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(this article includes screencaps featuring conversation involving a musical artist and collaborative partner, Caero, who granted me permission to include screenshots featuring his dialogue: proof 1 proof 2) -- In march, I hosted an auction in collaboration with a musician where the winner would receive a custom theme song for their character and I would make an illustration of the character using the music as my inspiration. The winning bid was 960 usd (to be split 480 for each of us.) The musician sent an invoice and on July 3rd 2019 the invoice was fully paid. The musician delivered my half of the payment without incident. The musician proceeded to experience some life turbulence and his correspondence with both me and the client suffered as a result. Trixx requested an update on how things were going with him and he responded. Feeling a little antsy as some more time passed after this, I contacted the musician and offered the idea to draw the illustration first. He assured me that he would have something to show soon. I unfortunately do not have screencaps for this part but he was true to his word and submitted a musical sketch, which Trixx approved. I then produced an illustration sketch based on what he provided. She approved the sketch, and requested a background that was a “kingdom, city devastation through the battlefield.” Following this, the musician fell out of contact again, and once again, Trixx inquired for an update, and received no response after two days. At which point, I apologized for her inability to get in contact with the musician and told her that I would reach out to him. Here’s the conversation I had with the musician. Following this conversation, I followed up with Trixx, letting her know that I understood the musician had spoken to her, adding that I would hop on ahead and complete her illustration within the week, providing updates each day until the work was complete. The following is what transpired: This is the link to the previously completed collaborative auction linked to in the screencaps above: http://www.furaffinity.net/view/27946332/ This is the link to Trixx’s completed illustration: https://www.dropbox.com/s/jd7o726jjdq7yi4/trixx.png?dl=0 (Version without the radial blur: https://www.dropbox.com/s/qdtk31qyfksez9u/trixx_2.png?dl=0 The conversation continued down this trajectory, eventually leading to a very confusing moment where Trixx began linking me to examples of work that were not provided as examples in the auction description, eventually going as far as to accuse me of editing the auction details (effectively gaslighting her). She dropped that particular topic as soon as she realized that she had been looking at the details and pulling up examples provided in the description of an entirely different auction than the one she had bid on. Eventually, I had considered completely redoing the background and most of the character for an additional charge (which she had warned me not to make too steep, on the premise that she has already paid for the illustration). I offered to redo things on the condition of her trust that I was putting forth my best effort for her. She voiced her lack of confidence, and I quickly determined that the safest course of action was to encourage her to take a partial refund. I had her invoice me for the partial refund, and promptly paid that invoice I left the group conversation, and she sent me one last personal DM Not wanting to continue the conversation with respect to my own time and emotional resources, I blocked her on discord following that last message I sent. The musician told me that he was going to issue her a full $480 refund. I sincerely believe that Trixx is not a wholly unreasonable person, and that the responses from her as seen in these screencaps were shaped largely by the wait time and lapses in correspondence. I tried my best to juggle the issues surrounding the musician and the needs of the client, but in the end, the variables failed to line up in a manner that was conducive to good business and a happy customer. This is my very first experience with both a situation and a client like this and it has been a great teacher. However her conduct, her assertive devaluing of my work, dismissal of my numerous attempts to problem solve with her under the assertion that I’m trying to rip her off, the moving goalposts, and her aggressive attempts to pursue the matter even after a refund had been issued for completed work has been disrespectful beyond what was called for.