Are you sure the customer didn't do this intentionally?

It seems this is happening to a lot of artists...I'm beginning to wonder if the customer is the same for each of them...

I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT THE F*** IS WRONG WITH PAYPAL.

IF THEY WANT TO CHARGE REFUND FEES, WHY NOT CHARGE FROM THE CUSTOMER, WHY ME?!

IF EVERYONE DOING THINGS LIKE THIS, I AM NOT ONLY BEING OUT OF BUSSINESS, I WILL LITTERALLY BANKRUPT!

F************************K.................!

I would say try and dispute it. Does not always work but sometimes it does. Also I've only seen charge backs happen on cc payments through paypal. Might be good to require bank payments and don't accept credit cards (if that is an option anymore)

when an transaction comming in, there's no way you can tell which is from customer's bank and which is from credit cards........

Lame. Sorry to hear that. I know it sucks lossing money, I'm not an artist but I've been burned on the other side, paying up front then the artist kept delaying till the paypal dispute day passes then disappears XD. So yeah it really sucks. It's all trust based on both sides of the issue

fuck thats not good to hear as you lose money on this

errrrrgh.................

hope things get worked out

WAT O.O DATS NOT FAIR

This is no good, but instead of posting this to FA you should talk it directly with your customer

he vanished for quite a long time, that's the problem...... >w<

just contact paypal as their policy is that you cannot request refunds on digital media

Ah, I see, that is a real pain, I'm sorry about that >.<U

A of people have been purposly doing charge backs through their banks.
Telling their banks & paypal that they didnt give permission for these charges, and thus the commissioner getting the art and keeping their money at the same time =/
I hope thats not the case for you, but it wouldnt surprise me c.c

COMMISSIONS ARE ALL BASE ON HONOUR SYSTEM.

IN FACT, IF THEY DO THIS, THERE'S NOTHING WE ARTISTS CAN DO TO "PROVIDE EVIDENCE" TO ARGUE WITH PAYPAL. ESPECALLY WHEN IT INVOLVES NSFW COMMISSIONS.........


SO WHAT NOW? ALL ARTISTS SHOULD STOP TAKING COMMISSIONS BACAUSE YOUR CUSTOMERS CAN'T BE TRUSTED ANYMORE?....

F....... :angry:

If this person did this to you, it's your duty to call out the person who did it and put them on the untrusted commissioner list. Nothing will stop them from changing their name and doing it again except for the fact that they gotta make a new character to do it. Maybe I can try and make some sort of database for untrusted artists and users and keep it off site so site admins can't get pissy about it.

I'm not sure if it's Paypel in this one. Paypal has strict procedure"which" should technically stop such a thing. But it's like someone above said. The commissioner could be pulling stunts on artists.

It makes me lost all the moods on taking anymore commissions now.

You work for someone, you didn't earn a single panny, instead you lost money. How ridiculous!

I myself don't know what it's like. But I feel very sad for you right Darkgooes. :( I wonder if others like myself could possibly lend a hand in the money you lost out of good faith.

Technically this is a risk of doing business to be honest. What you've experienced is the artist's version of "shrink", something most businesses deal with on a daily basis. Not to trivialize what happened because absolutely it sucks but this really is just a part of doing business. I mean you look at how many commissions you've done over the years and how many times has this happened? Most would say you've gotten pretty lucky and your shrink is quite minimal especially when compared to your entire commission history.

I mean as frustrating as it is, it's best to keep in mind that risk is definitely part of the game. The artist as a matter of fact has quite a bit of power given how frequently the problem of commissions of simple pieces taking months if not years for someone to complete, thus eliminating the possibility of a PayPal claim by the buyer. This is why there are people on this site that have found that paying via CC gives them the chargeback option when the artist decides to more or less use commissioners to fund a free personal loan, however in most cases you can directly dispute the PayPal charge itself through your bank as well so not simply accepting credit card transactions won't stop a chargeback if one is initiated. This is how a buyer can be protected from a deadbeat artist who has cut and run. Even a few well named artists have taken years to complete a pic for someone. It's ridiculous and annoyingly common. Generally speaking of course in the services industry either a partial deposit is taken up front or none at all. This minimizes buyer risk and instills more trust in the seller. Of course just like the deadbeat artist, there is the deadbeat commissioner as well. However, those do not seem to be nearly as common as those artists who take an excessive amount of time to complete work or just flat out cut and run and refund months later (if at all) and basically got themselves a free loan. But yeah trust is a big factor in this.

That being said, documentation is critical. With commissions being generally done in a text based environment, keep records of your chats and screen shots that show an actual date and time where possible of those communications. I also recommend sending a final proof to the commissioner once the work is completed and asking if they're satisfied before providing them a link/email with the full rez version. You can use all of that in a dispute of a chargeback and typically will win it. It takes time of course, upto 90 days but your chances of winning the dispute are much greater. Plus PayPal will reimburse the fees if you win but sometimes you do just need to push back a bit with them too.

