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https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/1013574.html WHO: ToBeABird/Bird/Pheonix/Otternonsense/PB_Willow/@StrawberryJemma on twitter. Old known aliases include CynicalSergal on FA WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/tobeabird where I initially contacted them and bought the commission. WHAT: 2 Sided Digital (Open Species) Bat Dragon Reference $40 WHEN: 5/6/16 May 6th 2016 to present day (ongoing) EXPLAIN: I specifically commissioned bird because they did the reference sheet of a character that I liked and I wanted something done of the same species. I had found the character through youtube, then found out they were purchased by someone, and actually stumbled on their FA page finally finding the artist behind the reference. I messaged them asking them to help me make a character of the same species. I asked for some basics for the character, it would wear a skull on its head, neck fluff like a bat, a long tail like a dragon, and big ears like a bat. They told me they didn't feel comfortable doing that because it would be copying their friend's character. Whatever I understand that though it is quite disappointing when generally most bat characters have all these characteristics. I was just thankful someone was actually going to be able to help make me a character from scratch with no images at all. I gave them some artistic freedom but generally its a bat dragon, it needs to look as such. The agreement (https://imgur.com/byYQg1X ) and the proof of payment. (https://imgur.com/b95ZIn9 ) Bird said in the messages the estimated time for the completion of the reference sheet would be finished in 7-25 days. So it should have been finished between May 13th 2016 and the very end of may, and if I'm being generous, end of June of 2016. Messages took place on May 6th 2016. The dates came and went, and I sat wondering what happened. I don’t feel like dragging their personal life through the mud, or trying to locate every single journal they posted about art delays, needing money or any other kind of inconvenience because there are many. I remained understanding and considerate during this time because it is the human thing to do. I am aware things can be delayed and people have home life and personal issues to deal with and it's fine because at the time the art was only a month late. Sometime in June or July of 2016 they did a stream on picarto and I saw the line art for the character they would be making for me. I saw them open the file of the old bat dragon reference they made for their friend, and they just edited the lines, as in directly opened the line art file for an older commission, and shorted the ears, changed the tail, the nose, the mouth, everything. The character didn’t look like a bat at that point, it just looked like a dog with wings. I do not have a copy of the line art because their queue/trello is no longer available. I didn’t feel like fighting them so I said the lines were fine but I really felt cheated. June came and went, July came and went, August was coming to an end so I decided to message Bird about the commission mostly to get an update if they finished or if I was able to get some things changed (https://imgur.com/A89OtmH ) this was mostly a message to remind them they had a commission due to me. Months go by with no update to their trello (which was available at the time,) I at one point in time they whispered me on picarto in October 2016 saying they hadn’t forgotten about the commission and they’ll work on it soon. Another time they said they would start working on owed reference sheets during a stream, and ended the stream earlier never touching any art. I sadly have no proof of these things because I never saved the messages and it was all on picarto so there's no actual saved evidence. I was never contacted again, nor did I contact them until they messaged me on my twitter in July of 2017 accusing me of sending my friends after them. (For the lazy, I don’t know who this person was, I never sent anyone after Bird, I solve problems on my own.) Bird's first message accusing me to of sending "my friends" after them https://imgur.com/ftj67RR the continuing messages https://imgur.com/ThYfcFM (obligatory "I know you've been waiting a long time," it was over a year at that point). Bird also asking me to find this person (despite me not knowing them) to get them to stop "harassing" him https://imgur.com/C5F0mHD . At this point I had started to scroll through the main feed of my twitter and saw Bird had tweeted these out https://imgur.com/SM68woa and https://imgur.com/Gp15wux . Whether or not they were actually about me I still made the notion to call them out for it since they previously accused me of sending people to harass them. Probably unprofessional on my side, but I also found it unprofessional to come after someone and accuse something they did not do. Also in the proof 4 they mentioned that my commission was 85% finished. https://imgur.com/sPv6Uzj and finally https://imgur.com/6m78KTM . Since the final message I had not received any kind of update about my commission being "85%" finished. I never received the line art and there were no updates to a queue, a trello or message to me. All updates from Bird of any kind seem to be journals about their personal financial issues. Their journals seem like a general place for them to ask for them to ask for money for overdue bills and vet trips or uber money. I had quit following their FA over a year ago because I was tired of seeing them open for emergency commissions and in stream commissions every other day but never actually show up with anything completed. If you just delve into their journals on FA you can see how chaotic and ridiculous it has been as a commissioner trying to get any kind of information from them. They have constantly locked, unlocked and deleted their twitter and since these previous messages from @pb_willow, they made a new one. I had to actually find their twitter from their fursuit business account in order to get ahold of them a year after they said the art would be completed in a week. I contacted them on twitter JULY 13TH 2018 The First Message https://imgur.com/PrvCE6Z My first message to them asking for a refund because I have been waiting over two years for this piece. The Second Message https://imgur.com/xTfAVy0 : Bird mentioning that on their FA journals (I stopped following them over a year ago) that their computer has died and they have debts to a cable company equalling over $500? They also mentioned to not contact them through this twitter and contact their art manager. The third message https://imgur.com/9ELAJAi They’re now saying they owe $900?) They said I need to wait Saturday to find someone to give them the time to use their friends’ laptop to plug their external hard drive into. I don’t know how long their computer has been broke, but why they didn’t get this done this as soon as they could makes me really skeptical of everything they’ve told me. If I delved deeper I feel like I would have been met with a ton of excuses. I told them I want either the art or the money whichever comes first, which sounds really rude, but it has been over two years. I do not trust this person to get me either the art or the refund. Every promise they had made to me has never been achieved. I feel like I have been lied to several times about this commission, and any time I have ever asked about seeing a work in progress I never see it, I am given a bunch of excuses among other things. I said I was going to message them saturday (July 14th 2018) but I gave them some time and messaged their manager (since they told me to) July 16th I messaged their manager https://imgur.com/vaPwZbF and never received a response. (JULY 23RD 2018) https://imgur.com/30j8Ww2 I messaged bird on FA asking for an update because their manager never messaged me back. I get a short message stating they sent me an update via twitter, which i can assure anyone, even if I could provide proof, I NEVER GOT AN UPDATE on twitter. Nothing else was in the FA message. Not even an update. Even if they did message me an update via twitter then they could have provided the update in the same message in FA as well to be professional. Instead I get a short and snappy message replying to me me asking about a commission that is TWO YEARS overdue. Message on July 23rd 2018 https://imgur.com/30j8Ww2 July 24th 2018 https://imgur.com/0Dctzas my patience has gotten very thin. I’ve not been given a real update, thus me lashing out. I’m tired of dealing with this individual. This is completely out of hand, two years waiting on a commission and I’m getting treated like I’m the one inconveniencing them. That Night July 24th 2018 https://imgur.com/6Vy6882 They asked me for my paypal email so they could send me the refund that night, later changed to when they wake up https://imgur.com/zmMAZLI to no one's surprise the refund never came. I gave them 5 days. (July 29th 2019) I messaged them to tell them I never received the refund https://imgur.com/UZixicK gave me some excuse about it being "summer in the south," (it's also summer in my state?) They have also seemed to forgotten that THEY TOLD ME THEY WERE GOING TO REFUND ME that same night several weeks ago because they no longer wanted to deal with me. But in this message they are accusing me of "not wanting to wait for the art." (Again it has been WELL OVER two years, I think we have gone above and beyond wanting to wait for this art.) It is now September 4th 2018, I still have not received the refund, only tons of excuses which is apparently the only thing I seemed to have paid for(?) I've checked their FA there's no indication that they've made an attempt to reach out to people to give them refunds or the art they're owed. I don't know how long it takes them or their friend to build a computer but over a month seems a little ridiculous (I know people work at different paces, but it took me four hours to build my computer and it was my first build.) Remember in previous messages they said they owe 14 people art that are stuck on their hard drive. I'm assuming since I messaged bird they have made zero attempt to try and retrieve these pieces for myself or for people by either a completed computer or by visiting a friend to use their computer. I have not been contacted to be paid back, this all started May of 2016, it is now September of 2018. Will Update As Necessary (September 9/4/2018) Most recent update (September 9/14/2018) Most recent update (September 9/16/2018) Sept 14th https://imgur.com/essiCtS (outgoing message) Sept 14th https://imgur.com/sTXgJvc bird’s message to me. I’m sort of dumbfounded and have zero idea of how to go about replying to this mess. This is where I get tilted and I’m sorry for that, this has been an emotional rollercoaster of all this back and forth nonsense. To recap: they had told me they “finished” the art (whenever that was) and I was never once notified before their computer happened to die. All this is riding on the fact we would not be having issues if they had either given me the art or refunded me when I asked a year ago. Several weeks ago they just told me they bought a computer (messages in the beware, but also here:https://www.furaffinity.net/journals/tobeabird/ in their journal where they also talk about going to IFC) So no money to refund people, but money to buy a new computer and go to conventions? JANUARY 4TH 2019 They sent me a PM in FA asking for my paypal and wanted to search through our notes to find how much they owe me, which I told them straight off the bat (eheh ) because i had a feeling they'd be searching for several months. In any case they finally sent me my refund today. So not exactly three years but close enough. Tired of ads? Upgrade to account with Professional package of service and never see ads again!

