Search the Community

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/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/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/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.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/833832.html WHO: Commissioner: Randombelle FA: https://www.furaffinity.net/user/randombelle // DA: http://bellybumdrum.deviantart.com/ Payee: jl2154 FA: https://www.furaffinity.net/user/jl2154 // DA: http://jl2154.deviantart.com/ WHERE: Accounts listed above, primary contact through FA notes and Skype WHAT: 2 Charge backs on 2 completed commissions (DEC) 3rd Charge back from account again on FEB 19th 2015 The commissions: Posted to my account: https://www.furaffinity.net/view/15037546/ https://www.furaffinity.net/view/14910780/ Posted to their account: https://www.furaffinity.net/view/14913048/ https://www.furaffinity.net/view/15040324/ WHEN: NOV 2014 - FEB 20th 2015 PROOF: Chat logs when charge backs happened and our agreement for repayment: http://pika-commissions.weebly.com/chargebacks.html Paypal logs of chargebacks: http://pika-commissions.weebly.com/chargebacks.html Sorry they aren't in perfect order, i went through my paypal account and screen capped all pertaining to the email address. Note that there are 3 separate transactions. Link to journals where i simply state because of charge backs from people using a 3rd party account i will no longer do business with persons who do not have their own Paypal account: http://fav.me/d8ir5et Chat logs between us on FA and DA: http://pika-commissions.weebly.com/chargebacks.html EXPLAIN: I received the original two charge backs on December 8th 2014 from the paypal address of the boyfriend, jl2154. The girl, Randombelle, was the one who i had most contact with as she was the one who ordered the commission. We agreed on the commission and i sent an invoice to jl2154, for the amount agreed upon. My paypal account is a verified business account and i only conduct business through my invoices, never allowing people to send money directly to me. My invoice states my terms of service and policy, meaning he has to accept them if he is paying the invoice, which is a contractual agreement by receiving my invoice and then paying it. The commissions, as listed above, were finished a month prior, in November. You can see my skype chat logs above where i contact randombelle about the chargeback. She tells me that her boyfriend's account was hacked and had problems with fraudulent charges, which resulted in my invoices being two of the charges that was charged back to his account. Note that i ask several times for the actual charges to be reversed and i offered that if they did this i would send back the money they gifted me to cover the expenses. I was most concerned with covering the -$90 balance and removing the flags from my account. The case went uncontested and was closed, so i kept the refunded money they gave me and dropped the issue. Since the issue was closed by paypal i expected that he never went in to cancel the actual charge back. TD;LR: The first two charge backs for two separate commissions were reimbursed by jl2154, through a separate transaction of money, and not canceling the charge backs on my account. Case closed uncontested and i let the issue drop. Please note i was never contacted directly by the payee jl2154, i spoke only to his gf Randombelle who assured me the issue was being resolved. ----- Third charge back was received February 19th 2015. My balance was -$62 as shown in the screenshot galleries above. I made a journal on both DA and FA, since i have had the problem of people using third parties to pay, that i would no longer be accepting persons paying with a third party and that i wanted ALL transactions to be between me and the commissioner only. I stated no names but gave a vague description of my current situation and my frustration, as it was late at night and found myself in a similar situation with the same two people as before. Journal is linked above and i will not be taking it down on either site. I noted Randombelle BEFORE the journal, telling her i had another charge back from her boyfriend's paypal. The journal was not to call her out before i made contact, as i never even mentioned names, only to express my irritation and policy change. I linked above our notes, with both randombelle and her bf jl2154 I expressed I wanted the charge back reversed and was told it wasn't possible because the account had a history of hacking and Paypal had seized control of it. From jl2154, as shown and screen shotted above "I can NOT access that account, it is now controlled by paypal since December. that's why I have a new account." screen shot: http://gyazo.com/d5e5a9f22d33c97ea56c30e45cb981c7 I declined to send an invoice for the owed amount to the new account, as invoices can be charge back on and i wanted to avoid this situation again in the future. I asked that the money i was owed be sent to my paypal address directly if they could not close the claim. He didn't send directly, instead sent an e-check that took 5 days to clear. And i was nervous of this because i googled it and e-checks can be charge back on in the future, a problem that has been frequent with this person. I didn't want to find myself in the situation again. I do not believe that the charge back was a result of paypal's error. If what jl2154 says is true and that the account has been frozen by paypal for several months then there should be no charge backs issued from that account. I was inclined to believe the hacking story the first time but the second time, several months later has set off several alarm bells. His story doesn't make a whole lot of sense, and they avoided questions, only going so far as explaining it all with 'hackings', so i think that neither of them tell the whole truth. Also i did not appreciate that they told me multiple times not to post to AB The boyfriend specifically told me in comments (screen capped above) "You might wanna be careful with the AB thing cuz they could counter saying you didn't contact the actual person paying directly." Screen cap of his comment and my responses http://gyazo.com/30c0a5a98ea1cb9639af761ed348f2be Making it sound like he was trying to pass off blame and responsibility. TL;DR: This user has a history of 'hackings' to his paypal account and used a security compromised account to send payments, resulting in 3 separate charge backs to my account. I was reimbursed for the charge backs but ultimately lost $20 to a 'debited charge back fee" from paypal Which i was told "On occasion, Paypal will take a $20 fee from you for iirc, the case being open at all." He didn't reversed or resolve any of my charge backs even though they were asked multiple times and told them i didn't want a separate transaction. I'm not pursuing the $20 fee because the girl already had me blocked after the incident so i just did the same in return to them. To me the $20 isn't worth the headache of dealing with them again. As I couldn't anyways because she blocked me. In my honest opinion i would avoid these two.

