission December 12th, 2024 - I am shown an early in progress sketch. This is the only art I ever saw related to the art I was owed. I am offered a gift which I never received Jan. 15th, 2024 - I check in to inquire about my commission At this point, she added several more people to her queue in her sever. It was quite large and backed up. (Some more evidence of this can be added if required) Unfortunately, this does not have a date but Creamii posted in her server that people are able to request a refund if desired. Several more slots are being opened on her Discord server for art despite art not being delivered Dec 06, 2023 - the Danger Den discord server sent out this concerning her queue. Jan 30th, 2024 - My partner messaged Creamii on PayPal as this was of growing concern. There was never a reply. Feb 5th, 2024 - My friend contacted Creamii on my behalf. LimaBean was still in Creamii's server at this point and had noticed that she changed her commission queue and that it no longer included me on it and so they reached out. A refund was again promised and never received. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- March 10th, 2024 I attempted to contact them again for a refund but they are not accepting messages from people who are not their friends and are not responding to contact outside of Discord. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- March 11th, 2024 An official refund was requested via Email with a reasonable week long deadline. At the end of the week there was no contact and no refund.

May. 23rd, 2011 at 4:22 PM jakejynx It's ridiculous that I have to make this post over something so simple, but this person has stopped responding to my emails, and has ignored the Paypal claim that I filed. On May 5, I posted a journal asking if anyone had some sparkle furs on hand that they would be willing to sell. Evilalcarne responded saying she could sell me some lime green fur. I paid $10 for the half yard of fur and $10 for shipping on May 7. She responded the same day, saying the fur would be shipped out on Monday. On Tuesday, May 10, I sent an email asking for the tracking number. She told me that she had stopped by the post office that day, but that her mother had the tracking number, since she was the one who went to the post office. On May 13, I sent an email asking for the tracking number again so that I could be home to receive the package. I received no response. On Monday, May 16, I sent another email telling her I was getting worried. Shipping from FL to GA takes two days at most. Even parcel post is a quick ship. I once again asked for the tracking number. She responded with "it's around here somewhere." And that was the last message I received from her. I sent a final stern email on Friday, May 20 telling her that I expected either the tracking number or a refund by the end of the day on Saturday, or I would be filing a Paypal claim. I received no response. A Paypal claim was filed late Saturday night, and it was not responded to. Today I escalated it to a claim, and I'm fairly confident that I will receive a refund, given that she is apparently unable to show proof that the fur was shipped. Please avoid transactions with this person. Communication is spotty, and she apparently can't be bothered to give you the tracking code on packages. Update: The fur actually arrived today via UPS. However, according to the tracking number on the package, it wasn't mailed off until May 20. That's 10 days after she claimed it had been mailed. Though I sincerely doubt it was $10 to ship, considering it weighs only 11 ounces, the UPS shipping calculator is apparently down right now, so I'm unable to get a price estimate. As if that weren't bad enough, when I opened the box, I quickly realized that it was not the half yard that I had bought. She sent me an 18x18 piece of fur (a half yard would have been an 18x65" piece). That's something like 1/8 of a yard, not 1/2. I know it was not a misunderstanding, since she included a note in the box saying "here is the 1/2 yard of fur." I can't help but think that she purposely sent me ~1/8 yard, and just assumed I wouldn't know what 1/2 a yard looks like. ? Fur 1 Fur 2 And this may be nitpicky, but on her site she has a picture posted of her dog lying in the exact same fur that she sent to me. Though I'm not allergic to dogs, the fur was going to be used on tails that could be sold to people who are allergic. I don't use furs that have been used as animal beds. Also forgot to add her contact/site information: Furaffinity (Gallery deleted) Deviantart Website Livejournal

I ordered 10 YCH's (1 in May and 9 in June), as well as multiple PWYW arts (in their now deleted discord server) from Brokenvocaloid between May and June of 2019. I ended up only recieving one of the PWYW pieces during an art stream they did, while all the YCH's as well as another PWYW were left undelivered. All of the undelivered art came to be worth $435 (though I was only able to find proof of $360 of that during my request for a refund, which was my own fault in not thinking to maintain recipts as I was completely new to the commissioning scene at the time and never thought to do so.) I requested a refund and only ever recieved $25 of the $360 I requested back. I was also asked at one point to give them $25 as they needed help with money, though at the time I didn't even have $10 in my account, I still gave them $5 because back then I was naive and just wanted to help. I realize that I was far too passive during the whole encounter and let them get away with too much. I was far too passive in general back then and it's something I had to learn the hard way. But even so, they shouldn't have taken advantage of that. I never received any more correspondence from them after this and eventually gave up. I'm not sure if they are still active online anymore, since they're constantly changing accounts, but just in case I felt it was important to share.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/927372.html WHO: Moneychan/Flamedragonkitten WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/moneychan (Main account- Disabled) EDIT: Re-enabled for now. http://www.furaffinity.net/user/flamedragonkitten/ ('Owed Artwork account' Barely used and contact was mainly through main account) WHAT: 1,000$ 6 page, ych comic. WHEN: Started on 03/11/2015 and is still ongoing. PROOF: Posted down below. EXPLAIN: March 11th-16th, 2015 I saw Moneychan was doing a really nice 'Strip gamer YCH', the quality of the piece was a ladder auction and she has wrote what the tiers were in another journal. (Which has since been deleted) The highest tier was full coloured and set at an auto-buy of 1,000$. She stated in the description if the bidding went over 500 she would take payment plans. I won with a bid of 600$ (I'm not 100% sure but I believe the tier was flat coloured sketch) and she responded telling me to note her with refs and such. I sent her a note with character references and my Paypal and discussed a payment plan with her. She told me she would send me two invoices and I could pay half now and send the other half within the 2 month limit. I sent her my first half (300$) and she confirmed receiving it. Original ych with bids and description: http://www.furaffinity.net/view/15964028/ (nsfw) Following notes: https://gyazo.com/0792305ae5e0028aed2a63eafb7f348f https://gyazo.com/577d39a02c062e7a86f0a1880e495b24 April 2nd, 2015 After discussing it with my partner at the time I decided I really wanted to get the highest tier of quality so I noted her asking