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/971939.html WHO: Gideon furaffinity.net/user/gideon twitter.com/gideonscorral gideonscorral.com (gated) WHERE: Initially email, later Telegram. WHAT: Digital artpiece (single character, full color) for $100 WHEN: Early May 2017 up to current. EXPLAIN: Mid April 2017: I contacted Gideon by email after he advertised digital versions of his art CDs on his twitter account. He was quick to reply and send the links after I paid through Paypal. May 1 2017: I was rather fond of one design in particular and I asked him if he took commissions. He agreed for a $100 single character piece. Seeing as he was quite responsive in his previous emails, that he's been active in the fandom since the early 2000s and the fact that I've seen his commissioned work occasionally on FA, I figured he would have plenty of experience in that regard and that getting a commission from him would be a safe bet. Though, at the time, I wasn't aware of this very site. So I pitched my idea to him and he expressed a similar fondness towards it, even noting that he could "easily do that". (I'm not sure why the font of this message is so small, but it's still legible.) I paid through Paypal and notified him, assuming he would send me a sketch within the next few weeks. (Email conversation, read from bottom to top. Partially redacted for NSFW content.) https://i.imgur.com/2FXOWQo.png Proof of payment: https://i.imgur.com/faywzgk.png "You have transferred 100 USD to" May 25 2017: Gideon didn't get back to me nor replied to another email I sent him, so I tried to contact him through a comment on his paysite, which I was already subscribed to anyway. He contacted me again through another email account, so I suppose he had forgotten about our initial email exchange. I inquired about the commission status after which he told me had to slow down (he had some health issues at the time) and that he would write me another email the next day (though that didn't happen). https://i.imgur.com/7xRb5RR.png June 9 2017: I inquired about another update as he hadn't contacted me at this point. He apologized, said he would get to the commission that week and suggested to use Telegram to keep contact. (Portion of reply redacted for privacy reasons.) https://i.imgur.com/tWRBVn0.png June 18 2017: After trying to contact him several times through Telegram he said that "life got a bit hectic" and that he had "a few guests over". I didn't want to come off as pushy so I let it be for a few weeks. https://i.imgur.com/ysSRgvi.png July 25 2017: Once again, I hadn't heard anything from him and as he didn't reply to the Telegram messages I contacted him be email again and I stated my displeasure at the delays and the lack of communication. He apologized again and said that he would normally only take payment after a sketch is shown. Also that he would give a sketch the following weekend. https://i.imgur.com/8TgYPZd.png https://i.imgur.com/7sWkBhF.png August 14 2017: Multiple weekends had passed since that message and I had received nothing at that point. I contacted him again, he apologized and said he'd send me a sketch that same night (I think you'll start to see the pattern here), while also asking if I could send the reference/specifics again as well as other details. That struck me as rather odd, because if one takes commissions isn't noting down the references the first thing you'd do ? https://i.imgur.com/JhFO7Rz.png https://i.imgur.com/FpYE5GS.png September 12 2017: At this point I was rather annoyed with the endeavour this whole situation had become as I had tried to contact him through email and Telegram, multiple times even, with no replies whatsoever. https://i.imgur.com/I7iX8Vw.png He was still quite active on Twitter throughout all of this however. It was only when I threatened to make this public and take legal action that he got back to me. He said I would see the sketch next weekend - it was tuesday then - while, for some reason, also going on about something unrelated to the commission. https://i.imgur.com/jFI8p85.png September 24 2017: The weekend had passed and I'd still seen nothing. My latest message to him is still marked as unread even though his status is "Last seen recently", which according to Telegrams FAQ means having logged in within the last 3 days. All in all, from a customer point of view I find this entire situation to be unacceptable. As I stated to him as well, I'd have no qualms with some delays on their own as long as you stay in contact and keep me updated. But when there is a consistent pattern with excuses and empty promises, as well as an overall lack of communication I'm rather skeptical on whether I'll ever see that sketch, let alone a finished piece.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/967696.html WHO: csmutrun WHERE: All galleries are NSFW / 18+ adult art. https://csmutrun.tumblr.com/ https://www.patreon.com/csmutrun https://picarto.tv/Csmutrun https://www.hentai-foundry.com/user/CSmutRun/profile WHAT: Digital art, 2x pictures. 2x characters + background, NSFW, coloured, paid by a Paypal sponsor/friend. 1x character, NSFW, coloured - never paid because we decided to cancel after the above commission took too long. WHEN: 27th - 28th March – made contact. 29th – 30th March – exchanged commission details & payment. 31st March – Promised to finish thumbnails tonight. AWOL 14th April – I ask for the WIPs, & request an explanation for going absent. 14th April – CS explains he lost his job & apartment, but we are top priority. Thumbnails promised. 14th April – When questioned for the turnaround, CS promises finished art by the end of May, & thumbnails promised tomorrow. 17th April – Missed deadline. Request sent. 18th April – Received a sketch WIP. AWOL ( Posted commissions for newer clients, contradicting his status ) Arpil 23rd free drawings livestream www.dropbox.com/s/w1tl5m6tat858mt/IMG_1177.JPG?dl=0 April 24th 20 drawings livestream www.dropbox.com/s/i959n15hai1s9ks/IMG_1178.JPG?dl=0 26th April – Enquiry sent. 26th April – Sketch cleanup received, one character. April 30th - Tumblr update for another livestream www.dropbox.com/s/ta2qbkho3u04c3w/IMG_1179.JPG?dl=0 1st May – Sketch cleanup sent of full scene. 12th of May – Cleaned up lineart received. AWOL 28th May – Enquiry sent. 29th May – Partial coloured flats preview received. AWOL 25th June – Enquiry sent. 30th June – Enquiry sent & refund request, threat to escalate to Paypal dispute if no reply. 30th June – 50% of refund received & finished art promised soon. AWOL 29th July – Enquiry sent. 29th July – Final deadline promised within 7 days, or refund. AWOL 5th August – Enquiry sent. 6th August - Art or Refund request sent. 7th August – Refund sent & confirmed. EXPLAIN: 47+ e-mails of asking for art wips, updates, and extensions. For a two-character commission co-owned by a friend, we had contacted CS, and after the payment went through, communication became erratic & uncooperative/avoidant. I. Consistently made & broke promised deadlines for WIP & finished piece. II. Never provided WIPs (despite in the contract) unless asked, AFTER repeated requests. III. Art progress was next to nil for 5 months, a total of 4 WIPs & a revision. (sketch, rough inked lines, cleaned lines, 5% coloured flats cleanup) provided. IV. Never followed up with an apology & work progress after missing a deadline. Had to chase with more e-mails. V. At one point ignored a deadline for finished art & repeated attempts to make contact, then made another promise immediately after we threatened Paypal dispute. accepting our payment. (See proof linked above) VI. As of 6th August he had ignored e-mails asking for our refund, after missing the final extension deadline on the 4th of August. VII. Responded to third e-mail & promised refund. VIII. Received 2nd half of the commission's price same night. PROOF: (Initial contact/payment & first case of AWOL) http://www.dropbox.com/s/6pd4ld7kmrd7xrc/IMG_0917.JPG?dl=0 (Example of AWOL & delayed responses to contact) http://www.dropbox.com/s/b80cbehq5x2adii/IMG_0903.JPG?dl=0 (29th May - 30th June AWOL & 50% refund confirmation) www.dropbox.com/s/bnqnwjam2ibo7el/IMG_1168.JPG?dl=0 (Last deadline, AWOL, refund escalation, 2nd 50% refund confirmation) www.dropbox.com/s/m6aw1ub6fp64li6/IMG_1171.JPG?dl=0

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/963745.html 2018-08-28 Update: I have been given a full refund by Ryunwoofie/Gudetamom/Ocean Wotter, the proof of receipt is added to the original album. 2018-06-28 Update: Ryunwoofie has changed her name on Twitter to @Gudetamom / Ocean Wotter, is not permitting any comments on FurAffinity even when offering new slots, and is still no further along on clearing her refunds. She may be attempting to flee her current commitments by hiding behind a new persona. WHO: Ryunwoofie (Artist) (Aliases include: @Gudetamom / Ocean Wotter) WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/ryunwoofie/ http://www.twitter.com/Gudetamom WHAT: Two and a half colored sketch pieces #1) Two-character colored sketch with extra details #2) My half of a two-character colored sketch piece with extra details (the other commissioner paid the other half as we were splitting the cost of this one) #3) One-character colored sketch. WHEN: #1) August 15, 2016 ($125.00 USD) #2) September 4, 2016 ($62.50 USD) #3) October 1, 2016 ($70.00 USD, $50.00 USD still owed) EXPLAIN: Ryunwoofie is an artist who, in 2016, had been active in taking stream commissions. I was cozied up to the idea of commissioning her and, fearing that I would rarely if ever make her streams, hoped that she would take some commissions "off-stream" someday. At the time my only contact with her was on FurAffinity. On August 15th 2016 she agreed to take a commission "off-stream" not too long after discussing the details of it (I had given them to her again at her request at the time of acceptance) and paid the quoted amount in full and upfront to her specifications and satisfaction. https://sta.sh/07plbsa0lak A month went by and I was being understanding on the delays, keeping in constant contact with Ryunwoofie, when she hosted a stream on September 4, 2016 that I was able to attend. When I was in this stream a friend and I decided we'd split the cost of another commission with Ryunwoofie, who wasn't able to do the artwork in the stream that night but agreed to do it off-stream. Each of us paid our half upfront after we all agreed on the details in private communications in the stream. There was follow-up discussion about that image, which is linked below. https://sta.sh/0j6ics96947 When October 1 came around without any updates or progress shown on the two pieces so far, Ryunwoofie opened up for one off-stream commission again and I was able to take the open slot. After discussing the details she quoted the price and I paid her upfront and in full. By November 30 there was still no progress despite previous claims that the artwork would be finished within two weeks or so, with ongoing explanations as to what was causing the delay. Due to the lack of progress and giving in to different ideas, we discussed alternate content for the third sketch and also agreed to switch from FA notes to email. https://sta.sh/01v42kqvrxg0 , https://sta.sh/021jgoebqtf4 , https://sta.sh/0h4brsomoqn , https://sta.sh/0cbimxw5u8f, and https://sta.sh/0l8ogcmt2ta Delays and issues continued up through February 2017, with no progress of any kind rendered. During a stream on February 11, 2017 I discussed making an up-front payment and drawing from some of the "credit" I accumulated with her to commission an idea I previously downgraded. She agreed, and while she didn't finish the art in that stream she did finish it a few days later. However, I was still waiting on the other three pieces we had agreed upon via email. https://sta.sh/0b5p7uu7sri , https://sta.sh/01gnm38rm0kj , https://sta.sh/0r2tubz0fm6 , and https://sta.sh/0zk197kyj86 Up to this point the emails were largely filled with patience about getting the art, up until April 24th, 2017 when Ryunwoofie appeared on Artists Beware. Realizing then and there that I may never get the other pieces of art, I contacted her on May 17th, 2017 (one other email went completely ignored mid-April) to see if I would be able to get the artwork by the end of the month, or failing that a refund. She agreed, though had nothing to show for it come June 1, 2017. On that date I follow up again and she agreed to do a refund by June 16th, either half on the 9th and half on the 16th or everything on the 16th. I asked her to keep me in the loop if there is any difficulty on this, to which she agreed. However, no communication has been received since then and my last email, dated July 7, went unanswered. https://sta.sh/02fgz5n8aefu , and https://sta.sh/01h0bams7ahk Unfortunately for me, due to the time that has passed I am not able to dispute the transactions through my bank (which issued the credit card I paid for the sketch pieces on) or PayPal (who processed the transactions for the pieces), which leaves this as one of my few final options for seeking a positive resolution or otherwise warning commissioners that working with Ryunwoofie may result in not getting artwork. PROOF: Album of conversations and PayPal Transaction Receipts: https://sta.sh/2xcgiy9s7df 2018-08-06 Proof of Refund: https://sta.sh/0n331a1iieh