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/823464.html WHO: Swizz, swizzlestix WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/swizzlestix https://inkbunny.net/Swizzlestix (banned) WHAT: 80$ USD of digital artwork WHEN: september 3rd was around the time i got the commission, september 4th is when i payed PROOF: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/105281784/ab/paypal transaction.jpg paypal payment https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/105281784/ab/swizznote sept 23 2014.jpg commission status https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/105281784/ab/swizznote nov 7 2014.jpg commission status https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/105281784/ab/refund request jan 9.jpg first request https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/105281784/ab/refund request jan 13.jpg final request EXPLAIN: i ordered a 80$ commission from swizz back in September of 2014 and i had asked him for commission status a few times through that duration once in september week or so after and then once a 2 months later in november, i caught him doing a stream during October these were YCH commissions done in stream I'm not sure if it was done ahead of anybody waiting though, this is where he was streaming it https://furstre.am/stream/Swizzlesneaks January 7th found that he was doing commissions for a few people listed as friends on his FA and still no response to my messages anywhere January 13th Sent out PM to all swizz's accounts including his commission email account asking for refund January 16th found pics on swizz friends account that were dated for January 7th despite inquiries on commission status and inquiry for refund however later that night i found he actually finally responded to me https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/105281784/ab/steam chat jan 16 a.jpg https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/105281784/ab/steam chat jan 16 b.jpg February 1st i have yet to get my refund back

https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/775398.html WHO: cicatrizESP/Rabid/makeshiftwings WHERE: www.furaffinity.net/user/cicatrizesp WHAT: It was going to be a simple waist-up, flat-color digital commission that was supposedly going to cost $10. She contacted me personally wanting to draw my character. WHEN: What got me suspicious was that she asked for five dollars more to cover Paypal fees…Off. When it got bad was the ignoring for months on end just for a single update, she has no list if there are other commissions going on or journals telling what is going on except she is trying to get active again but then disappearing AGAIN. I wanted to do a claim, but since I gifted stupidly I cannot get it back, nor can I get a refund with my ignored reply obviously. PROOF: When she first contacted me: November 22, 2013 http://i.imgur.com/CJSNdqC.png Proof of Payment on my part: December 5, 2013 http://i.imgur.com/5H5MuIT.png Internally questioning change of price to pay ridiculous fees: December 5, 2013 Was Naive and gifted it... (Explained below) http://i.imgur.com/XV8Dnp7.png https://i.imgur.com/wFaoixH.png She KNEW it would take it out of her '10' or else she would not have asked for more money! Red Flag there had I known... Getting worried at this point. But I was just being patient, polite and wondering if she okay and maybe if there was an update. I do not how much she is taking on, she has no list or anything. So I was curious. : December 27, 2013 http://i.imgur.com/CcINOfv.png Couple months later after ignoring the note above, the final response from her: February 3, 2014 http://i.imgur.com/8TmlRU9.png My reply... http://i.imgur.com/fQ8WG3Z.png My response left unanswered... http://i.imgur.com/7KN8Pdt.png EXPLAIN: At first she wanted that $10, but suddenly she wanted five more dollars to cover the Paypal fee? Paypal NEVER makes a person pay over $5 worth of fees and I never heard of it! She even said she would add in more art but I did not want it... But I fell for it. As Naive as I was back then, I decided to gift it to her, to pay the fees by gifting to move on about it (knowing earlier that gifting usually makes the person buying to pay the fee instead, but that was it…)…It seemed to work. (Later on it is revealed to me that the fee is there to PROTECT buyers and it is against Paypal's Terms of Service for sellers to ask the buyer to pay the fee FOR THEM.) http://i.imgur.com/3ys76EZ.png Trouble starts What I did not know is that if you ‘gift’ customers can no longer be protected because you cannot issue a claim against the person you ‘gifted’ it too. I learned the hard way. No longer will I be commissioning artist that require people to ‘gift’ the money to them so they do not have to pay the fee. Unless they request adding one more dollar to the original commission to pay for it or tell how much I should pay before hand to cover it, and I WILL CHECK. Asked for an update...http://i.imgur.com/CcINOfv.png Two months later… I finally get a response because I noted her asking for an update… But apparently it is going to take another couple of months for my commission. Nothing was done. Was it okay? No, you do not ignore your commissioners, especially what was the reason why for the delay. You tell them first and people should understand in this circumstance, do not IGNORE them for months! I am a very patient person and commissioned a lot of artists, they would tell you this! I can give a LIST. Is