I was recently commissioned by an seo to write about zetaclear products. they approved my articles but after a week of no repsonse regarding the payment they finally said (the SEO company) that their PC and stuff crashed.That is why they can't pay me. How stupid can someone get? Don't they think that I don't know that they can call Paypal or their bank to ask for a new password? I even worked for an American Bank before, Washington Mutual. How idiotic do they think copywriters are? For a month they made me worry about the payment! But after they did pay me... With $25 less than the usual amount. I found the site that they published the articles, should I continue contacting that site?
Threaten to ruin their reputation. And if they don't take your warnings to heart, do it. And next time, demand payment first.
Yeah I think it is my fault as I should have asked for payment first, but I was jsut starting out when they "hired" me to write for them
Contact the site they sold the content to and inform them that they are using stolen content. That should do wonders for the companies reputation.
Yes I did do that, however they won't reply (the legal department) regularly. Like, once every two weeks
Lynder - This is not an uncommon problem. In fact, it has happened to me many times. I have written several posts about this on my blog, and each one always seems to turn up more people who have been scammed. Generally speaking, I am not the type to make threats. The best way to combat this, as you mentioned, is to ask for a certain percentage of payment up front. It does not have to be 100 percent, but you will definitely want to cover yourself.
I searched the name of the domain turns out there were lots more unfortunate than me. He's even targetted citizens of third world countries with the promise of "SUDDEN WEALTH" when it came to finances. Turns out this guy is a member of an ok forum, and quite surprisingly, has a 'great' reputation. I contacted the forum master and she was very responsible, as she took me seriously.
Whatever you do, always get at least half of your payment up front! And if you are continually running into this problem, then maybe it's time for you to raise your rates and weed out some of the more "undesirables".
I am in the business for three years now and I never faced this problem. But I am aware of scammers. Having worked for all these years, I think I am in a position to get my orders mainly from repeat customers and so much so, this threat is minuscule for me.
Fight fire with fire. Buy the same domain name as theres with the ending - sucks, scammer or thief. Put up a blog and explain what happened....get others who have been stung to link to it or write about their experience. Then SEO it and get it on top of there name or right under it as it will have the same effect. You can then sell them the site at many times what they stole from you. Peace!
I hate scamming, What's a big head loser. That is a big stupid reason why they can't pay you. Find a way to pay their writers fairly, dammit.
It's always a little tricky when the customer is new...we just don't know if we can trust them. Collect a portion of the fees next time. Kind of keep things balanced...
To help avoid this, you could try sending the work in pdf files with high security, as in 'read only'. They get a chance to read the articles and pay, and then you send the word doc or text doc etc. (or the security password). If someone is *really* out to steal work, then they will - but this makes them work for it a little and they would have to physically copy the work from the screeen. All the best Christine