if she would be okay with sending me another invoice so I could have the highest quality. After some confusion with the invoices she sent another invoice and I paid it. (400$) Following notes: https://gyazo.com/e4c2358a938de11e2cdf7a9711e7cf95 https://gyazo.com/6778bbcf0ff9515a78955be79dc0657d https://gyazo.com/67500cb11b2d4f4f512b563a45026dec https://gyazo.com/61b3dbb654c5c4a2f596dc8e994c360d April 30th, 2015 I paid the last invoice (300$) and she replied telling me she would start on it soon along with her other comic. Note: https://gyazo.com/22d3426cf14b5dbce30e59d32e402d96 March 28th-30th, 2015 I sent her a note to her 'owed artwork' account because I thought she would want to speak on that one asking when she would be working on my commission. It went unread despite being active and she was also active on her main account so I thought I would note her there as well. She replied telling me that she would start on it when she got a chance and that there we're two comics ahead of me as well. Following notes: https://gyazo.com/a044a80060fdf66dc14276156c2d356f https://gyazo.com/62ed06459bdb46e7c138a4778a2dbf06 I don't have the dates for this as not only is her account disabled but I think the journals were deleted anyways but not too long after our conversations she had posted a journal saying that due to not being able to pay for her internet bill she wouldn't have it for a few months and wouldn't be on until fall. October 5th, 2015 I didn't see her active online again until around October but in September my partner at the time and I had a 'falling out' and we're no longer together and I didn't want to have my character in a comic with his anymore. I noted her asking if she could change the male character to my pet's sona and explained the situation to her. She replied telling me that she was sorry about what had happened and told me she was already into the flat colouring stage (I hadn't received any WIPs or news that she was even working on it) and that to change the character would take longer. I told her that I didn't mind waiting and that I would really like for her to change the character. She replied telling me that she appreciated my patience and would do it. Following notes: https://gyazo.com/86a5f2513886b5957b641539e8b799ff https://gyazo.com/8b57800096120c51c91a825c6ff7bdf5 January 26th, 2016 I didn't hear from her at all but saw that she had been taking commissions, posting owed artwork (a comic included) and doing personal artwork over the last few months so I decided to note her on her 'owed artwork' account as she was most active on that one, asking if she had had any updates and that I was in no rush since she had to redraw the male character but just wanted to check in. She responded saying that 'the comic commissions are the last things on her to-do list' and that she had 5 comics in total to complete. Last time I had spoke to she had told me she had only two ahead of mine and as I said above she had already posted a comic since then so I asked her about that. She responded saying 'it is two, yours and another commissioner' and that the others we're from another strip auction and that she was including her own personal comic as one. Following notes: https://gyazo.com/64a476f33e402e70788d9de528a261c3 https://gyazo.com/1e6119253cd562296907b39bde33f21c March 30th-31st, 2016 She sent me a note saying that she was working on my comic and was asking about if I had any png's for my (now) mates fursona's tattoo's. I replied to her telling her that I didn't and in a second note asked if she had any WIPs (I assumed she would have since I would think tattoo's would be in the colouring phase) and after sending that one my mate had mentioned that it would be okay for her to just trace over his tattoos so I sent her a third one telling her that as well. She told me that she was nervous about sending out WIPs but she would try to clean them up a bit and send them out as 'she's made me wait so long.' I responded to her telling her I was looking forward to seeing them. Following notes: https://gyazo.com/fd42978fac50e923e2a5bb3ed7980aab https://gyazo.com/24b9a91e43d4b8087ae96e0f6cedcb6e https://gyazo.com/d7377360c7c9758f78b7d5159fa9e1d5 https://gyazo.com/3087c8b0622c0676b0118b4e1d08093b https://gyazo.com/72c6a1ea0f8043bd4cb57a4f9560e851 April 17th, 2016 I had disabled my page for a few days due to drama and while it was disabled she had posted a journal saying she would be sending out WIPs to commissioners. When I enabled it I sent her a message checking in to see if she tried noting me. She responded saying that it was fine and that she just wanted to note me to tell me she would be clean sketching and line-arting the comic tomorrow. I told her that if she had any WIPs she wanted to send I would love to see them but if not it would be fine. She replied 'kk' and never sent me anything. Following notes: https://gyazo.com/6693ce191fd42b4e0279b2fc287cd37a https://gyazo.com/6ed6a6dee6a4e070fd355d36ab64fd58 July 17th, 2016 I hadn't heard from her in three months and was starting to get worried. I noted her telling her I needed some sort of physical update as it had been over a year since I commissioned it and three months since I last heard from her. She responded saying that she was sorry and didn't really have any physical proof besides sketches that she had 'barely started on'and that she was finishing all the pinup commissions she had taken and finishing someone else's commission who was ahead of me. Her priority now was mine and Lil-Maj's comic but she was lacking motivation and that they had been just sitting on Sai 'waiting to be done' and asked me if I still wanted to see the sketches. I told her that I would even if they we're just sketches. She replied with a Dropbox link leading to the first two comic pages very roughly sketched and the second one wasn't even done being sketched out. I was honestly shocking as I was expecting her to at least had all of the pages sketched out as she had not only told me that she was all the way up to colour before I changed the second character but told me she was up to lining even after the character change. I bit my tongue and tried to ignore the fact that she had been lying to me and just told her about how I had a new reference sheet that was in the works that was clearer than my previous one and sent it to her in case she needed it to help with sketching. We talked back and forth about my fursona's markings a bit before this conversation had ended. Following notes: https://gyazo.com/11e66ad2ceec40ff12675bdac13a91d8 https://gyazo.com/4fc089157fab581f735066a2cdba839e Sketches she sent me: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/fxxlgs4zgltt3ab/AAC1WO-fMkCUVgR_u9KBB5cda?dl=0 (Nsfw? They don't show any genitals but there are breast outlines and such) September 19th, 2016 I was updating my commissions list when I decided to go to her profile to ask for an update and to my horror her page had been disabled. I had to dig through my notes to find her other account's name which is still enabled. She hasn't uploaded anything on it since April and last favourited something a month ago. I sent her a note telling her that I was upset that she had disabled her account and that I had to dig to find her other one as she hadn't left any contact information otherwise and told her about all the red flags she was setting off. I told her that I either wanted my commission done by October 31st (my birthday) or a refund as this is getting ridiculous. Note: https://gyazo.com/41e4e36c0eb71490448b667e7305cdf6 It's now September, 21st and the