it so hard to inform? A reply...finally http://i.imgur.com/8TmlRU9.png http://i.imgur.com/fQ8WG3Z.png My reply back. I replied back to that final note that it would have been okay if she notified me earlier. No this was not okay and replied that I wanted a refund, but instead of waiting for my reply she disappeared for another two months and counting. I am done and fed up by this. http://i.imgur.com/7KN8Pdt.png Sitting for two months :] Funnily enough...even if I would have asked for a refund…. she might have already spent that money, including others!? This was on a journal 6 months ago (from April 22, 2014) that she was supposed to get ‘active’ again and I sent my “I want a refund note’ two months after until she disappeared again (not a surprise). So I waited even longer for nothing I am going to get back. She has done it before and I would not be surprised., People even asked for a refund there is a bunch of wrong with this... Quite sad. http://i.imgur.com/p3Rn5DV.png Journal comment http://i.imgur.com/8BM7CuY.png Artist Beware comment UPDATES: As of April 22, 2014...Heh. She is on the prowl again using the same tactic on by sending people either a note supposedly selling commissions again or shouting on their page. Where is my supposed commission? My money? Not done? Gone? Go figure. I can only warn so much by leaving this up on my profile and for the most part leaving the site. http://i.imgur.com/IFVXe0z.png Shout on page. June 10, 2014: I have blocked this user on Fur-affinity a long time ago because she ignored me anyway. I do not expect it to ever be resolved at all except I want this to be added to her thread. If she wants this to be resolved, she can resend/gift me my money back... But this will be a warning to others that she has not changed in the slightest. July 3, 2014: (Also added her other name to the title) On June 18, 2014 We have come to a slight agreement. The person is supposedly going to refund me on July 3rd as stated herself and I allowed it with the exception of three conditions; it is all the money I paid for which includes the fees, one of her names is on there so I know, and a message that has saying that she is unable to complete the service that she was paid for and is refunding my money back. I included that she can contact me here or on Furaffinity( as I unblocked her for this reason) that if she wants to make sure the paypal e-mail is correct that I can tell her/give it if anything. http://i.imgur.com/9fkv5xB.png Dead-line I have yet to receive any kind of payment... I will wait until it hits 12 a.m before updating this regarding if it is done or not like said. If it does not happen, I am not going to listen to any more excuses as I have lost patience with this person. July 4, 2014: It is forty past mid-night and have not received anything. She could not even hold up to her own deadline, not a surprise at all. This will stay unresolved until further notice... http://i.imgur.com/WC9tXFE.png No payment received.

On the 3rd of July, MarbleShark_AD reached out to me, complimenting my OCs and offering me to commission them to help with their homeless situation. I was initially interested but I didn’t buy a commission until August 14th, where we did business then. We settled for $50 USD for (1) one shaded commission, which then we discussed about payment. They only accepted CashApp, which I had to make an account to even send the payment. I had an issue at first until I managed to get the QR code to work, and the payment was successful. Soon after, they offered another commission for $20 USD, and I accepted. After telling me happy birthday the day after, August 15th, I barely heard from them, until almost a whole month later, September 10th. In the early hours of the night, they messaged me stating they needed money to get an Uber after getting out of jail and into an unsafe area 12 miles away from their home, promising me they’d pay me back. They specifically asked for $35 USD, again through CashApp, and ultimately I obliged, feeling concerned for their current safety. I messaged them a few days after to get an update, but I didn’t get much of an answer, and they left me in the dark without a response until October 13th, where, again, they asked for more money. They wanted another $25 to get an Uber from the countryside to the hospital, again saying they would pay me back, but due to the tight budget I had this month, I couldn’t help them again. In addition, I also commented about the previous time they asked for money and how they’ve yet to pay me back like they said. Plus mentioning that I’ve yet to get any updates or word about the status of the commissions I paid for, stating that seeing an update would be greatly appreciated. In response, they simply said, “sorry for asking for help damn.” I waited a few more days and asked about the commissions, and soon sent a huge statement representing how I felt about the lack in communication and the negligence of any update to the commissions I paid for. I told them to not ignore my message, only to see that it was never seen, and yet when looking at their profile, they’re making general posts and offering much smaller priced headshot commissions. - provided is the screen cap for paying MarbleShark_AD, or on their CashApp, Tenae, a total of $105 USD; $70 USD total for the two commissions, plus the additional $35 for their Uber ride back home. - Additionally, I provide the chat log from Twitter/X involving me, and MarbleShark_AD.