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/957689.html UPDATE: Artist has knocked out work in less than 48 hours after almost 6 months of waiting. It's very sub-par and I wasn't consulted before posting it publicly. Then deleted it. 48 hours later she sent me a revised version which appears to have been completely recoloured. Whilst it isn't great, I do feel that she has now fulfilled her obligation of delivering a complete coloured commission... WHO: Levana aka Levs-chan aka XxLevanaxX WHERE: https://inkbunny.net/Levana and http://levana-art.tumblr.com/ WHAT: Standard commission WHEN: Commission was requested on 3rd January 2017. Payment was sent 4th January 2017. Nothing at all has been done since EXPLAIN: I requested a standard commission on the 3rd of January 2017 and paid $60 promptly upon receipt of the invoice the following day. References were given the same day, and after some chitchat, the artist went silent for an entire month until I prompted her again on the 3rd of February. The excuse was given that "things [have] been kinda hectic", but no status update was given. A week later on the 11th more information was requested for the work, which I provided. Again the artist fell silent, this time for two months. On the 11th of April I prodded her again, to be told that "Everything's alright....I have been working on a few commissions". Nothing specific about mine though. AGAIN the artist went silent. I emailed her again on the 8th of May, but this time received no response. I tried again on the 29th of May, and was told the following day "I've been sketching out all of the commissions lately, yours included, so, it will give me a head start on the LineArts and colors for all of them. Hopefully I'll get them done by next week!". And yet again she went silent for three weeks. My latest email has gone unanswered. There have been no sketches, no linearts, nothing provided. In fact there is no evidence at all that she's even started working. As we're getting close to the Paypal 180-day limit I have told her that I am prepared to request a refund unless she can provide proof that she's actually started work. There was nothing in the commission detail or in any of our conversation to warrant such a delay. If I'd been told "The work might take up to 6 months" I would have understood, but there has been absolutely no explanation. UPDATE: After posting this I received a message from the artist apologising, and saying that she was "getting onto it right now" and would "be working night and until morning for your commission to be finished." Three hours later I received an incomplete sketch via email. I replied, letting her know of the situation but cautiously adding that I couldn't accurately judge the sketch as it was incomplete. I also mentioned that the Paypal deadline is the 12th of July, whereupon I have to escalate to a claim, or cancel if the art is done. UPDATE: 24 hours later (the 22nd of June), I get a message saying that she is considering closing all her accounts and paying everybody back. I have replied saying that she can do that if she wants, but there is still the option of finishing the work before the Chargeback deadline. I am bemused by her comment that she is "new to Paypal" but that's beyond the scope of this post. As of 23rd of June, I have received a rough sketch. UPDATE: She just posted the finished product to Inkbunny...without showing it to me first...and it's VERY sub-par...certainly not much to show for $60 and 6 months of waiting... I'm not sure what to do at this stage. She has TECHNICALLY delivered a finished piece of work, but it's hideous and full of errors... https://inkbunny.net/submissionview.php?id=1383124 (NSFW) UPDATE: 24th June - She's deleted the submission and said she'll work on it. UPDATE: 25th June - She's recoloured the entire piece and asked for my approval, which I have given. PROOF: Conducted entirely via Inkbunny PMs Initial request - http://imgur.com/DbHrJyQ February prompt - http://imgur.com/vSA99ci April prompt - http://imgur.com/u6ZLvIj May prompt - http://imgur.com/wOv7x2K Response after Paypal chargeback - http://imgur.com/2PSUEnv Me updating her on the situation - http://imgur.com/qsksRcL Artist's apology and my offer of options - http://imgur.com/Zw8a4hm Submission on IB and my comment expressing surprise and concern - http://imgur.com/FuonUzE

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/945938.html WHO: Vani / AshkechumSays / Stripesandteeth. Previously: Vanimute, VanillaKitsune WHERE: Twitter, we spoke briefly at MFF. WHAT: $150 MFF pick-up badge WHEN: Payment was sent on the 11th of November, - now, March 3rd. PROOF: All commission interactions : http://imgur.com/a/7VZlW Payment proof : http://imgur.com/a/LLcVd EXPLAIN: I commissioned Vani/Ash in early November for a badge that was supposed to be completed for MFF 2016 pick up . I was very excited to commission this artist, and sent the $155 (USD) right away. Once payment was made I was promised a WIP within the next few days (Proof of payment recieved, and saying I would recieve a wip shortly. http://imgur.com/YVrFzi9), I did not recieve a wip until the end of the month, after asking them for an update. (the 30th of November) After recieving a wip, I approved the sketch. I didn't hear anything up until the convention (even tho i send muitple DMs at the con) and actually approached her table. At their table they had nothing to show me (did not see the original sketch, or anything), and said they would be working on it that night, and it would most likely be done the next day. (Sunday) I did not hear anything from them until they was leaving the con. (Messages sent at the con, and afterwards. http://imgur.com/a/eQDqm) After the con I did not recieve any WIPs, or anything past the sketch point. We agreed to change the character on the 19th of December (character change, http://imgur.com/a/OAvZj) . I did not hear anything from them at all after this. I DMed them on twitter mutiple times from the 16th-22nd of Februrary and didn't hear anything back until threatening to file a charge back. They replied, with a several paragraph explaination of the things going on in their life, but no actual update on when the art would be finished, or what state badge was in. To this I responded that I would just like my money back, and would be going forward with a charge back. They asked that I wait a week for them to refund me, and that they would be posting adopts to make the money to refund me. Durring this week they did not post anything on their account (besides an astrology bot.). I also did not hear anything from them, or any sort of update on what they were doing. I proceeded with filing a paypal claim, and I'm just waiting to hear back for paypal. (contact with vani from the 16th - march 2nd, http://imgur.com/a/3sFAM ) I cannot reccomend this artist to anyone. unfortunately they are not very reliable and they does not stick to their word, or communicate with her customers. I am very disapointed, and while their work is gorgeous, please be warry of commissioning this artist. I wish I had seen their other bewares before commissioning them.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/934609.html WHO: Jinxsis (FA) / Jinx_in_boots (Twitter) WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/jinxsis/ (FA) https://twitter.com/Jinx_In_Boots (Twitter) WHAT: - 1 Art Box - 1 Custom Messenger Bag - 1 Custom Bandanna (for someone else) - 3 Halloween Badges (Made / Shipped) - Update to Old Character Reference Sheet WHEN: January 2014 - October 2016 PROOF: 1/5/2014 - http://sta.sh/01lgl1khf2jw 1/17/2016 - http://sta.sh/087h0ghdhov 10/24/2014 - Refund Payment Rejected: http://sta.sh/023sa6euym2x Note asking why it happened: http://sta.sh/01wou4o46eji 10/6/2016 - Asked about Ref redo: http://sta.sh/01hbsaehhbrd 10/7/2016 - Changes needed: http://sta.sh/01iucqs55vl3 http://sta.sh/0ljwlx1eij8 11/21/2016 - Blocked on Twitter http://sta.sh/0251ljbd100y http://sta.sh/0ljwlx1eij8 When asked why it happened from the bf: Pt. 1 - http://sta.sh/01pz49lg1cs8 Pt. 2 - http://sta.sh/017eg7x0eyht EXPLAIN: Jan. 5, 2014 - Initially commissioned them to do a Art Box / Custom Messenger bag for me for $75. Was contacted later that it could not be finished so refund could either be given or trades for the amount owed up to 4 items, no matter what they would be. Jan. 17th, 2014 - Initially commissioned for a custom printed bandanna for an ex-friend of mine. Was told that also could not be completed and refund was set to happen so refund could either be given or trades for the amount owed up to 1 item, no matter what they would be, and included with offer above. Oct. 24, 2014 - Refund was offered, but then was receded and not sent due to them not being able to at the time. Again, the refund was switched to the offers stated above with at least 5 things I would want to get no matter what they are. Oct. 7, 2016 - After the purchase of another character from someone else, I had asked for a small reference sheet change based on a character purchased from someone else. Was told that it would take 2-3 weeks for them to finish. I had also asked about doing two reference sheets: 1 for a reference sheet for a character I am getting a suit of and 1 edit for the reference sheet above at 0ct. 7, 2016. On Nov. 21, I had found out I was blocked on twitter when going to contact about the reference sheet to ask if it was completed as of yet so I could send it to a maker. In wanting to know why I was blocked, I had asked my boyfriend to contact the artist and ask what the reason I was blocked if they needed to get in contact me with a commission. They had said they did not need to tell me and would contact me when the commission was over with. At this point and time, I did not wish to get the commission anymore as not only am I not able to contact them on the main handle I handle my commissions I get from others, but without giving an adequate reason to this block. The time had also been too long, and as a business transaction, as this is treated for only at this point, I only want my refund from this artist. I am in the process of getting the refund back and was told it would be after Thanksgiving. The guess, since I am not able to contact them myself, nor have they contacted me, is Friday November 25th, 2016. **Update** Was told to my bf that I would be refunded within exactly 2 weeks. Keeping aware and if it is not fufilled by the allotted time, it will be taken up with paypal and chargeback will be filed. Proof: Clarity needed for amount to refund: http://sta.sh/025yfc2xbae5 Amount Clarified and Time for Refund Given: http://sta.sh/01htskdo0p90 **Update** Jinxsis had stated to my bf that they would give me the refund by the night of Decemver 9th. They still have not given back the refund, even when she stated she would have been sending the refund this week by the previous claim. By December 12th, the paypal charge claims will be filed on them by the end of the day. I hopefully will get my money back by then.</b> Proof: Asked on clarity of refund / problem to why she didn't send it 12/09/2016 or 12/10/2016: http://sta.sh/0egnyrdcw6n **Update** Jinxsis has not contacted myself or my boyfriend about the refund being sent through paypal since Sunday, so a charge back on the most recent purchase has been filed. Hopefully with this, the refund will happen and this can be resolved. Proof: Paypal Dispute: http://sta.sh/0940tovtds5 **Proof** So, after chargeback was completed and paid for the $10, my bf had asked about the account and if it was able to have the rest of the money sent that Jinxsis had said above (proof of clarity for 12/09/16 - 12/10/2016). However, as it seems, they do not have the money anymore and will be sending the money within a few days (again). So the money will be sent a few days before the holiday. It is confusing at this point and feels as though they are stalling to give back a refund at this point. I still have not had any personal contact with them at all, as said that they would do. So, once more, I have to wait for a refund for hopefully 2-3 more days. Proof: http://sta.sh/02ehgxnsqjgz **UPDATE** Still, there was no communication directly to me about any of this situation and delay of refund dates have happened. As of today, December 27th, 2016, I have received back my refund for all items I had previously commissioned. It is considered resolved. Never again will I commission this person and if you do, please be weary of communication as well as their intake of commissions. I hope no one else has to go through this.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/930964.html WHO: Buttbear/Yuristorm http://yuristorm.deviantart.com/ https://twitter.com/Blazefire_Saber http://toyhou.se/yuristorm http://yuristorm.tumblr.com/ WHERE: http://yuristorm.deviantart.com/ WHAT: Purchase of an character by Yuristorm, with the addition of edits to the design. (The artist allowed the customer to pay extra for edits to be done) WHEN: November 25, 2013 PROOF: http://imgur.com/a/Jvg6Y Contains everything related to this, but I will be linking to some of them in the explanation post. EXPLAIN: Yuristorm (at the time of purchase, known as Buttbear) hosted a journal selling and trading a variety of character designs. I took interest in a centaur and bird gijinka and discussed payment with the artist, along with asking if edits could be done to the centaur to better suit my tastes. (http://imgur.com/vvdd6bP) Payment was sent and the edits were agreed to, with Yuristorm promising to start on the centaur soon. [Read More] In Summary: -In November 2013, I discussed with Yuristorm the purchase of a centaur with additional edits to its design. -Communication was sparse in 2014 due to my respecting Yuristorm's health problems and letting the ball slip on my end concerning dutiful communication with the artist. In the time since then, I have become a more experienced commissioner and hope to do my best in being an excellent customer. -Communication picked up in 2015, with me often having to bump a note every few months to get a reply from Yuristorm, often around the time when the artist grew active on DA again. -Deadlines were broken what felt like many times: + August 2015 - Claimed that the art would be finished by summer's end, and thus the next few months. + November 2015 - Technically speaking this was not a true "claim," the artist only said it would be done soon, but since it took all the way to September 2016 for it to be done, I feel it is perhaps worth mentioning. + May 2016 - I attempted to set a rough deadline of one month beginning May 14th. It was not kept. + June 2016 - Again, claiming to get the art done "soon," while posting a good deal of other art, concerning some commissions and gifts, on Twitter. + July 2016 - Claimed at the end of July to be done within the next few days. + August 2016 - Claimed at the end of August to be done within the weekend. -Artist claimed multiple times to be done soon and would put up deadlines that would get pushed back. -Communication was inconsistent and poor. I will readily admit in 2014 I could have performed better but in 2015 and 2016 I did my best to keep in constant communication with what felt like poor response from the artist's end. -While I appreciate that the extras promised after this long span of time turned out to be a "beefed" up design and two reference busts, turning a beautiful design even more gorgeous, I am unhappy with the lack of communication on what the extras would be. This is a small matter overall of course, however with the additional troubles experienced when communicating with this artist, it adds up, and hence why I felt it may need to be pointed out as further evidence. -I understand the artist suffers from hand and health issues and I feel I have been patient concerning the matter, to the excess of nearly three years. However, they have been rather active with art and frequently post monthly art dumps onto DA. It is true that the art drawn is often sketchy and rough, but when there is such a large, monthly quantity of it while wondering where one's art is and seemingly having to tweet every time to get some sort of update...it does not shed positive light on the artist. I would like to stress that Yuristorm as a person appears to be sweet and nice. In the notes and tweets, the artist is friendly. However, the business side is lacking. There was a long length of time spent waiting for the design, along with what appeared to be poor work ethic (the broken deadlines and claims as an example) and communication. As such, while the matter is finally resolved at last, I am posting this beware to inform people of the artist's behavior with work and timeliness. Essentially, the issue is with the customer service and length of time spent on the matter. Thank you for your time, everyone.