note has been read but unanswered. I'm honestly very upset about this as this is a large sum of money that I may not get back. I have no idea what to do. Edit: I publicly tweeted them as they do not have dm's enabled. "I am once again trying to get into contact with you over the 1,000$ commission I am owed. Please message me on my fa asap." I also messaged them on DA saying... "I saw that you read my note and haven't responded and have been active on here as well as twitter so I will message you again here. Please respond with how to plan to correct this as I've been more than fair about it." Here's hoping. Edit 2: She responded to me on twitter saying that 'she hadn't been on fa since she disabled it back in June' and that she would Dm me. She dm'd me saying she was sorry about how long she was taking but she was busy with her fulltime job and was trying to finish commissions as quick as possible. I stood my ground and told her that Fa showed she read my message and that I know she is working but I will have to still set a deadline. She understood but asked me to delete my public tweet to avoid drama. I gave her my deadline and deleted the tweet and told her I would be capping it. Tweet: https://gyazo.com/156138889e14a71f73f52b8e4ba052d5 Messages: https://gyazo.com/33c2175eae24792b48d48259712f3094 I now realize I probably shouldn't have told her about the capping but I was quite aggravated that she claimed she hadn't been on fa when my note had been read. I guess I will have another update by the deadline to whether or not this is resolved. Edit 3. I caught her streaming on the 20th and she did personal work for a good while, I came back in a few hours later and saw she was working on the second panel of the comic but she had replaced the hand drawn panel of the video game with a screenshot from a video game. I told her that it rubbed me the wrong way seeing as I paid for every single one of those panels and she replied saying that 'she was only trying to make the comic get done faster but she would redraw it. I later saw her screenshotting a panel from another video game. (Not sure if she was doing it for the comic or something else) She did most of the page but left out my characters wings, horns and piercings so I noted her about it on fa. She told me she was going to do those last. Her using the game shot for the panel: https://gyazo.com/071c1ac06d04897bd94dfa04600b7dbd Her screenshotting a different game: https://gyazo.com/7f940db691e291196d5a0c11bcb1f51e Note: https://gyazo.com/cffbefa443fb8755f42007363fe9d286 It's now the 1st of November and as you can guess, she hasn't done it. I saw that she was streaming last night right before I was going to bed but it was my birthday so I was too tired to drag myself back to my computer to see if she was doing it and just assumed that if she was finishing it I would have woken up to a note from her or something. I'm honestly aggravated to hell and back so I noted her as nicely as I could possibly managed and went to go leave her another tweet to find out -surprise surprise- She blocked me on Twitter and has now set her Tweet to private. My mate -aggravated as well- has since tweeted at her and will not be removing these tweets. Note: https://gyazo.com/6359520d46bf1800b6efb8df6739cc6b Mate's tweets: https://gyazo.com/16954559715fc8c9b84c8b778cfb8529 Final edit: I woke up to a response from her and recieved the finished comic. The lineart looks rushed and the detail isn't the same as the example she gave for the Autobuy option but I'm lucky to have received the piece at all at this point. She also threw in a free coloured sketch Response: https://gyazo.com/572da8cd4d2ac06f991780536b56523e Comic: (Nsfw) http://www.furaffinity.net/view/21601732/ http://www.furaffinity.net/view/21601741/ http://www.furaffinity.net/view/21601753/ http://www.furaffinity.net/view/21601762/ http://www.furaffinity.net/view/21601786/ http://www.furaffinity.net/view/21601808/ Example of what the quality should have been: http://www.furaffinity.net/view/15498244/ (Nsfw) But anyways I'd like to say this is resolved.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/963160.html WHO; Yajuuu http://www.furaffinity.net/user/yajuuu/ http://www.furaffinity.net/user/ranpaopao http://www.furaffinity.net/user/zowazowa https://www.furaffinity.net/user/yajuucommissions https://www.furaffinity.net/user/naughtyjuu http://www.twitter.com/yajuuraku Also so as Yajuu (not on FA though) and Noxipie/Noxious (old) They account hop so often that there's probably more. WHAT - A full detailed image with two characters, 2 of a 4 piece set. Ordered one by one. ) First image (Ordered aug 11th, done nov 10th) of the correct quality I paid for - https://www.dropbox.com/s/wa9emlisrz2mqml/tkhunhun1 copyALT.png?dl=0 Image I received - https://www.dropbox.com/s/8vsp726d98j70gw/2.png?dl=0 I had spoken to Yajuuu over skype about a 4 part seasons set of images that my husband was interested in getting. We discussed and agreed on the first image and despite them taking a while, it was done with no hassle, except they ignored every request wips, so we discussed the other. Yajuuu opened for Xmas/Winter commissions on FA (I ordered via skype), and I mentioned we wanted the slot. I said I would be ordering this one for him as a Christmas gift. We agreed on half payment; half then, half as it was finished. I jokingly asked if mine could be moved up the queue, as I was excited. They told me it would be done in a few days as they only had one other image on their queue, and then me. (Later find out this was a lie) Beginning of December they needed to move, so I sent the second half payment on the 9th. Caps of the winter/Xmas commission journal she posted are not possible as it has since been removed. Payment caps; (Her first name is public on FA and twitter. I didnt cut it as proof I sent it to her) https://www.dropbox.com/s/cgtz4uuwxna2gkp/yajuuupay1.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/evwk84jm2wtd9j7/yajuuupay2.png?dl=0 They told me the image couldnt be done for Christmas, and instead the 31st. Nothing again and they said Valentines day. They mentioned they had done part of my image but didnt like it so they were redoing it. I never saw any proff the image had been started and was never given a wip. https://www.dropbox.com/s/rc42300597winn6/yajuuu2.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/ok7psgd566b7tkk/yajuuu4.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/7dxd30g5oi2hrmj/yajuuu1.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/f7qn0j2alzdag7p/yajuuu5.png?dl=0 They continued to do personal work and take on commissions. I asked for an uodate on Feb 23rd and was ignored. https://www.dropbox.com/s/852lr3dcm5vydaz/yajuuu6.png?dl=0 They told me they were entering a very popular contest on FA and linked me their To Do list (which they had earlier lied to me about, stating one ahead of me and that was it) https://www.dropbox.com/s/qwm8mspng3duhhr/yajuuu7.png?dl=0 Between this and they finale, They drew me another small commission, and a gift art, as well as TONS of personal art and other commissions. Personal issues kept happening, and I let the wait time slide. I asked for an update in early June on skype and was ignored. https://www.dropbox.com/s/k6ajnzfsbhaijve/yajuuu8.png?dl=0 A bit later I asked for an update on Discord. They told me it was a wip and would be completed soon. I asked to see it and they said no. That a friend had it, and didnt have sai so couldnt show me. Their TOS says 6 months and they'll give a refund. https://www.dropbox.com/s/c3rfmtlnr1x6n38/yajuuutos.png?dl=0 With no proof of work, ever, and they'd taken on so many commissions, I was upset and figured I'd never get my commissions so I asked if they could show a wip, quoted the over 6 months thing, and if not, could I have a refund. Wording in the IMs isnt as professional as normal as we were 'friends'. Not super close or anything, but enough that friendly chatting and banter was totally acceptable and chatted often. https://www.dropbox.com/s/3jskqcgm3obtp5b/yajuuu9.png?dl=0 They told me they were upset because someone had promised to have a working compuer for them, as they went out of state for a month, and claimed they would work that entire time. At this point they state they have commissions before me that were due for november and december, and states I set no deadline when ordering. They argue a bit over the deadline and when I link what's left of the skype conversation to prove I asked for one they get really rude; 'Uh.. I know what I said, TK, I'm not short of memory" https://www.dropbox.com/s/mqz3at24wabizsh/yajuuu10.