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

In April 2022 I met Kittbites at a party at my college. She said she was open to doing my commission after she took care of some things. I commissioned her because she said she would be able to finish my suit in time for Megaplex 2022, in early August. I took a little while to think about it, and then confirmed that I wanted to buy from her on May 15th. Three days later the invoice was paid. The total price was a fursuit head for $800, handpaws for $200 and a tail for $200. (I should first mention that this post is going to be very long. Kitt strung me along for almost an entire year while holding onto over a thousand dollars, and after finding out she has an extensive history of scamming, I just managed to get under half of that back, as well as a barely finished product, under the threat of legal action.) At first things were fine. But within a couple of weeks Kitt's responses began to become more and more sparse. This would set the precedent for the rest of our interactions, and it only got worse from there. It should be noted that Kitt was up front about some personal issues that she was going through at the time, which I have tried as best I can to leave out of this post. The problem is that over time it became clear she was using these problems as an excuse to not work on my commission. I know this because I was later able to find other examples of her work that were completed around this time. I will do my best to leave these issues out of this post regardless. I was a little upset that she left for two whole weeks at this point, but she eventually got back to me with correspondence. The suit was progressing along pretty well at this point, and Kitt was still responding in a semi-timely manner. Unfortunately, it wasn't long before the fur was lost by Fedex. I'm fully aware this isn't Kitt's fault, and I'm including this to give her the benefit of the doubt that she could have gotten my suit finished by August. (Also I hate Fedex) Eventually August rolled around. It became clear Kitt probably wouldn't have the entire suit finished in time. I remained hopeful. On August 1st Kitt gave me this update. "I have most of the fur sewn." This implies that she barely did any work on the suit from this point onwards. Shortly after this Kitt had some stuff happen in her personal life, and wasn't able to finish ANY of the suit on time. A few days later, Kitt completely dissapeared. August 8th was the last I'd heard from her, and I didn't hear from her again until September 12th. Due to the rules of this website I am not allowed to disclose where she went, but suffice it to say that she left the internet for the time. She gave me no warning that this could or might happen, and when she came back she gave a half-hearted apology. At this point I was beginning to get suspicious of her, but I had no recourse in the event that she take my money and run, so I was forced to smile and feign forgiveness. Unfortunately she immediately left again for another two weeks. The upper texts of the first image here are from September 15th. Then another week. Kitt then showed some more progress with the suit, including a fully furred head, but she got sick immediately after. However, she promised she would be able to have the suit delivered by November. I won't provide the screenshot of this mainly because it almost exclusively consists of cities and events Kitt and I are local to. However, I can show that she ghosted me again throughout the month of November: Kitt then promised she would have the suit done by Christmas. After leaving for another 2 weeks, some more "stuff" happened. At this point I was fully convinced that she was making things up, and was about ready to confront her about her making me wait almost seven months at this point. It was 4 days before Christmas and she sent me a picture of the "finished" head. I honestly really didn't like it but at this point I just wanted to get it over with so I said it looked fine. I had a separate friend who edited fursuits and I was planning on just having them finish any changes I didn't like. Kitt then decided to cancel half the order, deciding to refund me less than the original $200 I paid for both the handpaws and tail. Christmas came and went without any kind of correspondence, and I finally put my foot down. On January 7th I brought up the prospect of legal action. Kitt did not address this in any way. Through some investigation I also discovered that she had a commission manager this entire time that she neglected to tell me about. I messaged them and they immediately got her to send the unfinished fursuit head. This was about the best outcome I could have hoped for and at this point I wanted this all to be over with so I didn't contest it. This was also the last straw, and I gave her a final deadline of March 15th, 2023 to BOTH send me the suit and give me a refund of 500 dollars that I could use to pay my other friend, who would finish the suit. Kitt's manager responded much quickly, and was able to almost immediately get Kitt to send me what she had finished. The package arrived a few days later. Here was Kitt's finished product: This all but confirmed my suspicions that Kitt had barely even been working on my fursuit since August-November, and only found time to work on it with repeated pestering. Even at the time that I told her to stop and send me an unfinished version instead, she had over a month to continue from being "almost done." In any case, I now had her legal name and number on the shipping box, and was fully intending to report her in for what technically constituted as a felony. Kitt stopped texting me for almost an entire month before the deadline, but on March 13th, she finally got me my refund. I genuinely wasn't expecting her to. In conclusion, Kitt almost stole $1,200 from me, led me on for almost an entire year by taking advantage of my sympathy, and in the end somehow did the bare minimum in delivering an UNFINISHED product. It took the threat of police action to get her to do anything. Please for the love of god do not commission her. She has a history of this and I only happened to be lucky enough to be local to her and able to contact local authorities. In addition, she has dropped her commission manager and there is now no way of contacting her in a way that will get a reliable response back. Good night.

Originally posted on March 29, 2013 by mottenfest Mod note: As Who: Ravinghachi/Neotoxin Wolf/Skittles/hellishballoffur Website: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/ravinghachi/ Where: Saboten Convention 2012 What: Trade-RavingHachi was to supply two conbadges as payment for a premade fursuit tail. When: September 2012 Proof: Screenshots will be Provided below Details: 1. While at Saboten2012 I was selling a few things at a mini flea market the con had going on Saturday night. Among the things I was selling was a fursuit tail. Ravinghachi approached me asking if I would trade art the tail. An agreement was reached, and she left with the tail. 2. I sent her the details for the badges when I got home. The original note can be seen here (this is the 'lots of details' image) which has links and a detailed description outlining what I specifically wanted for the badges. 3. On November 2nd I received this reply that progress was excellent and she could drop them off if we set up a place to meet. During the holiday season it's really difficult for me have to for meeting people, so I asked for a scan. She said her scanner was broken, but had been uploading a lot of photos during that time. I asked if it was possible for her to send a photo of the badges. 4. On November 26th she sent me a note saying she was going to post my badge that night, but days went by and the scan wasn't posted. 5. On November 30th she responded the same day with a link to the badge (screenshot here). This is the badge that was posted. It's cute and all, but not really what I had asked for. In my reply I tried to politely express my concern for the lack of second badge and my description not being followed. She told me the second badge was still being worked on. I tried to figure out what to do about the first badge being incorrect and communication ceased. 6. I then saw her wearing the tail at TaiyouCon (Jan 4-6) while working at my dealer's table. Unfortunately I was unable to talk to her in person. 7. On Jan 8th I sent her a note which was read within 24 hrs, but has not been answered. That note can be seen here. 8. I left another comment on her page of Feb 23rd (screenshot here from my nexus). When I checked back tonight she had deleted it, with no answer to me at all (screenshot here). She responded by saying she didn't see/delete the comments. (I seem to have misplaced that screenshot.) I asked again for the money she owes me, she told me she had to use her mother's paypal because she didn't have one. 9. I waited again with no contact, so I left another comment on her front page. Her responses are here. She says her Paypal money was stolen, and that's why she can't pay me. 10. I noted her as mentioned, this is the final note I sent, which was read, before making this post. Here's the entire album of screenshots, since there are too many to post above. (Mod note: No other relevant to beware images were in this LiveJournal image folder at the time of archiving this post.) EDIT: 4/22/13 My account has been blocked. [screenshot] I'm obviously not getting my money or anything else from this artist. TL:DR RavingHachi and I agreed to a trade at Saboten2012: my $60 tail for two conbadges by her. After being given specific instructions, she did one of the badges which did not follow the guidelines set. After I mentioned to her that it wasn't right, she flipped out on me and stopped answer my messages. After trying to contact her again she blocked me and deleted my comments, then proceeded to tell people 'it was settled and she had paid me'. This isn't true: she still has the tail, and I didn't receive either of the conbadges. EDIT: 3/20/2014 I have not been compensated for the tail as of this writing, contrary to what this she is currently telling people.