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/927928.html EDIT: Added title! WHO: https://twitter.com/gorehund / http://www.furaffinity.net/user/gorehund WHERE: Commission started over Twitter initially, then contact migrated to Telegram. WHAT: A traditional badge to be finished by AC, two stickers, then a digital icon as compensation for trouble WHEN: Started May 20, 2016, ended September 22, 2016 PROOF: I will link proof throughout the explanation, but here is the entire imgur album: http://imgur.com/a/PiTG5 EXPLAIN: On May 20, 2016, gorehund opened on Twitter for badge commissions for AC pickup or mail. I really enjoyed their art style and wanted to commission them, so I responded to their tweet. They told me I got the slot and asked me to DM my ref and provided their PayPal email. I sent them my ref and desired expression. I also told them that I was interested in AC pickup and they responded that they would have it ready for me. Proof of payment I left the artist alone for a while. On June 19, they posted a photo of badge sketches on Twitter. I was thrilled to see that they had been working on it! Fast forward to Anthrocon (June 30-July 3). They posted on Twitter that they would be in the Artist's Alley Saturday and Sunday, so I stopped in on Sat, July 2. I asked about picking up my badge and they told me that they didn't have it done yet but they did show me their sketchbook with the badge sketches. They hadn't progressed any further than the previous photo but they said they could finish and ship it to me after the con. On August 3, I sent them a Twitter DM asking about my badge because I had heard nothing since AC. I got no response for several days, so I tweeted them publicly on Aug 8, letting them know I had sent them a message. They responded to me after that tweet with their Telegram username which is where the rest of our communication took place. I sent them a message on Telegram and they responded quickly. They said they planned to finish it and have it shipped the following week. I sent another message on the following Tuesday, asking if my badge was still on track to be finished. They answered with "Yep!" and I left it at that. True to their word, the badge was finished on Aug. 19 and posted to Twitter. I was so excited to see the finished product and messaged them on telegram, expressing my happiness with the badge and asking when it would be shipped. They said they would get it out on Monday, Aug. 22. I asked if I may buy some of their high-yeena design stickers and have them sent with my badge. They asked me if I could buy the stickers through their Storenvy for inventory purposes and I didn't have a problem with that. I purchased the stickers through Storenvy on Aug. 19 and added a note to ship them with my badge. On Aug 25, I got an automated email from Storenvy, stating that my stickers had been shipped. On Aug 27, I messaged gorehund because I hadn't heard a word about my badge even though the stickers were shipped. I made sure to mention that I put a note in my sticker order to ship them with my badge. They said they didn't see the note but said they'd ship my badge the following Monday (Aug 29). I asked if I could get tracking because at this point they had told me twice already that they would ship my badge and they hadnt, but they were able to ship my stickers promptly. They said that they could get tracking for the badge. On Aug 30, I received the stickers in the mail and asked gorehund if they had gotten the chance to ship my badge like they said they would on monday. They answered and told me that they were out running errands right then, and would be shipping it. I received the badge on September 8 and let them know. Out of curiosity, I looked at the postmark on the envelope and it states that the badge was shipped on Sept 6. So I was outright lied to by gorehund regarding shipping. I also noticed that there was no tracking number. I started to notice a few imperfections on the badge and the longer I looked, the more things I saw: Food crumb under lamination Stray crumbs and lint laminated to the back Piece of lint in the "A" and an orange stain on the white cheek A curly hair laminated to the back I messaged gorehund and brought this up to them. The orange stain wasn't in the photo of the unlaminated badge, so something happened between finishing the badge and the lamination that resulted in all of the imperfections. I asked if it would be possible to peel the lamination off and somehow clean the badge but they told me that they tried it with an old badge laying around and that the lamination sticks to the paper. They expressed remorse and offered to make another badge for me, but I declined that offer because it seemed unfair. I asked if I may be compensated with something small like a digital icon because I figured it wouldn't take much time. They said an icon would be fine and they could possibly finish it that night, if not the next day. They reached out to me 2 days later on Sept 10, saying that they contracted a cold but said they would try to finish it that night. I hadn't heard anything from them so 6 days later, I sent a message asking for an update around noon. They read my message but did not respond, so about 6 hours later, I poked them again, asking for any sort of response. They told me they would have it done the following night (Sept 17). I didn't hear anything from them, so I asked for another update on Sept 18. They said they were working on it right then. Later that week (Sept 22), I asked for yet another update at about 6AM. I wasn't expecting a fast response to that since it was so early, but they did not respond to me until about 10:30 at night. They sent a sketch with no words, no apology for the wait, no explanation whatsoever. I thanked them, and they responded with the finished icon about half an hour later. Again, no apology or explanation or anything. Considering how polite they had been with me before, I was surprised to have an icon figuratively thrown at me wordlessly. This transaction is complete and I have received everything I've paid for but after being lied to, told my badge would be shipped multiple times, and being told that the icon would be finished on multiple occasions but wasn't, I cannot recommend this artist to anybody. Their art style is wonderful but the customer service leaves a lot to be desired and I do not want anybody else to have to deal with this kind of service.

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/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/910500.html Included are links to screenshots of the journals etc in case of deletion. WHO: soaru@dA (old account) / hatchimi@dA (new account/formerly Dollrot) WHERE: http://soaru.deviantart.com/ http://hatchimi.deviantart.com/ WHAT: Digital art - Pixel icons x4 - $40 total (+paypal fees) (92 total icons owed to others on her to do list) WHEN: Soaru had claimed to have been diagnosed with Carpal Tunnel Syndrome in early May 2014. We were all very understanding of her situation and that there would be delays with her commissions. ( https://i.gyazo.com/2d18a1584409cebc7fd6d15f3f87241e.png journal link: http://soaru.deviantart.com/journal/Carpal-Tunnel-Diagnosis-453965909 ) and then another notice to commissioners: ( https://i.gyazo.com/cda7fca79f835063a19bd737fd96fc10.png journal link: http://soaru.deviantart.com/journal/Attention-commissioners-454227201 ) I first noted soaru about the icon commissions on July 17th, 2014, then the agreement was made and I sent the payment the same day. (see screenshots in ‘proof’) Soaru had then made a journal on July 26th 2014 to state that she had unlimited pixel slots open for the summer ( https://i.gyazo.com/ff5ccf459452bb685191edc39e486352.png Journal link: http://soaru.deviantart.com/journal/work-work-work-470968786 ) Unlimited slots never being a promising sign, but I am a patient person, and didn’t think much of it at the time. A few more updates regarding soaru’s recovery and commission progress were posted between August 2014 until August 2015 (I will get into these in my explanation below). The final update on August 25th 2015 was about her recovery and any updates for commissioners, and since then the account has been dead. PROOF: commission note paypal transaction EXPLAIN: As stated above, soaru had been diagnosed with Carpal tunnel syndrome. She posted a journal about it on May 14th, 2014 and continued updates on her situation. When soaru had opened commissions, I sent her a note expressing my interest, and the agreement was made on July 17th. I sent the payment the same day. On July 26th 2014, soaru posted a new journal stating that she had unlimited pixel slots open for the summer, ( https://i.gyazo.com/ff5ccf459452bb685191edc39e486352.png Journal link: http://soaru.deviantart.com/journal/work-work-work-470968786 ). I didn’t think much of this at the time. On August 20th 2014, Soaru posted a commission update ( https://i.gyazo.com/1b08df12e524cd8658c41b2a8160a8c6.png journal link: http://soaru.deviantart.com/journal/Commission-update-476955835 ), stating that she was working very hard on completing her commissions right now. She asks for our patience due to work and having to take breaks because of her carpal tunnel. I was in no rush for my commissions and only wished for her recovery, as I really couldn’t imagine how awful it must be to suffer from carpal tunnel as an artist.. She adds “I did not forget about your commission, don’t worry.” The next update was on October 6th 2014. Soaru states that commissions are now closed for a good year or so. She tells us that she is very busy with work, so commission progress is moving very slowly, and apologises for the wait. I can appreciate that she is going through hard times, so a few months isn’t much to wait given her situation. “I will not update you on how your commission if coming along because there are too many of you to note. I assure you I WILL complete the commission as soon as possible. So please be patient with me. You will receive your commission when you get it.” And no, I have no idea as to when you will receive it, and for that I'd like to apologize. I also won't be providing any refunds. You will get what you paid for.” I’m a patient person and I could appreciate that taking unlimited slots as there would be a lot of people on her to do list, but looking back now, not receiving any kind of progress report on how your commission is coming along is a pretty bad sign as well as stating that you have “no idea when a commissioner will receive their commission.” But again I was willing to wait and a few months wasn’t anything to complain about given her life situation. (https://i.gyazo.com/83b4d48b277187c21701d02963b5f5f7.png journal link: http://soaru.deviantart.com/journal/Commissioners-PLEASE-READ-486724217 ) Between October 2014 and February 2015, there was no real update on soaru’s commission progress or her condition. Apart from posting a journal in December asking if her commissioners would mind if she used her new base for their commissions or not. (I requested to stick to the original base I had ordered as it fit my characters better). ( https://i.gyazo.com/934a152cd6297a6082aef184dc9e00f3.png journal link: http://soaru.deviantart.com/journal/Question-for-people-who-have-commissioned-me-498366584 ), though you could hardly call this an update. Finally on February 10th, 2015, soaru posts her public to-do list and an apology for the delay with her commissions. (https://i.gyazo.com/67931c13a0edf8575e38623994e9681c.png journal link: http://soaru.deviantart.com/journal/TO-DO-LIST-UPDATED-PLEASE-READ-THIS-OMG-512941211 ) On this list there are a total of 96 commissions yet to be completed. At the time, I simply thought she’s stated many times she is working hard to get these done so over the course of months hopefully her list will get shorter and shorter, and she will get through these and can look past this tough time in her life. The next and major life update was posted on July 13th 2015: ( https://i.gyazo.com/8e096687c3b8c8bc92baef371ba68a41.png https://i.gyazo.com/7e8bc4738ff1ea001597797b8e525eec.png journal link: http://soaru.deviantart.com/journal/Life-Update-ADDED-546016180 [screenshot & link to updates journal linked at the bottom: https://i.gyazo.com/12e87e334c506d2f8477ef92f83e50d7.png journal link: http://soaru.deviantart.com/journal/updates-447349674]). Soaru talks about how she realizes how unhappy a lot of her commissioners are with her services, her surgery and the date being under negotiation, and that she has been going through recovery. “I'd like to assure ALL MY COMMISSIONERS that I am not running away with your money. I WOULD LOVE to provide refunds to all of you, I cannot stress that enough. But I simply do not have the funds to do so. I know I've already asked you all to be very patient with me, and some of you have and I'm very grateful for that. I do not expect everyone to be understanding of my situation financially/mentally/physically, but you WILL receive your commission.” Her last update and sign of any activity on her account was on August 25th 2015. ( https://i.gyazo.com/0153602488fb599d70ff0bb7bad6a9fa.png journal link: http://soaru.deviantart.com/journal/Recovery-Update-556158826 ) A promising recovery update stating that soaru’s wounds are healing well, she still experiences some pain but it should disappear soon. She says she should be able to start commissions mid-September. She says she’ll be sure to post a journal update, as well as join.me streams of commission work, and finally that “You will also be provided with WIP's of your pixel so you know I'm actually doing your commission.” I cannot speak for everyone on her list but I have not received any kind of work in progress shots from soaru. Since then, soaru had provided no updates about surgery dates, delays, or any kind of work in progress to assure people that she was indeed trying to work on these commissions as she had been stating for the last year. Many of the comments on her page and in her journals talk about the lack of any kind of update given the situation and the wait for all of her commissioners. Soaru is even ignoring notes and comments from her clients. Many of the comments urged her to think about trying to refund even just a few commissioners to lessen her workload and to just resolve the situation as quickly as possible. Soaru also states that once her recovery is over she will be working her hardest to finish all of her commissions in response to another