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/4kgsa3es01hkkgw/yajuuu11.png?dl=0 At this point the whole thing turns sour. I tell them I understand the issues that popped up, but that they'd missed so many deadlines and it's way overdue. They keep saying they have a lot of overdue work before me. They completely ignore when I bring up they told me it was one commission, then mine. She then says 'Ill hurry and finish it' and then I worry. They say 'it might be rushed'. https://www.dropbox.com/s/1yry42o45nbc995/yajuuu12.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/v8hwoufxwro0qk3/yajuuu13.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/41ldoev9xcawv71/yajuuu14.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/hnyfbxla2oi31gy/yajuuu15.png?dl=0 I never once asked for the image, I asked for the WIP, or a refund. We argue this and I state multiple times I dont want it rushed and that I paid for a full image, they insist I didnt, and that I only paid for a BG, as if the quality is up to them. I state if theyre rushing it I want a refund, they ignore it and state again that Im not their only customer, and they 'want to hurry up and get it done'. I say thats its a scam, they cant just lower the quality of a commission. I ordered from their journal that had an image with samples on it equal to the first commission, with a clean full detail BG, and soft shading, and highlights. https://www.dropbox.com/s/2khlqzt7g6kppr0/yajuuu16.png?dl=0 They talk a lot about how their other commissioners are so patient, and try and guilt trip me. I kept asking for a refund and they never reply to it, so I finally say 'just finish the art'. NOT asking for it, but no longer expecting to get a refund. They give a day or to eta for the PC to be up and my commission to be done that weekend and miss that deadline, they dont contact me so I ask for an update. https://www.dropbox.com/s/ieigo745vbnbw26/yajuuu17.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/tzawrluj1do04ob/yajuuu18.png?dl=0 The image was.... not what I paid for. I cropped both images to hide who the artist was and asked a few friends if the two matched in quality; they all agreed the winter one was clearly rushed and not the same quality. No names were named. Things were missing from my character, the BG was sloppy, and, the quality of the coloring was nothing like what was to be provided. Yajuuu refused the fixes, but agreed on the eyes and freckles. And I (unhappily) accepted a partial refund they said would be given in a month. (Half refund was received later) She also claimed she put extra detail in to the fall one, but the fall one matches the samples that were initially given for the commission tier. https://www.dropbox.com/s/vjjb97sdwkpkzv3/yajuuu19.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/iad4cv0zrqpg5u7/yajuuu20.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/t6fe8x3vsvlmd2r/yajuuu21.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/kwd9bfibj20ubg9/yajuuu22.png?dl=0 I agree to unfollow their twitter, but I guess it was misunderstood because its not super clear? But only after I get the refund, as I was VERY uncomfortable with the artist blocking all my means of contact seeing as they had already ignored me on skype a few times. I agreed to not post the AB as well here, as it would be done and over with. During this, she blocked me from her private twitter. https://www.dropbox.com/s/ye19l6dc29i92yl/yajuuu23.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/y58h5s5j808o9ws/yajpricing.png?dl=0 She mentions that she gave me a discount; I paid $50 USD and it was listed at $80 USD but she said she was thinking of giving all friends discounts. Yajuuu then talks about how her other stuff is delayed, and how she has so many projects shes behind on, and how her other customers are patient and how shes giving them freebies. She goes on to say I demanded my commission when all I asked for was wips and updates and gets very snippy with me. https://www.dropbox.com/s/6vf79bw5lwr3c8t/yajuuu24.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/dex72meo5dtrc21/yajuuu25.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/25jw06og48ilo6f/yajuuu26.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/0wlufkxbd7unjk2/yajuuu27.png?dl=0 I agree to unfollow her twitters (Sorry I guess I still wasnt clear on that, I still liked her art and wanted to watch her PUBLIC FA account) I mention Im not home and will unfollow when I can. She blocked me before I could unfollow her. Before I was blocked on her twitter she called me out by name and kept posting guilt tripping tweets, as seen below. https://www.dropbox.com/s/3mhf9flrtqm9ee7/yajtwitter.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/3nudsd903lnszlq/yajtwitter2.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/lksbaubqn97g003/yajtwitter3.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/dpskula42ni6hu3/yajtwitter4.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/qhe9zavr855fj4e/yajtwitter5.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/se5s1l10rr60rsp/yajtwotter4.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/egvwpm0elkfh5jn/yajuucallout.png?dl=0 (call me out by name here, thus no longer keeping it 'private') And the three journals they posted about/to me on FA https://www.dropbox.com/s/0fqo4keuu134qnz/yajuuujournal.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/wu1fi7wyc81gp84/yajuujournal2.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/mpwjxqb3j5kks90/yajuujournal3.png?dl=0 I wanted to keep watcher her FA because her art is super pretty and I really love it. Twitter is more personal/private so I agreed to undfollow even though it's also public. SHe then started posting the journals and got the mutual friend to ask me to unwatch her FA, I replied that I never agreed to and Im not noting, commenting, or faving. No harassment or anything, just wanting to see some art. I think this was just me not being clear enough though? My bad on that, I'll make sure to be MUCH more clear from now on. I decided to ask for advice, and go against my promise of not posting this as her attitude was awful and she did not let the situation go. EDIT; for clarification, I did unwatch her before posting this beware, and she did post more journals. One on her main, in regards to a journal I made (she was checking my page, as she no longer watches me), and two on dead/old accounts that I forgot existed, that I was still watching because of said forgetting they were there.