This started on discord where I ask if I can get a 2 piece commission from 1 of there post in a artist community discord. (their original post on discord has been deleted) * I post my 2 Character REFs in-between theses * Paypal transactions: Screencap taken on 7/28/2022 of my commission on their Trello: -Kev0855: Paid / Sketch in progress I ask for there Trello to keep up to date with there progress without bugging them too much. (I tend to bug people/Artist with questions a lot) We talk about some IRL things between these 2 caps of our DMS* This was my 1 and only draft of the commission that I've got so far and this is about 3-4 months into this commission 4/28/21-7/28/21 I'm very patient with people and I knew they had commissions ahead of me from there Trello but I don't hear from them till 7/28/22 ( 1 year later ) during this year gap, I went through IRL issues so I wasn't always online. So I didn't reach out during this time till I got settled down and was able to check-in on things. Never got any updates or messages from them either during this gap year. At this point I started to ask around to friends and other artist in the community about this delay and lack of communication from this artist without saying who they were just incase they were going Real IRL Issues. Most people said I should say something to the discord Higher-ups(Admins/Mods) about this ongoing issues. On 7/28/22 I try to press on what's happening and why it was taking so long. I try to give them a out by offering to just drop the whole 2 piece commission and just doing a refund so that its 1 less commission to have to deal with. I figured that they might have taken on more commissions then what they could handle at this point and I was trying to lessen there load. They reverse the choice back to me and letting me know of a IRL issues. I figured that with the IRL issues and that it didn't seem to be that much of issue doing my 2 piece commission that i would ask how long would they think they need to finish. They said that they hope to have ALL the YCHs done in 2 weeks time starting from that next Sunday (7/31/22) 2 weeks later being Sunday (8/14/22). This is being the 1st IRL issues delay. I wait 2 weeks and poke them again to see what's happening. On 8/14/22, They let me know that they plan on finishing all their YCHs by the end of August and that my commission was next in queue. They offer a apologue on the delay and a choice between a refund or again offering a extra small piece added to the commission. I didn't want to put more work on there plate and I just wanted to have the art finished and 1 more thing of there plate. This is being the 2nd IRL issues delay. For a month I gave a little *poke* here and there to see how things are going and to see if they have any updates on what's happening since there Trello hasn't been update since July 8th 2022. On 9/4/22 they update me after me asking that 1st piece needs the shading done and starting colors on the 2nd piece. They reminded me that I got 2 commissions, At the time I was taken back by that statement but I ignore it cause I just wanted by 2 Piece commission that I've been waiting for over a year now done. On 9/26/22 they let me know about another IRL Issue that delayed them from reaching out to me about what's happening and from any progress on any commissions. They claim to have called out of work to go home and finish my Commission that night. They Again Apologies for the delay/issues. My DM on 10/22/22 was made to let them know that I knew that they went to TwitchCon cause they had it as their Discord Status before and during TwitchCon. This last cap is the last of the DMs at this time 12/19/22 8am. There are 4 months worth of DMs in 1 screencap and more IRL issues.