comment. I tried to note her back in January: ( https://i.gyazo.com/cf393ed24d2d8fe08285099283e79359.png ) to ask about changing characters since it has been so long that I had forgotten who I had even requested, but there has been no response. However, in my sent notes it is marked as read. Around late February, a friend and I (who is also on soaru’s to do list) came across a deviantart account named dollrot, but recently changed to hatchimi. At the time there was no evidence that hatchimi and soaru are the same individual, however we did find her art style to bear very close similarities to soaru’s. For some time we just kept an eye out since there wasn’t much posted to hatchimi’s gallery at the time and it could just be a similar style. Here is a comparison we compiled of all the similarities we found (style wise) : http://orig03.deviantart.net/d537/f/2016/154/f/1/comparisons_by_theangelofmemories-da4ubbh.png Over the course of the last few months we’ve tried to gather as much evidence as we can that links hatchimi and soaru as the same person. A few things we noticed: Her icon style is in the same style as her old one (they’re not made from the same base, but the way the eyes are pixeled have the same technique done on them, plus they almost overlap in terms of head placement over body) She still uses bases extremely frequently and they all have their toes pointing inwards with their hands by their sides with closed fingers. A similar technique with the way she shades her noses, and the highlights in the character’s eyes Handwriting comparison http://orig02.deviantart.net/06b4/f/2016/166/2/f/handwritting_by_royal_jelliefish-da6ck3m.png The first semi-concrete proof comes in the form of a work in progress shot from soaru, and something I noticed when I popped in to one of hatchimi’s picarto streams a few weeks ago. This is Soaru's wip screenshot with her file location atop the SAI window. notice the "C:/users/mew/desktop/file/cootiewootie.psd" Now, look at the location on this screenshot taken from Hatchimi's picarto stream. Same user name and location as to where the file is saved. "C:/users/mew/desktop/file/BASEA.psd" Along with the similarities of their style, noticing that they share the same user name and have the habit to save on the desktop is too much of a coincidence. Now, the evidence we have found that positively links soaru and hatchimi as the same person was something I noticed when hatchimi posted her artvsartist meme. She has since taken it down but you can still view it via google cache here: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://hatchimi.deviantart.com/art/artvsartiste-611370644 screenshot: https://i.gyazo.com/ad467bb0d3af2f1e4794c2464916a57f.jpg A while back soaru had posted a self portrait to her deviantart, and looking at the two images it’s hard to think they’re two different people. Please note the same piercings and gauge in her ear as well as the facial similarity. http://fav.me/d8hcuq8 screenshot: https://i.gyazo.com/090fdf9f9535898df2d0febda19d16d6.png A friend had found soaru’s old paypal/email address through the icon commission transaction. Hatchimi’s current paypal does not contain personal information linking her to soaru, but with some digging with the ‘soaru’ email address, we have discovered it is used for her instagram account that has been up since 2012 and is still active: https://i.gyazo.com/b536e315ee2473202d9842807a0a1561.png When lined up side by side from the image from the artvsartist meme: https://i.gyazo.com/09f0a7f2270ec47712465a1e29420878.png The name that appears in the transaction for the payment to soaru from 2 years ago also matches the name on the instagram account if there is still any doubt that they are the same person. The evidence collected in this case was through a group effort from her dissatisfied customers I have reached out to. **Edit : 17/06/2016 We have posted jorunals on deviantart revealing our findings and to spread the word. my friends (who has been in contact with hatchimi to send her the beware post and to see if the situation could still be privately resolved) : http://royal-jelliefish.deviantart.com/journal/ARTIST-BEWARE-Soaru-Hatchimi-615658826 Hatchimi has also posted a journal with her defenses and some evidence of a conversation between herself and soaru through email, as well as a note she sent inquiring about commissions to soaru. http://hatchimi.deviantart.com/journal/Harassment-soaru-drama-615813488 Someone picked up that there is a tab open in this screenshot for 'msn canada' it isn't by any means concrete but it could confirm her location, and this could be another piece of evidence that links another similarity between them. http://orig06.deviantart.net/ce3f/f/2016/165/e/a/ccb568bad3054274b7fe6f00b4a87a34_by_hatchimi-da6aqen.png anoher edit: a user found a page in the waybackmachine that has her country listed as canada: http://web.archive.org/web/20151024030234/http://dollrot.deviantart.com/ So we can prove that she and soaru share the same location. A big question for me in all of this is that why now of all times would she choose to reveal this screenshot of her noting soaru about asking about commissions? Surely its a strong piece of evidence to support that the two are different people, so why wouldn't she send it to us sooner rather than this much later? http://img10.deviantart.net/289a/i/2016/168/6/a/proof1_by_hatchimi-da6mxv6.png (screenshot in case of deletion: https://i.gyazo.com/f95a0191f17fd6a7aa8e13112f34e47b.png ) At first it looks fairly normal, but someone commenting on the beware journal checked their old notes from before they changed their username, ane the previous username shows up in older notes, not the new on since hatchimi was formerly Dollrot until earlier this year, why does it say "Hatchimi said the following" and not "Dollrot said the following"..? Another commenter then claimed that it is possible to run a test on images which will tell you if the image has been edited, and the screenshot came up as edited in photoshop, so this tells us that the note screenshot is fake. Here are the websites one can use to detect a doctored image: http://fotoforensics.com/ http://imageedited.com/ Hatchimi is still denying that she and soaru are the same person, despite all of these new revelations, I will continue to update as more light is shed.

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

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/892163.html WHO: Jace Wallace / Wakkawa WHERE: http://jace-wallace.deviantart.com/ & http://wakkawa.tumblr.com/ WHAT: $150 digital painting commission WHEN: November 26th, 2014; sketch received and payment sent December 12th, 2014 PROOF: Initial order: http://i.imgur.com/8VBVvr0.png http://i.imgur.com/szyi0dE.png Proof of payment: http://i.imgur.com/QV4EzFw.png EXPLAIN: Well, it's finally time for the official A_B post. I asked for advice back in June, and since the situation is more or less "resolved", it's time for me to put it all together and post this as a warning to others. I commissioned Jace at the end of November in 2014, the same day he put his commission post up. He's an art idol of mine and I'd wanted art from him for ages, so I jumped on the opportunity. He always seemed very professional to me, so a $150 commission seemed like a good idea at the time. The original commission post said they would be finished by Christmas (2014), and he sent me the sketch WIP on December 12th. http://i.imgur.com/Jy4btWg.png The WIP at this time: http://i.imgur.com/Vs5UUDe.jpg At that time, he said his plan was to send out more WIPs that weekend and have them finished the next week. http://i.imgur.com/TpYsWTe.png After that message claiming that WIPS would be sent out that weekend, I didn't hear from him again. In fact, he seemingly disappeared from the Internet altogether. Not too strange, possibly, considering it was the holidays. However, he had made a firm promise of a deadline, and with the commission being $150, I was a bit more wary than I normally might have been. I let the Christmas deadline come and go, but on January 10th I noted him asking for updates: http://i.imgur.com/keQ7LmU.png As it is still, it went unread and unopened. I continued not to see any activity on DA, Tumblr, or anywhere else. I was getting worried, mostly due to the $150 amount and the fact that I have been burned before. Since I hadn't seen him open my note, I decided to email him in hopes of getting an answer that way, on January 24th 2015: http://i.imgur.com/rvEROmB.png And I never got a response to that either. On January 30th, I sent Jace an email and a note on deviantArt telling him that I would be opening a Paypal claim. http://i.imgur.com/dDiUr7J.png As I say in the message, it was mostly to get the money back in case he was unable to access the computer as I didn't want to let Paypal's claim window come and go. Even with Paypal's claim window having been increased to 180 days, I felt uncomfortable enough to do it at this time given his complete lack of responsiveness. Jace must have seen the claim, for he mysteriously reappeared just a few days after I opened the claim. I received the next WIP on February 2nd, 2015. I cancelled the Paypal claim at this time, despite the fact that he made absolutely no note of it or that he had even seen it. http://i.imgur.com/S3umDjv.png The WIP he sent at this time: http://i.imgur.com/ZTqd2N0.jpg It was quite off putting to me that he made no mention of the claim or the wait much at all. But, then again, I felt a bit bad for filing the claim in the first place -- especially with his reasoning of mental illness. I figured, since he had given me an updated WIP, he would have the piece done pretty quickly. My response to him is here: http://i.imgur.com/kiuiFpu.png which he never responded to either. More radio silence. I sent him a note on May 15th, 2015: http://i.imgur.com/8gJHWmT.png to which I got no response. (I do believe he opened/read this note.) The next time I heard from him was in June of 2015, strangely and conveniently after I sent him a note telling him that I would be contacting my bank about the money (given that Paypal's claim window had then passed for me, by a few days) and posting an Artists Beware post about the situation. http://i.imgur.com/RXa81Ov.png (He was still active on tumblr during this time.) His response, with a slightly updated WIP: http://i.imgur.com/fwz0yd0.png The WIP at this stage: http://i.imgur.com/UHguQJN.jpg This was when I posted asking for advice on A_B. I was mostly just pleased to actually have him RESPONDING to me again, and at this point I assumed that if I went ahead and posted the A_B on him right then, I would NEVER get the piece. So I tried to get him to agree to a deadline. He then agreed to have the piece finished by the end of July, 2015. http://i.imgur.com/aIMFmDP.png http://i.imgur.com/YVLH7OX.png So, another month and it would be done. Obviously, that came and went. Surprisingly, he took the initiative to note me on his own on August 1st, telling me that his tablet had broken. (I had already seen him post about it on his Tumblr, which he was continuing to update regularly with paintings and posts.) Again, pleased that he was CONTACTING me and not ignoring me, I accepted his claim that he would have it done the next week. http://i.imgur.com/1Nk8ri2.png http://i.imgur.com/A3sUxI3.png Aaaand that didn't happen, either. He did not contact me again past that point, AT ALL. (I send him another note on September 3rd, 2015: http://i.imgur.com/BbhcdiY.png ) In fact, the only way I got him to contact me again was rather direct and annoying. On top of updating his Tumblr regularly while ignoring my messages, he had gotten into the habit of streaming quite regularly on his Twitch account. Sometimes games, sometimes painting personal works. I subscribed to the channel, and was receiving emails whenever he started streaming. At first I was just happy to see him working on something, and didn't interact with him. However, when he continued to ignore/"not see" my messages, I decided to bite the bullet and reach out to him during a Twitch stream. On October 25th, 2015, I entered his Twitch stream and inquired after my commission. He had his mic on, so I don't have a record of his responses, but here's the chat: http://i.imgur.com/jOrPowU.jpg Basically, he reassured me and told me a very long story about how he had gotten locked out of his DeviantART account AND the email account associated with it, so he hadn't been able to log in at all. He promised to email me after the stream. He sent me an email that night and he attached another WIP and claimed it was pretty much done, just needed to be cleaned up and tweaked. (Note: this was quite a small screenshot that didn't allow me to see closer details.) http://i.imgur.com/d7KZdbe.png My response: http://i.imgur.com/vW59uJl.png The WIP he sent at this stage: http://i.imgur.com/3kNQwSj.jpg And, again, that was the last I heard from him. I actually let him be for a while after that email, mostly due to how incredibly fed up I was at this point. Plus, he said it was close to being done, so I figured it wouldn't be long. Again, wrong. I emailed him on January 12th (3-4 months later) asking if he had any updates on the piece or on his situation. http://i.imgur.com/Lr2bYa6.png I got no response. He continued to be active on Tumblr, quite regularly posting text posts and art. So, on January 27th, I emailed him. http://i.imgur.com/1uUNoke.png Of course, I do realize asking for a refund at this point may seem out of line to some, but like I say in the email I figured it would be the easiest way to resolve it. I didn't want to wait around forever to get the finished piece and would have been satisfied with the file as-is and a partial refund, even 10% of 25%, ANYTHING so that I could FINALLY take it off my list and forget about the heartache. On January 28th, 2016, he emailed me and claimed the piece he had sent in October was the finished piece, minus the rendering of one hand. He then claimed he would send me the finished file as soon as he smoothed out the hand. As well as a quite P.A. comment about the fact that if this had been for a freelancing company, it would have cost me $2000. http://i.imgur.com/V2OP8si.png Half an hour later, he sent me the .psd of the 'finished piece'. It is almost entirely unchanged from the screenshot from October. And, to my dismay, it's quite rough and not as refined as the sample piece he used for his commission post. There's a part in one of the character's irises that bleeds into the eyelashes, really badly. The ear is a block of unrendered, unfinished painting. The male figure is very rough and untouched compared to the female figure. Overall, the entire thing is quite sketchy, quite unrefined, and quite unfinished -- when compared to his sample. At the very least, it is not what I would hope for after over a year of waiting for a $150 commission that had a much more refined example. Here is the final file he sent me: http://i.imgur.com/91E4qbU.png Note that it's barely changed (if at all) from the WIP from October. Over 3 months for that lack of work done on the piece. Here are some closeups of a few of the problem areas I identified: http://i.imgur.com/ePJmE2v.png http://i.imgur.com/FRBDd1n.png Again, here is the image he used in his commission post: http://i.imgur.com/t0PaIRP.jpg As it is, this situation is "resolved". I'm NOT happy with the piece, but I sincerely doubt he will ever give me any partial refund (the piece is, after all, 'finished' according to him) and I don't care to see how long it would take him to refine the piece more (I'd prefer not to wait another full year, really). And while I feel the end result is not in line with what he was offering, my complaint is about his unprofessionalism rather than the art itself. Art is subjective, and though I may not be happy with the piece, it is "finished" in his eyes. My gripe is his refusal to keep in touch, the constant ignoring of my messages, and the continuously broken deadlines. In the end, this is a beware to all other artists and commissioners out there. Do not commission Jace Wallace. I have no clue if he plans to ever open commissions again, but if he does, it's not worth it. This is hands down the most frustrating experience I have ever had with an artist. It's not even the year+ wait that bothers me -- I've waited that long before, I'll wait that long again. But EVERY time I attempted to contact him, I was ignored, unless I had made a direct claim that I would be pursuing action against him, or I approached him directly IN PUBLIC. (There were a few times when I commented on his submissions on DA or profile on DA, but he has hidden the comments at this point.) He set deadlines, and then he broke them with nary a word. He made excuses, avoided contact, and continued to be active on Tumblr regardless of the owed work. At least with other artists I've had this problem with, they disappeared entirely. With Jace, he was still active on Tumblr almost this entire time, just deliberately ignoring my messages on DA, Tumblr (where he was active, WHILE HE WAS ACTIVE) and via email. In the end, I feel disrespected, insulted, and disappointed - and I don't want anyone else to go through the same situation. EDIT: The final email he sent to me, after I submitted this A_B post and informed him I would be doing so.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/891244.html WHO: Kahuna Otter/ Sugarfactory / SugarAussie WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/sugarfactory/ https://twitter.com/sugaraussie WHAT: Digital art on a physical item: It was a two sided, two character dakimakura (silk full length pillow) that was to be shipped to me in the UK. WHEN: - Slot was confirmed and paid for on 28th August 2015 - Refund was offered on 2nd December 2015 - Final contact before starting Paypal dispute 10th January 2016. PROOF: I hope it is okay, these are all filtered in my post in links as it will make a lot more sense with the explanation part. EXPLAIN: On 28th August 2015, Sugar Factory posted a journal offering a one time commission slot for a dakimakura of your character for $150. I emailed her my reference and my idea. She replied confirming I had the slot http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.09.16.png Cut forward a couple of emails which included discussion of making it two characters on each side for an extra $20 and I was ready to pay. I sent my payment via Paypal on 28th August as seen here: http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/paypal.png She confirmed she would start straight away http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.09.50.png 
On 30th August, I was sent a sketch of the first page, and then slightly later, a complete line art for the first side as seen here http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/lines 30-08-15.png I confirmed this was good and no changes needed to be done. Communication stopped until 30th September where I emailed her for an update regarding this and another piece of art I had also commissioned (a set of telegram stickers). http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.26.41.png Reference here is also made to a badge i commissioned before which, she never sent to me but instead just posted to her twitter (which I didn’t follow) and a friend of mine linked it to me. At this point I was informed that she would send the high resolution copy of the badge and that all digital work was back on schedule. Communication once again stopped until 2nd December where I raised my concerns that there was no progress on the piece since August and that I was hoping it would be done for Christmas. At this point I was reassured that she would try and get it done, and if not she would issue a full refund for the item; I hadn’t even asked/considered a refund at this point. http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.30.30.png On 3rd December, I asked whether a refund would be easier for her than trying to get the art done in time, and was told she was researching options but if it doesn’t work out she would refund me that night. http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.32.28.png I queried again on the 4th and was told she was waiting on responses from companies. I decided on the 8th December to message again to see if there were any updates and was informed she had decided to issue a full refund AND complete the art but asked if i was okay waiting a week for the payment. http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.35.24.png I replied saying I was okay waiting but that i would feel awful if she were to do the art as well. On 20th December as I hadn’t received the payment I sent another email to her http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.37.02.png At this point I was getting fed up of excuses and no progress and a lot of correspondence occurred that day about how I was in breach of her TOS and that she only agreed to refund me because I was a friend of a friend (despite her offering the refund to start with). I stated i would like a date with which the refund will be paid and was told that she would pay me in smaller amounts until the full amount is paid, I was okay with this suggestion. http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.40.45.png I received no small payments, but on 26th December I received an email saying she was near the full amount. http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.41.52.png On the 30th I emailed to ask if there was any updates and could she send what she had so far even if it wasn’t the full amount. I was informed she was at the hospital but would when she got home http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.42.31.png On 4th January, still nothing from her, I was told she was dealing with a quick emergency and would pay the following night. http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.43.41.png On 7th January I queried what happened with this, and was told she was waiting for a payment. http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.44.42.png 
 Today I emailed again, explaining it was getting ridiculous and indicating i was close to getting Paypal to sort this out for me as i felt I was getting nowhere dealing with her directly. http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Screen Shot 2016-01-10 at 21.46.11.png A lot of emails went back and forth tonight which i have bundled into a screen dump you can see here http://yksi.org.uk/sugarfactoryAB/Untitled 2.png I was faced with blackmailing that because of me her partner can’t eat, and that I will be hurting her as a business and putting her in debt etc. I have no idea what she is going to do, or what choice she has made as per the last two screenshots. I have raised a Paypal dispute now, and I have escalated the claim though I have no idea if this will be successful or not. Edit: I have been successful with the disput with Paypal Thank you for all your kind comments though

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/880870.html WHO: Honesty. [current account], Sailor., SailorBases, yoloswagdoctor [old accounts] WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/sailorbases/ & http://www.furaffinity.net/user/honesty./ WHAT: Custom bases for my species for rp/adoptables/etc.. 3 separate bases [1 for each species] or 1 base with tons of options for customization. WHEN: May 29, 2014 - First contact made + commission + price agreed upon + paid. Asked for update September 2014. Heard nothing back. Asked for another update on Halloween 2014. Heard back & gave info again. Heard back Nov. 11 - Offered to try to get sketches for preview that night. I agreed. Didn't hear back again. Posted public journal about refunding everyone on Christmas day 2014. June 25, 2015 - Offered art to those who wanted it instead of refund. Took art option. June 29, 2015 - Sent info to new account when I realized the old one wasn't being checked. Oct 27, 2015 - Sent a note asking for updates so I could add that to my owed list. Nov 4, 2015 - Note was read, not responded to. Sent a rather abrupt note asking for a response and got one - asking for all the info again + price paid while indicating I might be refunded instead. Sent info back and stated I would prefer my refund SOON if that was what she preferred to do. PROOF: Initial PM requesting a base - http://i.imgur.com/KA5MDKm.png Accepting commission, price given, me accepting it - http://i.imgur.com/cUfXKz0.png Paypal info given, told her I paid - http://i.imgur.com/mXHL3QA.png Paypal proof of payment - http://i.imgur.com/j8tQOVI.png Checking in September 17, 2014 - http://i.imgur.com/ItQhZ05.png Inquiry on Halloween 2014 - http://i.imgur.com/Btc7IeU.png Response on Halloween 2014 to my inquiry - http://i.imgur.com/jCe5y8T.png Offer to sketch things up that night, Nov 11, 2014 - http://i.imgur.com/JSImwcx.png Last contact from them that year. Refunds instead of art, leaving community, etc journal on Christmas 2014 - http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/6370870/ Offering art instead of refunds June 25, 2015 - http://i.imgur.com/kfd3p1v.png Telling them I wanted the art instead as per their journal - http://i.imgur.com/D381Bi6.png Note sent on June 29, 2015 - http://i.imgur.com/thJbatg.png [cut off custom info at bottom of note] Checked in with them since I saw them posting and doing commissions on Oct 27, 2015 - http://i.imgur.com/szFqbOG.png I was admittedly short here on Nov 4 2015 due to frustration at seeing them post but not responding to my note - http://i.imgur.com/S82hYoR.png My final note on Nov 4, 2015 - http://i.imgur.com/OW6Has1.png [blocked out my custom info as I didn't think it necessary to the beware] EXPLAIN: I commissioned Honesty. back on the 29th of May in 2014. I contacted her asking about a custom base - she had a journal up on her bases account [now abandoned] offering them. Once we'd worked out the details I paid her $36 for them total. She had a lot of RL issues happen and I was happy to wait. I realized she was not really doing much on her bases account and contacted her on her [then] new account - Sailor.. I didn't get a response initially and contacted her again on Halloween 2014 asking what was going on and for updates. Got a response [you can see in the screencaps above] and I thought everything was worked out. Didn't hear back from her til over a week into November, when she offered to sketch up previews for me to approve. I was happy with that and said as much. I didn't hear from her again at all that year. On Christmas she posted a journal [listed in proof above] about refunding everyone. I was unhappy since I'd wanted the bases but understood that she'd had a hard time. We got slow updates for a while, with promises of refunds but nothing really being done, up until June. She made a new journal offering art instead of refunds for those of us who wanted it. I really wanted my art so I contacted her as requested and let her know I'd love to do that instead. I figured she would get on them and it wouldn't be too long a wait. Wrong. She has taken on many new pieces, continued to work [slowly] on old pieces, but rarely gives updates. I was getting somewhat frustrated and decided to contact her to touch base and see what was up on Oct 27 since I saw she'd been posting owed art and new stuff as well. My note was read but never responded to, and I saw her continue to post and interact with people on the account. I got somewhat frustrated and sent her a short note requesting a response to my note. She did respond, but indicated she might need to do a refund instead of the work. I responded back letting her know that was fine, but if she was going to refund I'd really prefer it SOON since I've been waiting for almost a year and a half at this point and that is a ridiculous amount of time to be waiting for anything. At this point I just want to be done - art or money asap so I can mark this as done in my records and stop stressing out over it. EDIT: I have finally gotten a response, though only after I sent a new note. I've seen her post up repeated new YCH flat priced pieces and auctions and complete personal pieces as well as gift art + a few commissions, but I don't know how much of that is old owed things and how many are new things. I know that she has taken on far too much and is still taking on more work, because of various situations in her life. With that said, I don't think that taking on even more pieces when she's already so far behind is wise - at the very least the older pieces need to be done before the new ones. I am probably getting a refund she says [as of 2/13/16 when I sent a new note]. She says it may take a while though and will be in payment plans. I'm more than slightly irked by this because I didn't get to pay her in payment plans to order, but it is what it is. I do not consider this resolved and will not until either my art or the money is fully refunded. EDIT 2: I delayed my response to her for 2 reasons. 1- I needed time to cool off because I was angry. 