I need to say that we worked with Chloe Wintermane before (you can see payment history) so they were a trusted person (as I thought). I have a strict ToS, but even with it there is a human factor. ♦ June 19 2022 - Chloe wrote me about the idea of 5 page comic. It was a huge project including Chloe Wintermane and their friend Jacki Northstar + three YCH slots. There were a lot of art and price discussions, creating sketches and then in August 8 all YCH preparations were finished and in August 10 I uploaded YCH to my gallery on FA: https://www.furaffinity.net/view/48501288/ ♦ August 18 2022 - auction was ended. Everyone paid for their slots, Jacki too but later. Chloe owed me $450. ♦ August 19 2022 - ChloeWintermane said that they "would love to pay a half now and the other part next month", well okay! ♦ September 5 2022 - I wrote them first since I started to worry. Chloe said they lost their job and promised to find a job and pay as soon as possible. This project is a huge one and included too mane people so I decided to start working on it. ♦ September 17 2022 - I sent Chloe final WIPs with flat colors and didn't receive any answer. But I decided to continue and finish the comic no matter what because I felt responsible for 4 other people. ♦ September 30 2022 - 5 page comic is finished. https://www.furaffinity.net/view/49321560/ The same day Chloe wrote me that they have a new job. What a good news! ♦ November 16 2022 - Chloe sent me $150. Another $300 remains to be paid. From that time, silence or ignoring, sometimes accompanied by empty promises, began. I don't think there is any chance that this person will pay for my work. On April 25 2023, I wrote them a message and a final warning. You can guess that I was not paid anything. You may rightly point out that it was my own fault and should have waited for full payment, but on the other hand 4 other people paid for everything and I was trapped. If I hadn't finished the comic by today, it would be a reputational blow to ME. It is very painful and disappointing.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/1004177.html Who: AshleyZombie/AshleyZombieArts When: May 16, 2018 — July 11, 2018 Where: http://ashleyzombiearts.tumblr.com/ What: A finished digital painting for $100 This artist usually gets a positive reputation from her fans and community, so this might seem like a shock. No artist is perfect, and surely no artist is bulletproof. I hope any fans of hers will see reason, and not an intent to do harm. This is my story. About a week ago from writing this (July 1) AshleyZombie canceled my commission because of con booth prep and "personal issues." I asked her to not do this, that I was willing to wait until con season was over and she was ready. But she did not want to hear any of it. She then kept half of the money I gave her for the commission and sent me a terribly done rough draft of the image, which is not what I was paying her for nor do I think it's worth half of the amount she charges for a fully rendered painting with cleaned lines and refined color work [see example here]. I expressly told her I don't agree to these new terms for a half payment, and that because she is the one canceling our project, that she is breaking our contract. She then slapped me with a bunch of horrible terms from her ToS page, which we never discussed beforehand. I initially contacted her on Tumblr after seeing a post about her being open for commissions — which was back in May, so over a month ago — and we hashed out the beginnings of what I thought would be an amazing commission project. Not once did she mention her ToS, and furthermore that because she was the one breaking our contract that she has no right to enforce her ToS onto me. It's already bad enough that to be on her commission list you have to pay 100% upfront. But now that she's able to cancel any commission she chooses, and is able to keep half the money for doing very little work, is a VERY BAD business practice. If all you are going to do is open for commissions, then cancel the commissions you just took while barely working on them just to keep half of the payment, then maybe you shouldn't be doing commissions in the first place if you do not plan to complete them. I understand bad things happen in life. I am completely forthcoming about personal issues, and I am willing to bend over backwards to help you out if I can. But this is something I feel she is doing to take advantage of clients, who will mostly remain silent and let these things go. I did not feel this was fair for her to do, and I was more than happy to negotiate a new settlement for the work she has done. However based on separate terms unrelated to the canceled commission. If you start a commission for a digital painting, and the end result is a rough doodle, then I am willing to pay you for a rough doodle. Just to put prices into perspective here, she was offering commissions for half-body and full-body paintings, at $100 and $180 respectively. I am glad I only purchased the $100 slot, because if she considers what she gave me to be worth half of $180 I would legitimately lose it. Either way, the practice of canceling someone's commission and charging them half for very little work is most unbecoming of her reputation. I haven't even mentioned the communication timeframe, usually taking weeks before getting a response. For the most part I was quite unassuming. After the first day of making payment, on May 16, she told me she would be able to send periodic WIPs. About 8 days later, on May 24, she sends me a rough sketch of my character which I absolutely adored, and told her to continue on after making some small fixes on the character. Again, another 8 days of waiting for a response, and on June 1 she informs me that there are no updates and to check her commissions queue. That didn't help clarify what was her situation was, but I reassured her that if she needs time to just let me know what's going on and keep me in the loop. At this point I ask her to let me know when she thinks she will be able to resume or get back to me about my commission, but no response. Twelve days later, on June 12 she finally responds with an update asking me to confirm the color palette and eye color. I comply, and I confirm the things that are correct and things that aren't correct. However I expressed slight dismay at the fact that we never discussed the changes to the preliminary sketch that was first drafted almost four weeks ago, and that the changes needed were not reflected in the update. I even clearly stated the issues unaddressed at the end of the email, verbatim. She then reassures me that the corrections will be reflected in the final painting, but I was already having doubts — my trust in her to do what she says was really all I had left to rely on. I tried to press on a conversation about the initial changes to the first draft, however that was shut out with another 4 days of silence, and finally on June 17 I received a response comparing the first draft to the second with color. At this point I was somewhat troubled by the lack of progress on the commission. An entire month has gone by, we haven't discussed the details or how we should go about fixing said details, I am receiving updates arbitrarily which only address the artist's concerns and not mine, and I personally found myself frustrated and contemplative about the appearance of the initial draft. So I withdrew my responses for a time, as it seemed the artist was not interested in having a conversation about my commission. I had the intention of responding later, or looking forward to AZ keeping her word that she will make the changes I am asking for in the next update. That was not to be so, because a week later on June 23, she sends me an email. "Hi, i hate to be doing this but im send out refunds to clients that's waited over a month or so due to the fact that i have con prep to worry and i've been slowly burned out with work. I've got a lot going on irl too and I've been stressed about it I don't think im doing this character much justice and im not following the guild lines too well with whats shown on the page. This character's been sketched and colored already so i'll be giving you a partial refund. I Just need your paypal email and i'll send you the full image when i send the money back !" Basically she's decided to scrap the project for her own reasons, but also — by the way — she'll be keeping "part" of my funds as tribute for her efforts thus far. Under different conditions, as I stated before, I'd have been happy to compensate her for her efforts. But the way this was imposed upon me, with disregard for her own incompetence by not completing her end of the deal, seemed to have disingenuous intentions. I sit on this email for about a day, contemplating alternatives and then I arrive at a solution. I ask AshleyZombie to reconsider putting the project on hold until she is able to collect herself and is ready to continue, preferably after "con" season. I was open to a new timeframe, and expressed that I'd be happy to wait. She refused, twice, and it was basically a one-sided conversation. Actually, come to think of it, the entire conversation since day one was very one-sided. I'm not very aware of many one-sided business conversings, but