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

Originally posted on May. 11th, 2013 by thetrevmans WHO: An artist who until recently was frequenting Furaffinity under the username Comico. Recently Perma-banned from site. Other Alias and locations: Skype: shizimiru Furrafinity: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/comico/ WHERE: The offense took place mainly through PayPal, however Shizimiru's main form of contact and "business" was through FA. WHAT: The art in question was a $400 dollar "mature" comic piece that was commissioned by me through a different artist (name of Hashire on FA) at Shizimiru's request. We were to "share" the piece with our characters, and Shizimiru promised to pay me 200 for her half of the work "when she had the money." WHEN: Auction for said comic was posted approx. March 28. Winning bid was placed on the 29th by Shizi. PROOF: Initial Skype between Nataya/Taya/nxcritter and Shizimiru of forged paypal screenshot: Forged paypal Screenshot, taken from skype chat shown above(my full name blotted for security): Offending charge is at very bottom. MY paypal screenshot of the same dates (full name blotted out for Shizi's security): The comic in question (be warned, adult content): (no longer on fa due to my request to scrap the image) The green notes and dialogue we're placed by Shizi herself, after the auction was won. EXPLAIN: After Shizimiru (hence forth referred to as Shizi) won the bid, I was told to pay the auction holder (Hashire) the full price for the auction and was told by Shizi that she would pay me her $200 "share" of the commission. At the time I thought nothing of it because, for better or worse, I tend to be pretty trusting of people. Anyways, after a series of complicated matters not directly relevant to this issue (and far more personal than what this board probably allows), it was mutually decided we didn't want an art piece together anymore, and I blocked Shizi from skype and FA for reasons not pertaining to this post. Later on, Shizi sent me a message through one of her friends telling me she wanted full rights to the comic. At this time she had still not paid me the $200 she had claimed she would give me. Again, due to issues irrelevant to this comic itself, I handed over the rights in the hope to just end all communication and issues regarding her. Shortly afterward, she was banned from FA and the artist making the comic gave rights back to me since I still had full financial claim to the comic. I promptly told her to scrap it, but since she had already put a lot of effort into it, said she could keep the money for her time and effort, and the rest could just be considered "donation" since I was really just fed up with the entire situation. Please keep in mind, the artist Hashire was nothing but kind, understanding, and cordial through the entire affair. Later on, I was made aware of the fact that Shizi had contacted Hashire in an effort to reclaim the comic, citing that she had indeed paid me back for it. When questioned about PayPal logs, Shizi claimed she "couldn't find it in her records" then returned to artist Hashire a couple days later with said "missing log" showing that she had supposedly paid me the $200 she had been promising all along. This so called proof is shown above in a screen cap, which was handed off to her now ex-friend, Taya/Nataya (nxcritter in comments), in an effort to reclaim said money from me. Shizi lied and claimed that I had actually short changed HER 200 dollars, and used the forged PayPal log as proof. Above is posted her log with multiple transactions. The one with $200 for "Trev" (me) at the bottom. It is dated April 12th. If you look higher up, you'll see another transaction on that same sheet of from "Trev" for a mere $63, dated April 15th. Next to that you'll see MY PayPal screenshot, consisting of only 3 transactions during that time period. 2 of them pertain to Shizi, and both are for $63, showing that she edited the initial amount that she sent to me. Which as you can see, she promptly asked for back 3 days later. After confirming matter with Hashire, I showed that the money had not been paid, and was able to show her that I was an honest buyer and was not trying to get away with extra cash. Shizi on the other hand tried to get away with either a free comic, or 200 dollars of money she did not have to begin with. For anyone curious, nxcritter became involved because I had blocked Shizi, and Shizi chose to use Nataya/Taya/nxcritter to reach me to try and get me to hand over the money she claimed I owed her. In short, this is a warning to all honest artists out there. Usernames Shizimiru, Comico, Klusters, Shimiren, Sheenix, or ANY username laying claim to the species called "Shimiren" (majority of these screenames are mentioned on the furaffinity page linked in the WHO section above), is a woman that tried to short change me both in money and art. My hope is artists or other buyers like myself that have dealt with this individual will comment on this posting, so more will come to light on the types of these dealings she has attempted before, and probably will again if given the chance. Thank you for reading. -Thetrevmans.

Original Agreement + Proof: I was contacted by Mechogama through my FA notes on Oct. 11, 2021 with an offer to draw two individual pieces of my horse sona for a total price of $300, fully colored with background. After a cursory investigation there was an art trail showing that despite the out-of-the-blue solicitation the artist did have a track record of delivering and agreed to the proposition and we exchanged Discord contacts. Fig 1.0: Initial message over Furaffinity Fig. 2.0: Initial Discord message to establish continuity of account “HACKED” being Cleam/Mechogama the name had been CLEAM as of initial conversation but latter events lead to a name change and new account. After establishing that we were who we said we were we got down to brass tax. My quote for the work would be: 2 Pieces @ $150 ea. - Fully Colored - Background Included - Multi-Character with central focus on my horse Fig. 2.1: Reiteration of agreement, addition of update schedule and providing an EOD sketch. Fig. 2.2: Transactional Proof Things proceed apace in payment but the end of day sketch and the 2 day update schedule do not come. Fig. 3.0: Sudden request for more money under false pretenses A request for $50 instead arrives in confusing format with me initially mistaking it as an attempt to be upcharged. No work has been completed thus far and I let the artist know my qualms with the sudden request. It has been about a week and a half since our initial conversation and I approach Mechogama about our agreement. Fig 4.0: CLEAM as shown in cap is original avatar and name of account as can be seen in Fig. 2.1. I am told that I will receive an update when he returns home. While I do