2- I had some things going on elsewhere. I sent my response to her on 3-3-16 and apologized for the lateness. You can see that here - https://gyazo.com/52a50045a15b08d379c0f54b51c07966 and then noted her again on the 6th when I checked and she'd read it, posted journals and other things, and not responded. You can see that here - https://gyazo.com/e77ff4cfa2fb8b7df3c130ba042e279e . I feel I was fairly neutral, though I am admittedly growing impatient because I just want my money or my art, or at the very least a better estimate than the very vague 'it might be a bit' in the notes. I don't mind if the money isn't right away, but then I saw her taking commissions for spotify premium, which bothered me as I feel a refund should take priority to luxuries of that sort. I have also left a shout on her main page today asking her to please respond to my notes. Both have been read, she's been active places, and I'd really just like this to be resolved. You can see that both have been read here - https://gyazo.com/52a50045a15b08d379c0f54b51c07966 EDIT 3: I left a shout on her page on I want to say the 12th of March. It's been deleted [should have screencapped, my bad] but I did get another response. I proposed swapping the base, as it was a large commission, for a single full body piece since the amount was the same [within the range listed for them, anyway] and after my shout she responded asking me not to leave shouts. I pointed out that's been the only way I get timely responses, but dropped it since I was getting communication now. She agreed to the swap to a single full body piece and is supposed to be updating her queue soon with a public list so everyone can see where they are. While I'm still upset, I'm less angry now that I've gotten some responses and have moved forward on at least swapping for something that should be easier for her to complete and is fair with her rates [admittedly the base was priced quite low for the number of things I'd be getting]. If all goes well and she gets her queue down, I may consider commissioning her again in the future should she be willing as I really do enjoy her art style. Still don't consider this resolved, but will come back to let you know once it is. EDIT 4: I got my finished piece, and it's perfect. I consider this resolved and would recommend people commission her once she's got her queue down a little bit. She's gotten a lot better about communication and I'm pleased with the outcome.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/879578.html WHO: Chuuchichu http://chuuchichu.deviantart.com/ https://www.pinterest.com/chuuchichu/ http://chuuland.tumblr.com/ http://chuuland.weebly.com/ http://www.gaiaonline.com/profiles/shadomu/28269981/ http://www.gaiaonline.com/profiles/bunnybutler/30781909/ Where: http://chuuchichu.deviantart.com/ What: May 2014 - Custom character design When: May 2014 Proof: http://imgur.com/a/PbFzw (Contains all the ones listed in this post along with a few extras) Explain: In May 2014, Chuuchichu held an auction where she would design for the winner a custom character from her Nemu species. I won this auction at $220 ($227 overall with fees) on my side account, Celebibonbon (http://chuuchichu.deviantart.com/art/NEMU-Custom-Auction-CLOSED-451902408). My main is Vespisia. Details were exchanged via notes (http://imgur.com/oSNfXGm) (http://imgur.com/e8lgNzr) and payment was made (http://imgur.com/s7QG3ky). We gave each other our Skypes for easier access (http://imgur.com/VvBAogE), and work was begun (http://imgur.com/diHadyl) (http://imgur.com/zpj7ZFN) (http://imgur.com/6QA0QfA). Progress was pretty good; I attended a livestream (I believe it was a Join.Me in the first week of June 2014 or so) and watched get work done on my character and it was nearing completion in just that one session, just needed a few more touches and shading done and some cleaning up to become fully completed. Chuuchichu sent me another note a bit later, inquiring about possibly scheduling a new livestream time to finish up the custom. Unfortunately, I dropped the ball during this part of the exchange, as I took several months to reply, during which time Chuuchichu sent me two notes that were follow-ups inquiring where I was (http://imgur.com/gtze9js) (http://imgur.com/UxXfd76). This part was certainly my fault. I would eventually reply to her in November 2014 (http://imgur.com/35EZWM6), and as can be seen in the screenshot (http://imgur.com/cQ9r61J), the note was read, but never replied to. Months would pass with no response, she had been fairly active before the advent of the custom auction, and afterwards, would be decently active, but I would realize in 2015 she stopped becoming active on DA and her many other sites around spring 2015 it seems. In any case, on Deviantart, I sent her a note in June 2015, asking for an update (http://imgur.com/sQmBgwN). It was not read. I sent her another note on August 2015, that note was also unread (http://imgur.com/BDn6G1N). I recently sent her a note in October (http://imgur.com/4AWfNmr), and that was also unread(http://imgur.com/qSixMt3). I also left a comment on her profile in July 2015 (http://imgur.com/hTogVwO), asking for an update, which was also not replied to. At one point, an old friend of hers contacted me, asking if I might know where Chuuchichu was, because as mentioned previously, she had gone inactive. I replied I did not know, and she expressed sympathies concerning the pending custom, agreeing that it was not a fair deal to me. I also sent Chuuchichu a message on Skype in June 2015 (http://imgur.com/qTdjtfV), which was never replied to. Other attempts included sending an email directly in July 2015 (http://imgur.com/PxRBqwR), and even asking one of her old friends (http://imgur.com/1kvBMOE) and a group she belonged to if they knew where she might have went, but no one had any idea. I began to think perhaps she had a medical emergency or something highly serious and time-consuming at the very least. But last night (11/5/15), I found her Pinterest (https://www.pinterest.com/chuuchichu/), and it turned out she was active. It seems to be her indeed, and she pinned things just a day or two ago. At this point in time, I am looking into filing a chargeback as multiple attempts to contact her on various platforms have all consistently failed, and she is clearly active. To summarize, 1. $227 commission for a custom character paid and started in May 2014. 2. Last discussion and update was June 2014 2.A. Part of this was definitely my fault as between June and November, she sent a few more notes, but I did not reply due to stressors from 'real life.' 3. Note sent from me to her in November 2014, was read and not replied to. 4. More notes sent in 2015 (three total), they are unread as of the moment, along with an email, a skype message, a profile comment on DA, and inquiring friends and groups if they knew where she is. 5. Found her on 11/5/15 clearly being active on Pinterest. 6. Looking into filing a chargeback now since multiple attempts at contact have failed. [Edit 10/11/15: I did not send the payment via gifts, I sent it through services, but yes, I did pay the fee for her. v_v Sorry for the confusion of my wording! Also, I've contacted Paypal and my bank on the 6th of this month or so, and both said it was too late now to file chargebacks. Instead, they advised me to take this to the police and the BBB, so here's hoping. I will be calling Paypal back though to let them know about how she had originally asked to send the payment + fees via the gift option.] Thank you for your time, everyone. EDIT/Adding more: On March 3 of 2016, Chuuchichu logged onto Skype and I was able to reach out and talk to her. She apologized and quickly issued me a full refund and was very respectful and mature in her handling of the situation and knowledge of receiving a beware. I consider the situation resolved now and believe Chuuchichu acted admirably and sincerely in her resolution.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/864661.html WHO: Wyldfire/Wyldfire7/Fr0stbit3 WHERE: http://furaffinity.net/user/wyldfire http://furaffinity.net/user/fr0stbit3 http://weasyl.com/~wyldfire7 WHAT: Traditional 2 character NSFW sketch commission http://i.imgur.com/JCcdnQ0.png (details blurred out for NSFW reasons) There was more notes before this, but they just include me at first wanting a comic, but then not being able to pay, so we decided on a sketch image. WHEN: As you can tell from the timestamps on the notes, the commission was discussed, agreed on, and paid on August 1st, 2014 A rough time line of the situation from initial conversation, to 1st payment (or agreement of trade) to signs of trouble. http://i.imgur.com/tISUOYg.png I've blocked out the end of the email as the first part proves that Wyldfire is Fr0stbit3 PROOF: Discussion of commission: http://i.imgur.com/JCcdnQ0.png Payment: http://i.imgur.com/tISUOYg.png Note that the sketch is too hard, artist wanting to change it, and me asking for a refund instead: http://i.imgur.com/Y1gShFI.png More screenshots regarding the situation can be found in the explain area below. Explain: On August 1st, 2014, I contacted (on Weasyl) Wyldfire7. At first, I wanted a comic commission, but it was changed to a 2 character NSFW sketch commission involving a dragon of mine and one of his. It was paid for that very night. As I waited, I feel deathly ill and was unable to access the internet (nor was I physically able to) as I spent the next 8 months in the hospital. When I was finally able to get online again, I was expecting to see the sketch commission, as it'd been close to a year. Instead, I find a note that had been sent on the 24th of August, 2015, saying that the sketch was too hard, and if I wanted the commission still, I'd have to request a different pose. I was a little disappointed, but at this point in time I'd fallen away from the fandom and my characters, and was more interested in a refund. A refund was agreed on, and I'd sent my paypal information, the amount, and started to wait. About a month later, I poked him about my refund and received this. http://i.imgur.com/uUA9bh8.png I understood where he was coming from, so I resumed my waiting. Though I didn't log on for a while after I sent my last note, as I had a lot going on in my life and just assumed that he'd get to it soon, so I tried to give him space and not badger him about the refund. So when I logged back on about a month later to poke about my refund, and I received a note that contained a personal means of getting me my refund. I shall not repeat what was said here, but I will say that I was rather grossed out by it. A little while passed, and I decided to check my paypal to see if I'd gotten my refund. I, of course, didn't, but on my payment summary, I noticed something strange. The paypal email address that I'd originally sent it to (which was related to his Wyldfire/Wyld name) had been changed to Fr0stbit3works http://i.imgur.com/tISUOYg.png I was confused, as his name was still the same, it was just different. Soon after that, I visited the journal of one of my favorite dragon artist's on Furaffiinty, as I noticed that were opening for commissions and I wanted to see if I could afford one. Well, in the comments, I saw this http://i.imgur.com/2ACVkkX.png They have the same name as what the paypal address had been changed to. So I visited the userpage and saw that they're skype address was the exact same as the paypal address http://i.imgur.com/rfoF11b.png Please note that the Tier 1 commissin slot started at $60 and went up, so it's clear that he has enough to refund me. So I go back onto Weasyl, sent (and received) this http://i.imgur.com/eREiIAo.png I'll admit I was a little frantic as red flags were going up quickly, but I tried to control my emotions regardless. I was frustrated when I read the reply, about how I needed to be 'patient', so I just didn't reply as I'm sure I'd let my emotions get the best of me. About another month passed, and I visited his userpage again, and saw that he'd going to the movies to view Ant-Man, and would only have $15 left until he got paid again http://i.imgur.com/evnKMEA.png Him saying that he had 'nothing he needed to buy' is really frustrating to hear, given that I've been waiting for a while now for my refund. So I finally decided to shoot him a note (7/18/15) asking for a time estimate for my refund. What I got back... http://i.imgur.com/g0ryPTl.png He's claiming that I have him confused for someone else, even when I have all this evidence that he is indeed who I can prove he is. http://i.imgur.com/QUqHeB8.png I confronted him with a screencap of the paypal summary, and this is what he said. I was angered by this, so I didn't reply, as I know, again, my emotions would've gotten the better of me. (as a note, I've moved from Weasyl to FA, given that the note system is easier for me to keep track of) Mere minutes later, I get this note on my Weasyl http://i.imgur.com/NglAIdX.png After everything I've seen, I have the feeling that I'm just getting the run around at his point. As of 8/4/15, I have yet to receive a refund. I don't know what to do at this point. I paid with my paypal balance, so I can't contact a bank at all, and I'm well past the 45/180 days to file a chargeback. And I'm sure that posting this will cause me not to get my refund at all, but the least I can do is try to warn others about him before they get taken advantage of too. Please be very VERY wary of commissioning this artist.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/860264.html [Editor's note: Ellis Cain now goes by Ellis Umbra and the FB link has been adjusted accordingly.] WHO: Ellis Cain/Octoplanet WHERE: Furry Craigslist on Facebook. Post url in question: https://www.facebook.com/groups/701968973213985/permalink/838965656180982/?comment_tracking={"tn"%3A"O"} Archive: https://archive.is/fDZXY WHAT: Pair of premade foam base wings for $100 + $25 shipping. WHEN: For sale post went up on FC on the 8th of May, payment made on the same day. PROOF: Proof album, will be pulling links from here: http://imgur.com/a/sNKx2 EXPLAIN: A video of a pair of premade wings that were being sold was uploaded to FC on the 8th of may and as I am slowly piecing together a fursuit, I enquired. They were perfect for what I wanted so purchased them on the spot. After some friendly back and forth I was given their paypal (which is actually another users, I am told they are business partners) and their furaffinity so I could look at their other work as I was interested in seeing if they would finish the wings (although I chose to leave it as a foam base.) My first red flag was when they sent me this while I was out at dinner http://i.imgur.com/SJvoOhZ.png and I politely informed them of Paypal's ToS and resent the payment (still as goods and services). After a couple of inquiries with no response, on the 15th I was told they would be mailed the next day http://i.imgur.com/b50pxQ5.png And then on the second I inquired again http://i.imgur.com/DlVPTEw.png On the 9th I finally got another response http://i.imgur.com/VZ6i6Vd.png Then no contact at all http://i.imgur.com/mnBo6VH.png I filed a Paypal dispute on the 22nd http://i.imgur.com/sCDlk3E.png (Sill has not been responded to) Eventually I had to go through the admin of the Furry Craigslist group in order to get a response (On Saturday 4th) http://i.imgur.com/KIbdJrG.png <-response Ellis gave the admin. It's now the 12th (as of writing) and I still have not gotten either my wings or a refund. I honestly really wanted those wings but I've been left feeling scammed instead. I am very glad I went with the rules and didn't send as a gift! Update Monday 20th: Paypal sided in my favour last night after no response from Ellis, no contact from them via Facebook either. Update Tuesday 28th: The user Ellis claimed was their business partner got in contact with me today. However, apparently they have no idea they were ever partners in the first place and are barely on speaking terms. I have permission to show you the logs with them and the logs of their conversation with Ellis. http://i.imgur.com/4jVe9P6.png http://imgur.com/a/k0pmz