they usually don't end well for the receiving party. A few more emails, and it seems she's actively pushing for me to just accept what she's saying. From her tone, I can tell she's frustrated with my noncompliance and pleading. And to be fair, I am just about as equally as frustrated with her unresponsiveness and authoritative diction. I grind our pleasantries to a halt and let her know my thoughts on what she is trying to do. Specifically that I do not agree at all with her new terms for a partial refund for an item I do not want in its current state, at a price of her choosing. I lay out the barebones of our contract and how she did not complete her end of the deal. As a result, I asked that she consider completing the piece at full price — or that I demand a full refund and that she keep her incomplete efforts. Perhaps to count it as practice work or something to stuff into a sketchbook. I tried my best to be reasonable and logical, also taking effort to acknowledge her "apparent" hardship. But even this was met with incompetence, as she accused me of trying to bully her into not paying. I told her I would consider paying, but under arguably different circumstances. Nonetheless, seeing as how negotiating with her has gone so far, I wasn't optimistic that she would agree to anything else. Then she slaps me with her ToS. Which states that if the client should ask for a refund, and if she is halfway finished with the piece, that her terms would apply as such and a partial refund of "half" of the original commission price. And that would make sense, if I were the one requesting the refund. I even told her if I initiated the refund, I would be okay with paying half. But that isn't the case by far, and the complete opposite is true. She has termination terms, but she's exempt from terminating herself? And because she's broken contract, I don't understand how her terms can still be enforced. That got cherry picked to mean what she wanted it to, and as such she says it doesn't matter who initiated the refund. That if the work itself is halfway done then she is entitled to half of the payment. No negotiations. Had she simply imposed a cancellation fee, she wouldn't be able to enforce it. Our situation wasn't any different. That out of the way, this argument continued for one additional response from her, basically telling me that I'm bullying her, that her ToS are to protect her, etc, and that she will be enforcing her terms regardless of how wrong she was for breaking our deal. So far, I am taking this up an echelon with PayPal. Hopefully they will be able to resolve this issue where I cannot. And if they can go no further, I'll take it to civil court if I have to. It's the principle that's going to cause more harm in the long run, in my opinion. And not just from AshleyZombie, but from other similar-minded people as well. This is what I expected to get. [link] And this is what I got. [link] Still, the issue isn't about worth. It's that the original deal was not honored. We agreed on $100 for a finished digital painting. But instead of that, a new deal was shoehorned into this one, involuntarily, for a partially completed work for half the cost of the original price. Which I never agreed to. However it will be difficult for her prove what constitutes as a "half work," and what justifies "half payment" based on her ToS. Had this been a normal cancellation fee, I'd gladly pay it but... wouldn't you know it, I didn't cancel? Please beware of this artist, and others like her! Proof: Emergency Commissions Post | The original was deleted, saved on archive.org Payment | on PayPal Email conversation [PDF][NSFW?] PayPal case is ongoing! UPDATE (July 11) PayPal has ruled in my favor. The case is now closed! Proof of decision (July 10) I also discovered that AshleyZombie reopened commissions not even a few days after canceling my commission! This means she lied about her reasons for needing to cancel, in stating that she needed time to de-stress, etc, yet just hours later she reopens extra fresh on Twitter. In other words, AshleyZombie is accepting commission slots, only to later cancel any commissions she doesn't want to do while keeping half of the money given to her by clients. Do take note she leaves that part out, as if a full refund was offered. This is beyond reprehensible. Please be VERY aware of this before commissioning her. I'd offer to help revise her refund policy, but for someone to scam their clients like this I cannot bring myself to want to help. My perspectives on AshleyZombie have definitely changed after this discovery, and not for the better. Archive.is link: [Reopened Commissions] Rant on Twitter: [Rant]

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/958083.html WHO: Ignri on FA WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/ignri/ WHAT: Digital art. $180 commission with alternate versions and additional background through my moving fundraiser. WHEN: June 14th (6/14/17), and ongoing EXPLAIN: User commissioned me for a commission through my moving fundraiser. After they approved the sketch, they decided to get a partial refund to buy a similar commission elsewhere to “save money.” After the conversation, I told them I would be giving them their refund in 2-3 business days after the money transferred back into my account from my bank, but they filed a dispute against the invoice and refused to let me properly refund them for the commission when the funds became available. The user approached me wanting to get a commission through my moving fundraiser with an alternate version and a background added to the piece. He sent in an order form with all of his information for the commission, and I reviewed it and quoted him the price of the commission on June 14. He agreed to the price and paid it same-day. FA note commission quote and agreement: https://www.dropbox.com/s/scda3kskug1yisl/AB_Ingri_01.png?dl=0 Paid invoice: https://www.dropbox.com/s/k7h6brggzw59aqw/AB_Ingri_003.jpg?dl=0 Commissioner notifying me of paid invoice: https://www.dropbox.com/s/e1c3bv6ci9ofecy/AB_Ignri_02.png?dl=0 Because of a bigger log of commissions I’ve gotten through the fundraiser, I was able to get the sketches done for him to review the next week. The sketches were done and sent to the commissioner on June 20. He responded positively to the work, so I was confident to continue working on the commission to completion within the next couple days. Sketches completed and delivered: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ykdw77beap7zfy4/com_Weavile2_Ignri_v1.jpg?dl=0 - NSFW https://www.dropbox.com/s/ca3qq5pos1bdtvl/com_Weavile2_Ignri_v2.jpg?dl=0 - NSFW Positive response to receiving the sketches: https://www.dropbox.com/s/wg1cv7nae5tu3fx/AB_Ignri_03.png?dl=0 The next morning on June 21 I received another note from the commissioner stating that he wanted me to put a hold on his commission, as he was waiting to hear back from another artist that was doing a similar piece for him and he was considering requesting a partial refund from me to “save some money.” I responded explaining I couldn’t hold the commission, as the commissions through the fundraiser were meant for the fundraiser only (all fundraiser commissions had freebies for the fundraiser ONLY) and it was going to be ending at the end of the month. I asked him in the same response to let me know quickly whether or not he wanted the refund, as I would need to make time to transfer that money back into my PayPal from my bank immediately for him. His note: https://www.dropbox.com/s/8w5oe7r9w5cchtr/AB_Ignri_04.png?dl=0 My response with two of his questions: https://www.dropbox.com/s/nhgpv85hscs9bu8/Screen Shot 2017-06-22 at 3.07.48 PM.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/jb47h7vncmz73n8/AB_Ignri_05.png?dl=0 This led to a series of notes of him asking me questions regarding the commission, and me responding to those questions as concisely and clearly as possible while asking again if he wanted the refund. I explained to him that the partial refund total would be $140, where the original first version sketch would be $25, and the alternative second version would be $15, totalling $40. I also explained that I wouldn’t be able to continue the commission later, because on top of moving at the end of the month I’m starting a new full time job and having a backlog of commissions wouldn’t be timely or ideal for my schedule. I started becoming uncomfortable with the conversation, and thinking back to his original reason for the refund that I found to be rather skeevy, I decided to explain that I would be cancelling the commission and refunding him for his partial refund he told me he was already considering. FA note chain: 1. https://www.dropbox.com/s/lt3ikfpt6u51yxr/AB_Ignri_06.png?dl=0 2. https://www.dropbox.com/s/q0tb67fj7ek3r69/AB_Ignri_07.png?dl=0 3. https://www.dropbox.com/s/t7jo3thortzcjxg/AB_Ignri_08.png?dl=0 The refund being transferred to PayPal from my bank: https://www.dropbox.com/s/63j36vp3i0zi8vs/TRANSFERFROMBANK.png?dl=0 He responded in defense to having his commission cancelled and refunded (linked above as number 3 under the FA note chain). I responded to this by noting him the completed sketch files that were finished for his commission that his $40 expense paid for, and that I would note