not receive said sketch at the end of the day, I do receive initial sketches 4 days afterward. Fig. 4.1: Initial sketches arrive By this point I believe the artist is just pre-occupied and am willing to acquiesce to the slight delays. I do not hear from Mechogama again until Nov. 11 2021. Fig. 4.2: Mechogama let’s me know that he is still aware of my commission. Fig. 4.3: Mechogama contacts me again about alleged technical issues with his computer and a timeline for repair + compensation for the trouble. We would discuss some specifics of the commission again on 12/04/2021 and I would hear from him one last time on 12/25/2021 before radio silence on that account. Fig. 4.4: Offer for more pictures, details on an after-pic, no agreement on paying for after-images but semi-regular communication seemed apparent. Fig 4.5: Last message received from the original CLEAM account before allegations of being hacked would appear nearly a month later in Mechogama’s first Discord chat: “The Dirty Paw”. Fig. 5.0: Mechogama alerts his server that his account has been hacked. It has been one month since I have heard from him. The details of the hack are slightly suspicious but seems to be standard Discord phishing. The account in question was never deleted but the alleged hacker had since deleted their's. Fig. 5.1: Supporting evidence of the hack, names have been removed aside from mine for the server-wide alert. Server effectively dies. By this point I had not been aware of the hack as I had been busy with my courses, however after another month I would contact Mechogama through FA after having seen no attempt to get back in touch with commissioners or announcement from any other source of information. I had discovered that this alleged hack occurred while trying to get a hold of Mechogama about my commission. Fig. 5.2: I messaged Mechogama on FA and he promptly responded to me. This is the first time I’ve spoken with him since Dec. 25, 2021. I join the Discord to find it hosting some people but far less lively than before, there is evidence of some activity and posts. This allows me access to Mechogama’s new iteration of CLEAM to continue trying to find a resolution to this commission issue. Fig. 5.3: My attempt over the last half a month to get information and this apparent ‘update’ on my commission. I had messaged CLEAM at various hours to get his attention, and it is obvious that he had been avoiding responding. At this point I had decided that this commission was never going to see the light of day and that I wanted a refund. Due to Mechogama refusing to answer my DM directly, even while online in “League of Legends” as his account status showed, I posted an @CLEAM into his new Discord: “Furry4Ever” to get his attention, the contents including the information on his avoidance of me. He promptly deleted the message in the public Discord and finally responded to me in DM. Fig. 5.4: After my notice in his Discord server, Cleam/Mechogama finally deigns it appropriate to respond to me and promptly removes me from his Discord group. Finally, after months of silence, I am granted my audience and he agrees to refund me. As of the time of this Artist Beware I am awaiting confirmation from Paypal that my refund has been processed, however I am not convinced that it will not be forced into claim status. Mechogama immediately went back to play League of Legends after the outburst at the end and no update on my refund through Paypal has been shown nor has he responded to my question regarding if he has even seen the refund request. Fig. 5.5: Outlandish response to request for refund, I inform Mechogama that the refund request has been sent and receive no indication from him that he has even so much as looked at it. Mechogama has been an unreliable and unprofessional artist at best, and outright attempting to con a client at worse. Reasonable attempts to rectify a situation and patience shown considering circumstance were disregarded and the attitude towards myself as a client and commissioner was dismissive. If you are expecting regular communique, timely updates, or for the original agreements of your commission terms to be met you should look elsewhere.

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

May 22, 2014 https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/768650.html WHO: Sickboy, Pales, horrorprince.deviantart.com, http://whorrorprince.tumblr.com/ WHERE: deviantart.com, virtualpetlist.com, and furry-paws.com WHAT: All digital art. The absolute best I can do for screenshot proof is provide the forum post where I discovered him on virtualpetlist.com (see: http://www.virtualpetlist.com/threads/sim-artist-looking-for-work-again.15631/) and on another forum that is now defunct. I recognized him because he went by his alternative name Pales on the defunct forum and I addressed him as Pales which prompted him to message me. I do have those messages but they're text based since they were backed up from the forum software. I never thought I'd have to use them as evidence. Eventually we switched to IM and screenshots will reflect that. WHEN: I’m copy and pasting what I wrote on another forum as I’ve tried to reword this several times and it’s just too hard for me emotionally. So I hope this suffices. Sorry if it’s too long.. I paid in advance for items in June with a deadline of July. Sickboy didn't meet the deadlines, however, he did give excuses which I was empathetic of. We extended deadlines several times. I often had to ask him for progress. Here is a conversation we exchanged over IM where I asked him about my items and how he addressed my questions. Although that conversation is dated October, I did ask him two to three times before October, once in July and a separate time in September. The week of September is the time he delivered 7 items and said he would complete the rest that week. I trusted he would, and again paid in advance that week for more items. He has not completed any items since September or that payment. I again asked him in January to which I received similar responses to the first conversation. Nearly a week later, I discovered that Sickboy had been anonymously mentioning my commission to others, complaining about how I had asked him about my commission, which urged me to cease working with Sickboy altogether. Sickboy explained recently that his tablet broke, that he was depressed over the passing of a friend's cat, etc. I am understanding, but I had been waiting for my commission for almost more than six months before these events transpired. Sickboy has told me an item takes him twenty to thirty minutes to complete. We originally agreed that he would complete the art, but circumstances changed, I requested that I be refunded, to which he agreed. This correspondence was through DeviantART. He told me he would refund me sometime in the future and when he had