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/856511.html WHO: Eindraa, Iingo http://endraa.tumblr.com/ https://twitter.com/whitekens http://whitekens.weebly.com/ Where: http://iingo.deviantart.com/ What: Dec 2013 - Two Chibi Commissions May 2014 - Fullbody Commission When: December 2013 for the chibis and May 2014 for the fullbody. Proof: http://imgur.com/a/QsVKY Contains all the pertinent image files, but will be linking to singular ones in the post. Explain (This is a very long post, I apologize for that! There's a summary at the bottom): In November 2013, Iingo (then known as Eindraa) opened chibi commissions (http://i.imgur.com/9ts6BsT.png) to help with college tuition (http://i.imgur.com/JpKaptF.png). I purchased two chibi slots. (http://i.imgur.com/uvY0fMX.png) As can be seen, I also considered asking her to do some gijinkas of anthros (http://i.imgur.com/VER6i9n.png), but I decided not to do so in the end, and payment was discussed and sent. (http://i.imgur.com/72fN4vL.png) Months passed, Iingo was active on DA with large giveaways, interactive journals, features, and running groups. She also submitted art on a decently frequent enough basis, at least one piece a month, if not more. http://i.imgur.com/kuJMTCr.png http://i.imgur.com/wPGwSqP.png http://i.imgur.com/4DoWlTC.png http://i.imgur.com/LG4kuk7.png http://i.imgur.com/hN4BiCh.png http://i.imgur.com/xgmobjq.png In February of 2014 or so, she sent me a note asking for a new reference image of one of my characters for the chibi, as the dropbox link no longer worked. Nearly three months passed by before I replied, going by what I can find in my notes, and I am definitely to blame for the lengthiness in that situation. I replied in May 2014 with an updated link, and also asked for a fullbody commission, (http://i.imgur.com/Pgi170z.png) as I noticed she had opened some slots for them up(http://i.imgur.com/6aSuak5.png). She replied about two weeks later and I paid quickly after. (http://i.imgur.com/sLfKjk9.png) This would be the last contact for half a year. My name was never put down in the fullbody list. She continued being active during this period of time with more journals and artworks. http://i.imgur.com/hRm7jIc.png http://i.imgur.com/eVRJ9Bg.png http://i.imgur.com/ReLnE5I.png http://i.imgur.com/Z4LKTiY.png http://i.imgur.com/EdMxKi7.png (A commission was posted around a month later.) http://i.imgur.com/1L0sSsp.png http://i.imgur.com/qprg5bZ.png (Again, no contact made to me, and the only one from this list she finished a commission in decent time was Choubidubinette's, of which she owed two chibis to the customer it appears and would finish the last one months later) http://i.imgur.com/QPAUIuH.png (Was not done with commissions.) [Read More] To summarize: -I purchased 2 chibi commissions in December 2013 and a fullbody in May 2014. -She has never contacted me on her own (as in, not having a deadline enforced, angry customer, etc, of her own volition), except once in February 2014 to request I send her an updated character reference which I took nearly three months to reply to and apologize. -She has been fairly active this entire timespan with both art and journals and DA activity, only beginning to slow down somewhat in the beginning of 2015. -Took down her to-do list twice, and current one is incomplete. -Did not answer most of my notes asking for updates until I tried to enforce a deadline in February 2015. -She broke her deadlines twice. Claimed she would finish by the end of February or March. She did not, and when I contacted her again at the end of March, she promised two would be done in a week, something that proved to be inaccurate. -Does not listen to my concerns. Asked twice to be notified before working on the fullbody, that did not happen. I listed examples of the styles I wanted, no response was given and the finished chibis are in a wholly different style. -This does not truly pertain to me, but I have reason to believe she is ignoring others as well. Also, in late 2014, she said she would be nearly done with Tirekins' commission, but it would take her many months before she was actually done. The same occurred for Choubidoubinette's commissions and many others. Thank you for your time everyone. Updated 8/2/15: The situation has progressed some more since then. (http://i.imgur.com/xrpfLrX.png)(http://i.imgur.com/OQVvUPR.png) I ended up not replying to this note, it was clear we were in a disagreement over the situation and would not be able to reach a middle ground. I point out that it was actually three months and not four, and that she continued her lack of communication and updates throughout that process and the month-long reply was as earlier mentioned in this post, due to stress experienced from discussing the matter with her. In any case, this was my reply two weeks later, where I asked why she broke a deadline yet again: (http://i.imgur.com/1KK6les.png) Iingo replied: (http://i.imgur.com/lb217Wa.png) I sent a note back essentially thanking her for the reply. She finished the fullbody commission the next day! (http://i.imgur.com/ZF6umLQ.png) (http://i.imgur.com/QT4MjBT.png) I replied that I liked the one with the background: (http://i.imgur.com/xOetHO0.png) A few minutes later, Iingo posted the fullbody commission to her gallery: (http://i.imgur.com/pM60k4o.png) / http://iingo.deviantart.com/art/Full-Body-Commission-for-Vespisia-545980631 Again, this is the commission sample when I purchased a fullbody commission from her: (http://i.imgur.com/H7atwRi.png) I know styles change, especially with how long this situation has taken, but the two look different in not just style, but quality. To make sure I was not biased, I showed the pieces to others for comparison, and they agreed and noted that it looked like they were made by two different artists and I should ask for a partial refund. Which I did, I finally replied to her last night, having been silent from the hurt of receiving what to me, seemed like a subpar commission after she noted me the piece, which was unprofessional of me to do so. Here is the note I sent her last night at last: (http://i.imgur.com/VJi4utd.png) I thanked her for the piece and asked for a partial refund. Iingo would reply a few hours later with three notes: (http://i.imgur.com/SJedypc.png) (http://i.imgur.com/4qhW1h3.png) (http://i.imgur.com/6UVoOCW.png) I do not intend to reply to her notes. Again, no agreement can be made between us so there is no point. I am updating this beware to let everyone know what has progressed in the situation and I suppose it is resolved, somewhat. Because I got my commissions at last and partial refunds. However, my intention was really to warn people of her work ethic and behavior and in that regard, it is not resolved. Again, thank you for your time everyone.

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.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/845464.html Who: Thera Where: FurAffinity: https://www.furaffinity.net/user/thera/ Weasyl: https://www.weasyl.com/~thera Deviant Art: http://theramutt.deviantart.com/ What: 1. Animated Icon ($15 CAD) – One slot of several offered for animated icon. (Link to FA note) 2. 1-Character Digital, Soft-Shaded ($50 CAD) – Part of “Black Friday” commission sale. Subject was a SFW portrait of my werewolf character Vaarak. (Link to FA note) 3. 2-Character Digital, Cell-Shaded ($80 CAD) – Part of “Black Friday” commission sale. Subject was an NSFW kink picture of Zaelgolin and Sabre Dragon. (Link to FA note) *Note that Thera has since deleted all journals and comments referencing the above sales. When: 1. Animated Icon: Paid in full Nov 19, 2014, no progress of any kind to date. 2. 1-Character Digital: Paid in full Nov 27, 2014, no progress of any kind to date. 3. 2-Character Digital: Paid in full Nov 29, 2014. Requested a completion date of Feb 14, 2015 to be a valentine’s gift. The date was agreed to (link to FA note), but was missed with no progress. It was after this time I requested a refund for all three commissions. Thera responded by saying she could not offer any refunds, but would complete both this and the single-character commission during the following week (link to FA note). This date was also missed with no progress. Proof: 1. Link to payment receipt for animated icon ($20 CAD paid) 2. Link to payment receipt for soft-shaded commission ($50 CAD paid) 3. Link to payment receipt for NSFW commission ($80 CAD paid) Note that all of the above receipts are the result of Interac e-Transfers: a money transfer system only available in Canada. Explain: Let it be said that I never wanted to escalate things as a means of dispute resolution. This case is a simple example of an artist not following through on promises. While the above points illustrate the case rather well, I’ll try to give a broad synopsis: Having previously commissioned Thera (and quite liking the results), I jumped when I saw her sale on animated icons. Brief comments were exchanged, the fee paid and I was added to the list. A few days later, I saw Thera open another set of commissions for Black Friday. Having not commissioned any work lately, and really liking her art style, I took two slots: a single-character SFW commission and a two-character NSFW commission. All commissions were paid for in full as shown above. Having paid for the commissions in late November, I was really hoping for at least the NSFW piece to be completed by Valentine’s Day. This date was agreed to, but despite several notes (Note 1, Note 2) requesting updates, the date passed with no progress of any kind. Agitated, I asked for a refund. Thera apologized, but said she could not offer any refunds. In recompense, she assured me the drawing would be completed within a week, and even offered to do another piece for free. Giving her one last chance, I wanted until the end of the week only to again have the date missed with no progress. A few weeks passed before Thera finally posted an outstanding commissions list (now deleted from FA), dozens and dozens of pieces long. I contacted Thera with my concerns, but she assured me the piece would be completed that same week, and suggested I attend her stream. The date was schedule and I logged in, only to find Thera doing impromptu commissions for others. During the stream, she said she would not be working on any outstanding commissions that night, since she needed to take on new work. It was at this point that I sent a note threatening to post to Artists Beware if I was not refunded. Thera requested my payment details, which I promptly provided. After an additional three weeks of waiting, I have still not been paid, and am left with no recourse but to post my experiences here and hopefully warn other commissioners. Throughout all this, I do want to stress that Thera responded civilly and amicably in all notes, and made numerous promises to set things right. It is just unfortunate that none of these promises were ever fulfilled. Update: I have since been refunded in full for all payments noted above; this beware has been resolved.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/844349.html WHO: Squeedge/SqueedgeMonster FURAFFINITY TWITTER MAIN TUMBLR & ART TUMBLR WHAT: A pre-order of her "Tyrant King" shirt. WHEN: The shirt was ordered in December of 2013 with an estimated delivery date of January 2014. PAYMENT: Here. EXPLAIN (&PROOF): Back in early December 2013, I saw that SqueedgeMonster opened up pre-orders for her Tyrant King t-shirts through Twitter. It was supposed to be a "last printing" of the design and I couldn't pass up the opportunity because I really liked the design and I didn't want to miss my chance. I understood that the shirts wouldn't arrive until after Christmas. They were scheduled to be shipped in early January. I still haven't received mine and communication, directly or indirectly, has been practically non-existent since payment was sent. During the pre-order, over 100 shirts were purchased. I lost the proof for this when this was sent back to me for revisions, and when searching for it again I discovered that all of her tweets prior to June 2014 seemed to have disappeared. In early January, she made a post on Twitter about the shirts being sent out to her from the printer and her receiving them. In late January, Squeedge made an update about the shipment of her shirts on Tumblr. Apparently a lot of them were stolen before being scanned at her local post office. My shirt was a large, so it was not in the first box of shipped shirts. I waited it out. After the post office fiasco, I didn't contact Squeedge for several months as she was going through personal issues at the time and didn't think it would be appropriate. After things seemed to simmer down, I tossed her a message on Tumblr sometime in April (which I don't have proof of thanks to Tumblr's lack of outbox function). A few days passed and this was posted. That was the last time I heard anything pertaining to the shirts. In June I was looking through my Twitter feed when a re-tweet from Squeedge appeared; it was someone wearing their Tyrant King shirt. It looked as though the shirts had finally been shipped out. I dug a little bit to see when they were sent so I could know when to expect mine, only to discover that she'd put what was supposed to be a "final run" design, which she'd emphasized plenty of times in her advertisements back in December (seen here), up in her DesignByHumans shop. This admittedly upset me. In early September, I made my Twitter public (usually private to keep spam accounts at bay) and tried to initiate contact. It was met with no response. I attempt contact again later in the month, to which she actually replies saying she'll e-mail me later that night. She never did. I finally decided to shoot her an e-mail myself (found on one of her Tumblrs). She responded a few weeks later with this. I never responded to it because, well, I really didn't know how. In the meantime she opened a Patreon which seems to be turning a decent profit, designed several new shirts and put them up for sale in her online shop (and continues to do so), gone to conventions and taken on numerous commissions -- but she hasn't been in contact since the e-mail above. I put this off for as long as I could in hopes that the situation would work itself out, but I've reached my breaking point. I just want this resolved so I can enjoy her work again.