him as soon as the transfer for his refund completed and the money was sent back to him on PayPal. After some time, he responded to me in defense once again. His note: https://www.dropbox.com/s/lfq407aao4qhizq/AB_Ignri_09.png?dl=0 I responded to his note clearing the air of why he was refunded and my stance on the situation, and that I no longer wished to continue this topic of conversation and the only notice he would get from me was when his refund was available and that I transferred the money back to him. My response: https://www.dropbox.com/s/rqk5a1ht5hqs1p4/AB_Ignri_10.png?dl=0 He had read it, but never responded to my note. On June 22nd, I came home to find over $100 in the red in my PayPal account and an unresolved dispute issued by the commissioner, stating it was a precaution for “just in case.” My girlfriend sent me money to get me out of the red. Dispute and bank transfer: https://www.dropbox.com/s/9pa0dywv1t25jpk/AB_INGRI_PAYPAL_02.png?dl=0 I contacted the commissioner on FA regarding the dispute. (At the time I referred to it as a chargeback, as I was mistaken. I realized after the fact this wasn’t a chargeback, but a filed dispute with the commissioner. I got confused since the funds had been taken out of my balance and assumed the taken funds = chargeback.) I explained that because he filed it, all the funds for the FULL amount of the commission ($180) were immediately taken from my account, and that wasn’t the agreed upon refund total of $140. I further explained that, because of the dispute, he would not be receiving his refund when it arrived from my bank because he wasn’t entitled to the full $180 amount. My note regarding the dispute: https://www.dropbox.com/s/crm79s1m8ynlo6u/AB_Ignri_11.png?dl=0 Instead of speaking to me directly, I found that the commissioner was using PayPal’s Resolution Center to relay information, so I chose to respond there. Eventually after a brief back-and-forth, he stopped using the Resolution Center and replied to my note on FA. First Resolution Center conversation: https://www.dropbox.com/s/3gcregue1qj2x2r/AB_Ingri_PAYPAL_01.jpg?dl=0 I tried to work with him in resolving the case one-on-one, despite the nature of his replies. I had gotten the refund earlier than expected and explained that I was readily available to issue him his partial refund when the claim was canceled, as I couldn’t refund the agreed partial $140 amount through the invoice if the claim was still open. It was forcing me to refund the full $180 amount. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem like he was willing to work with me. I couldn’t trust that the commissioner would return $40 to me if I gave him the full amount of $180. Conversation about the dispute (I mistakenly referred to it as a chargeback at the time): https://www.dropbox.com/s/edbs1jf05jrwyt1/chargebacknotes.jpg?dl=0 I updated the Resolution Center messages stating I was ready to refund the commissioner once the dispute was canceled. PayPal Resolution Center conversation: https://www.dropbox.com/s/fsagu2pumaqss2z/PayPalResolutionContinued.jpg?dl=0 (The website footer was blocking a portion of the messages, so I had to get snapshots of the comments from my phone and put them to the side of the covered messages.) He never read my last response, so I sent him one final note to give him a chance to comply in the morning (June 23): https://www.dropbox.com/s/hbpv3gmfyvz4tig/finalchargebacknote.jpg?dl=0 On the morning of June 23, the commissioner hadn’t read or responded to any of my notes, so I contacted PayPal over the phone about the matter to see what should be done. The commissioner didn’t seem to want to take the partial refund anymore and seemed to want a full refund (as suggested in this chain of notes https://www.dropbox.com/s/edbs1jf05jrwyt1/chargebacknotes.jpg?dl=0 ). The representative reviewed all of my evidence and information right then and there over the phone, and decided to escalate the dispute as a claim right away on my behalf due to the commissioner’s behavior after I explained the issue with the refund situation. Though I wish it didn’t have to come to that, I did what I was advised to do by the representative and submitted the same evidence to the claim regarding the payment - me canceling the invoice, me stating the agreed-to terms of the partial refund amount and when the refund would be delivered, me delivering the sketches/work done prior to canceling the commission, my notice that the refund was available to the commissioner and him not complying or allowing me to refund him. Basically, every single note exchanged between myself and the commissioner. The representative stated the commissioner could either cancel the claim to accept the $140 refund now, or continue the claim and have to wait up to 30 days for PayPal to review the claim and it would be out of my hands until the investigation was finished and the claim is closed by PayPal. I had hoped he would decide to cancel the claim so that he could receive his refund immediately. He later read my note, but never responded. I looked back at the dispute and found that he had decided to continue the claim for PayPal to review: https://www.dropbox.com/s/dzfciwch5ou0ka8/underreview.jpg?dl=0 I finally did get a response later in the evening, and I responded to let him know of the situation as it stands now: https://www.dropbox.com/s/9wsgn3wuq93spy5/paypalclaimexplain.jpg?dl=0 In hindsight, I believe I was rather defensive myself in my response to his note explaining why I was refunding him. A similar (but much less severe) case happened with this same commissioner in early 2016, which guided my decisions to cancel his commission and my response. I also know now it would have been best to leave the funds in my PayPal account for just such a situation as this. I had been transferring all the funds received from commissions for the fundraiser as soon as the commissioners had approved their sketches, as I was completing these commissions within 1-2 days after the sketches were approved. My thinking on transferring the funds this way was to make sure they were there during the duration of the fundraiser and so that I could organize the funds in preparation for signing a lease and putting down the deposit and first month’s rent on a new home. I’m honestly not sure what to do at this point other than to just… wait? I ultimately only want to be able to give him his $140 partial refund as soon as possible. I’ve been wanting to block him, but I know it would be inappropriate to do so as he’s still - despite this situation - completely entitled to his refund, and I don’t want to cut him off entirely due to that reason. PROOF: Chain of FA notes in order from when the sketches were originally delivered before the commission cancellation to the final note sent to the commissioner regarding the reason for his refund: https://www.dropbox.com/s/fqnxuigtd39b69f/notechain.jpg?dl=0 Chain of FA notes in order regarding the dispute: https://www.dropbox.com/s/edbs1jf05jrwyt1/chargebacknotes.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/9wsgn3wuq93spy5/paypalclaimexplain.jpg?dl=0 Quote agreement and paid invoice: https://www.dropbox.com/s/scda3kskug1yisl/AB_Ingri_01.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/k7h6brggzw59aqw/AB_Ingri_003.jpg?dl=0 Artwork finished before the cancellation of the commission and delivered to the commissioner: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ykdw77beap7zfy4/com_Weavile2_Ignri_v1.jpg?dl=0 - NSFW https://www.dropbox.com/s/ca3qq5pos1bdtvl/com_Weavile2_Ignri_v2.jpg?dl=0 - NSFW Dispute with refund transfer and full Resolution Center conversation: https://www.dropbox.com/s/9pa0dywv1t25jpk/AB_INGRI_PAYPAL_02.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/fsagu2pumaqss2z/PayPalResolutionContinued.jpg?dl=0 UPDATE: I had called PayPal and spoke to a representative about the case, and they told me there was nothing more I could do on my end until the claim was closed, or PayPal contacted me via e-mail if they needed any more information. This evening (June 28), I received this e-mail from PayPal: https://www.dropbox.com/s/pg8dwwonrc66xi6/claimemail.jpg?dl=0 I responded to the claim: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ug92hs7046qlhec/claimupdate.jpg?dl=0 I received this e-mail in response: https://www.dropbox.com/s/vedz5or60tbav1e/claimemail2.jpg?dl=0 Hopefully the refund is accepted, he can receive his refund and the claim can be closed. UPDATE 2: I received another e-mail response that the commissioner agreed to close the claim by accepting the partial refund of $140, so the claim was closed in my favor. I've since notified the commissioner that the refund was delivered to him and blocked him. E-mails: 1. https://www.dropbox.com/s/43o1q5fzf9428hu/closedclaimemail1.jpg?dl=0 2. https://www.dropbox.com/s/un6qlp07fc4b78o/closedclaimemail2.jpg?dl=0 FA Note: https://www.dropbox.com/s/efoq411k83k6ayz/closedclaimnote.jpg?dl=0 Hopefully this experience helps others who've experienced similar situations with commissioners, and can see how the process worked for me so it gives some insight on what to expect in case an event like this happens with someone else. PayPal was nothing but pleasant with me and had an absolute willingness to work with me on the matter.