the money he'd message me through VPL. I was okay with this. I asked him how he was, just a general "how are you" and he blocked me from DeviantART. There is absolutely no reason why I was blocked, which leads me to believe I won't be receiving my money back, nor will I be hearing from Sickboy again. PROOF: Agreement: the first one: http://i.imgur.com/wm4eA49.png (6/27) & the second: http://i.imgur.com/Do0MtgY.png (9/8) Proof of payment: http://i.imgur.com/iFHOzfs.png & http://i.imgur.com/6NMJOaI.png Proof of him agreeing to finish the overdue art on 9/8: http://i.imgur.com/4k3hUdo.png (he did not finish them that night) Evidence of him cursing at me: http://pastebin.com/qpc2EEv4 Due to him accusing me of editing this pastebin, I am posting a screenshot of how it appears in my logs: http://i.imgur.com/7NK29Jv.png - I am sorry that it's formatted in a block of text. My logs apparently bugged out and I don't want to edit it to prove the point that they weren't touched. EXPLAIN: I’ve done everything I could to ask for my money back. Despite his promises to do so (as seen in his responses on my forum thread) he is now lying to others saying he doesn’t owe me any money http://comments.deviantart.com/1/449033043/3447744659 I’ve tried everything. I don’t know what else to do. I was scammed out of a lot of money. So much money that I’m not comfortable even saying it. That is why I’ve blacked it out. It’s embarrassing. Another thing I’d like to advise to potential buyers is that this person has a Terms of Service that isn’t very airtight and very contradictory. This has led me to the realization that the art he did do I will need to replace. So on top of the money I was scammed out of, I will also need to replace all the art he actually did to. I came to this realization based on his terms: http://sickboyart.co.nf/tos.php I did not have these terms laid out in front of me when I was commissioning the seller. I don’t feel comfortable that I’m required to credit him to use the art he did for me because it may lead to others commissioning him and rendering a similar experience. http://i.imgur.com/sRPGvEc.png To me, his terms are also very confusing and legally unfriendly. All efforts to sign over his work to me have went ignored. Edit: Please read: The problem with the Artist's TOS is NOT solely the credit but instead the legal loopholes and problems that may be faced with the rights of the work and refund policy. I was advised to get the work replaced because of the confusing terms. I do not have a problem with crediting artists so long my order is completed. The reason why the TOS is being mentioned is so that people are aware of all his terms before ordering. I was not I have personally made the decision to get the art he did do replaced because I disagree with these terms. Again I provide them here so potential consumers are aware. These terms didn't exist when I made my order.

May 20th, 2014 https://artists-beware.livejournal.com/767746.html WHO: HulaHula11 WHERE: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/hulahula11/ WHAT: Digital full colored image with background - $100 WHEN: Payment was sent April 29th, but the majority of the issues were from last night to today, May 19/20th PROOF: Payment Proof: http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/2848/2848_original.jpg Emails (I just posted all for total information! Issue starts in last two links) http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/4336/4336_900.jpg http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/4543/4543_900.jpg http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/4846/4846_900.jpg http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/4897/4897_900.jpg http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/5149/5149_900.jpg http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/5583/5583_900.jpg http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/5739/5739_900.jpg http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/5915/5915_900.jpg http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/6193/6193_900.jpg Their rant journal: http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/5773489/ If deleted, screencaps: http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/3227/3227_original.jpg http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/3387/3387_original.jpg Before finished commission (NSFW): http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/3595/3595_900.png After image (NSFW) : http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/kayliimae/54117801/3920/3920_900.png EXPLAIN: As how most of my commissions start, I sent them a form requesting they read my TOS along with asking for general information for the commission. After that I sent them a sketch, and they asked for revisions. So I sent another. They were still unhappy with it, so I sent them some thumbnails with 3 new poses at no extra charge thinking they didn't like the original pose. One of these poses was approved so I did a touch up. They were happy with both the sketch and inks, so I finished the image and that's when the trouble started. I sent them the finished files and they sent back 3 emails stating that the eyes were not colored (they were, but with a spotlight effect that made the eyes brighter, I didn't fight that) and that the nose should be black, not pink, even though in 2 of the 3 refs they sent, the character had a pink nose. They never specified they preferred black to pink so I went with the color shown in the majority of the refs. As this detail wasn't specified beforehand, I asked for a fee, because my TOS states that if the coloring is wrong and it's not my mistake, I ask for an edit fee. It was a small change but it's part of my TOS. Personally I should add, I asked for a fee at this point because I had already done multiple revisions of this sketch as the commissioner wasn't happy with it, I didn't think it was unfair to ask for a little extra for more of my time. TOS: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NvMkcR6HH9rpAa-nGTAX9WM_6M5IcmaX2-ttm-PrpJA/edit They replied back snappily in the last email and before I could respond to them, they posted a journal on FA calling me a "thief" and a "cunt". I am putting this on Artists Beware because I felt like I went out of my way to appease this commissioner with extra work for free but they did not specify preferred refs and got snappy when I used the color that was used in 2 of the 3 refs. And then they got angry and publicly insulted me when I asked for a fee as per my TOS that they should have read at the beginning of the commission process. I saw this and decided I didn't want any money from them, so I did the edits, sent the revised files, and told them to no longer commission me for future work. This beware is about their issues with communication and their treatment towards me.