One thing to keep in mind as well, chargebacks can happen if the card was reported stolen or charges not authorized by the original cardholder. Sometimes people see a PayPal charge and don't bother comparing it in their transaction list, freak out and call their bank. A big one however involving PayPal is when a buyer forgets to select the no shipping needed option when sending payment. That will often result in an automatic chargeback if you do not mark the item as shipped so unless you are sending out invoices to your clients, just double check any options on the transaction to verify that there is no option to mark something as shipped.

So there are ways to protect a buyer and a seller in business transactions, just oddly enough the buyer is rarely aware they are even able to dispute ANY PayPal transaction even via cutting PayPal out of the loop entirely once the time has expired as some banks give you as long as a year to dispute a charge. There is bad on both sides of the fence but at the end of the day, the buyer tends to take most of the risk and from my perspective the problem with artists either running off with money or taking well over a year to finish work that should have been done within a week or two is a far larger problem than chargebacks.

The second part could be person hasn't got very good standing position with money with the bank. And such the bank could of possibly withdraw it via Paypal's permission. But that seems very unlikely.

I hope this gets fixed soon <3 your work is amazing *pets softly*

you should probably identify this customer to Furaffinity admins, see if there has been other previous artist complains regarding them

that's why i like western union fund transfers, good old cash and no refunds

PayPal is becoming a pain more and more these days for people.

That's why I call it as PayFoe.

I have a feeling I know who did it, its very unfortunate, and there's really nothing we can do about it for digital commissions. But this person has issued chargeback on EVERY transaction placed in the last 2 months.

This is a pretty common scam, sadly, and one that PayPal makes it easy to do. All the commissioner has to do is dispute the charge with their CC company, and when the CC company issues the chargeback PayPal just passes it along. Because you (the artist) is not dealing with the CC company directly, it makes it very difficult for you.

Like some other people said, dispute the chargeback with PayPal and find out why they reversed the charge. If it's because of a CC or bank chargeback, get the name of that company so you can complain to them. Where PayPal has been pretty crappy in the past is when they "protect their customer's privacy" and won't tell you which CC or bank kicked the whole thing off. A light at the end of the tunnel is if you can dispute the original chargeback, tell the bank or CC that their member is trying to defraud you. While the bank and CC try and look out for their members, they have no love of scam artists either.

Sorry this happened to you, but just remember most commissioners are honest people. Shame one bad one ruins it for everyone.

what if you sold art credit tokens through paypal that could be used for commission that way when you wanted to fight with paypal it would be over the tokens no the art itself?

The extra fee is a fee charged to paypal (by the bank/debit card holder) which they then pass onto you so they have no financial loss. As for why the customer doesnt pay it... they could pay you the rest of the money so they shouldnt be able to. It's also meant as a deterrent so if you get lots of chargebacks you lose alot of money.

I wonder who said commissioner is, this happened last year and a few months before that event. And FA hit a massive shitstorm. I hope you will be alright in the end though.

Gotta love beeing held responsible for someone elses account right?
Getting fumped over because you're the seller.

♡ paypal.........

Things like these are what's making more and more people each day start using Bitcoins/Webmoney...
:/ You might be able to dispure the chargeback, but chances of that.going well are a bit of a gamble.
In any case, good luck, and may things be good for you once again soon!

That's ridiculous. Is it even legal? How are you obligated to pay for something that has absolutely nothing to do with you?
It's things like these that put me off doing commissions, although I might have to start doing them again anyway.

I know I'm a little late to the party here, but have you tried to do paypal invoices? They give you better protection as the artist, and ensure that the invoice is for labor and not goods, since they are paying you for your time, not the finished product.

erm.... what is..... paypal invoices ? @w@

Instead of you giving them your paypal email, they give you there's.

Under the Sell tab on paypal, go to "Request a payment"

Fill out alll the information and make sure that the service is labeled labor (not goods). It gives you a firmer defense against back payments.

checked, thanks! :3
will try to find out how it works :3

hope it helps :3

That sucks, I've always wondered why PayPal(read: PayFoe) has such a shitty chargeback feature which allows scamming. I'd almost say there shouldn't be automatic chargeback possibility when you're paying to another person so both sides(the commissioner and the artist) have to agree the chargeback before the money moves. That would stop the chargeback scams but in the other hand, it would allow scamming artists to keep your money so it would be two-edged sword.

This sounds like fraud. Charge backs are usually done when you ripp someone off but sometimes they are used to rip others off.

You might need to contact your bank about and have all emails and paypal respects handy for a case.

Also if this was a NSFW piece then you might need to be prepared to explain that.

I know a bit of it because I did a charge back on a artist that tried to rob me.

So sorry for you, this is really bad luck :o