Commissioned art and YCH purchase on 5/24/2023 This Beware does contain NSFW elements, All communications were handled in discord After some difficult communication due to a language barrier, we finally came to an understanding and payment was sent These are the two payments through boosty, one of these is an error as boosty charged me twice. Here is the YCH that was purchased along side a REF sheet slot Here is the initial communication between me and the artist, it took a while to come to an understanding but we came to agree that its two ych slots and one commission if they are able to get boosty to send me a refund for the extra $200, knowing boosty from my perspective they is no way to really get a refund unless i want to get my account banned by doing a chargeback as in their eyes it would be considered fraud from some of the other cases i have seen They made an announcement on their discord saying that they are burned out due to them working on furry art and would prioritise working on working on human art if some of the people in their discord would like that instead So five months have passed from the initial commission DM's so i sent a DM in discord to see if they have a trello to see where i am in the queue, they apparently do have one but they keep it in private access and its supposedly in their language (even though i could work it out with a translator) in addition they state that the art would be worked on in november, After two months have passed including november which was the supposed date that the commission's was being worked on, so i sent another message to see what is going on... and no response, i waited until january to send another dm and still no response (image includes overlapping DM's from earlier images) I gave them a warning that if they continue to ghost me, i will be forced to look at my options such as posting an artist beware, after i gave them the warning they responded with this reasoning for their absence despite them streaming on twitch days prior Image includes another member of the artist's discord who also became frustrated with how long they are having to wait Due to the nature of this i decided to give them time to sort things out on their end and continue to wait, i waited a week as they would supposedly be working on art and sent another DM, they still did not reply, I then waited until this February to send another message and still no response still no message from them to as of typing this 2/26/2024 Here is their twitch activity for this month and prior They seem to be working on art for themselves such as emojis for their twitch discord and personal pieces it even seems some some of the newer streams are missing

Jul. 7th, 2012 at 6:47 AM aperturefox I haven't posted here before, so I apologize for any mistakes. About two months ago (I believe on May 4th), I commissioned someone at an anime con for two tails, one of my fursona, and one of my fiance's. I paid upfront VIA cash- 90$. I only have the one email she sent of the night for proof of this whole thing. Ever since that email she sent, I had not heard from her since, even though after I tried to contact her at times. I do not know what's going on, if she lost internet or something. Quite frankly, I know nothing. The rest is under the cut. EDIT: (4/14/13): Sent her another email, plus I contacted her VIA Etsy, where her recent upload was around March of this year. http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/266/alik.png/ EDIT: I sent her another email a few days ago, and this is what I got: http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Baka_Koori_Kitsune/akijs.png Was about a week ago, but I have not heard back yet. EDIT: I was going to email her today, but my hotmail wouldn't work. Finally I got this on my phone, and now hotmail works! It must have known. http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Baka_Koori_Kitsune/Capture-2.png WHO: Aliks Cosplay http://www.alikscosplay.com/ http://www.etsy.com/shop/AliksCosplay WHERE: BAMCon- '12. First anime con in Pittsfield, MA. Took place probably around 2-6 PM on May 4th. I paid up front, 90.00$ WHAT: I ordered two tails to be made for my fiance and myself of our fursona. She said because of the markings, it would come to 90$ all together, ship included. When we were talking to her, she asked for my email which I promptly gave to her, which she emailed me from her phone asking me for the reference sheets for the tails. WHEN: We started transactions on the 4th. As stated I paid her 90.00$ up front in cash. I don't have a receipt, just the emails. The first email was sent to me asking about our references, stated here. http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Baka_Koori_Kitsune/screen1.png After that, I sent her the email containing the two references. http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Baka_Koori_Kitsune/screen2.png After I sent her that, she said that she had received it on her phone. I forgot she said that honestly (I have a crappy memory), and sent her an email about 13 days later. http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Baka_Koori_Kitsune/screen3.png So I waited. Then, I sent her another email a couple weeks later. http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Baka_Koori_Kitsune/Screen4.png Then, I sent her this today. Now, I tried to not be rude, to be truthful I'm just really awkward at typing these emails, because I feel I sound 'pushy' when I really don't mean to be. I realize now I probably could have worded this better, and if she does read it, she probably is pretty mad. I'm sorry, I really tried to be professional about it. http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Baka_Koori_Kitsune/Screen5.png This was sent today PROOF: Other than the emails I really don't have one. She didn't give me a receipt to my phone, or anything. EXPLAIN: I tried to e-mail her within a couple weeks so she didn't feel like she was being hounded. I have no idea if she's getting them, if something happened, or what. She never did ask for my address to ship, but that might have slipped her mind. I have her etsy/website, but I don't think they have been updated in a while. I don't hate her, I'm not spiteful towards her, I just really want either my money back, or my tails.

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