Paying for half of a trade, pricing?

[banrai.livejournal.com]

I'm in a situation where some years ago I agreed to do a trade with another artist - in fact, I believe I've posted about this before here. Said artist is well known in community, so I would rather not name names, even though at this point they've blown me off twice about this. :/ I would really like to give them one last chance to make right before I call them out - but that's not the point of why I'm posting.

The second time I approached the artist about why they'd not finished their part of the trade, which we agreed to do and I completed my half of on the same day, July 24 2010. Said trade item was delivered to the artist by hand at the following FWA, during which they mentioned that they've just not had time to do their half. Between all of that time, said artist had taken numerous commissions - more than I could even begin to count.

Said artist continues to take tons of commissions. Again, more than I could even begin to count. The last time I inquired about when they might finish my part of the trade, the artist mentioned that they might like to just pay me for the value of the ACEO, but I suggested that I would be pleased to settle for just a sketch, even though our trade agreement was for a full color ACEO. The artist agreed to this. This was on May 16, 2013. Since this time, the artist has continued to produce tons of art - sketches, finished work, you name it, they've done it.

At this point, I am preparing to ask the artist to just pay me for the value of the ACEO becuase I'm tired of waiting and messing with this. Which leads to my question: do I ask for the price that I charge for ACEOs now? Or what I charged then? Generally when dealing with commissioners, if four years had elapsed between getting a price quote, they'd be required to stick to the new, more current pricing. Is it fair to do this with a trade gone bad, as well?

Comments

[celestinaketzia.livejournal.com]

Personally, I would charge the amount you charged then. The amount of time and skill put into the image has not changed, unlike a quote which has no work completed.

[poto-heart.livejournal.com]

The amount of time and skill put into the image has not changed

I would have to disagree with that - OP has presumably spent at least some time chasing this person around trying to get their half from them. That's time and effort that wasn't factored into the initial deal, and has taken enough of a toll on the OP that they are feeling that they have to change the trade. So although there was not more time spent on the piece itself, there was more time and trouble spent on the deal as a whole.

OP, personally I would charge what you feel comfortable charging, not exceeding what you currently charge for ACEOs.

[celestinaketzia.livejournal.com]

From my own prices, I charge $40 more than what I used to four years ago. I really couldn't justify that if it were me if they were getting something at a significantly different skill level. Especially when considering the artist offered to pay for the image some time ago, and I declined.

[banrai.livejournal.com]

I suppose I should have been a little clearer - previously I charged just around 20-40, depending on complexity sbize.

[chronidu.livejournal.com]

Personally this would also be my action on the matter. While I understand the idea of waiting 2 years and collecting interest, personally I would not be comfortable charging for quality I did not provide.

So to say if my price for a sketch back then of that quality was $10, but now I charge $20 for a sketch 4 years later that is far better quality and takes the same amount of time, I would not feel comfortable charging the $20 for that $10 sketch, as it is still a $10 sketch in my eyes.

This is purely my personal take on it however, if you feel that this situation warrant's a sort of interest on the piece then that is for you to decide on the matter.

[fenris-lorsrai.livejournal.com]

Charge the price you'd do now. They agreed to barter services. those services have a value. Interest has now accrued on the overdue services. If it was any type of regular business they'd have charged interest on balance due and possible sent it to collections.

Value of the ACEO now is totally appropriate.

[slinkslowdown.livejournal.com]

+1

[snobahr.livejournal.com]

Totally this, and if your mystery artist (who, after 4 years of blowing you off, should be named, in my opinion) agrees to pay for the art, send that bill via paypal or square invoicing, so there's a nice legal paper trail.

Because I'm bitchy that way.

[adzuki.livejournal.com]

I agree with the above posters. Charge what you would now for the ACEO.
Your time and effort have worth.

[vauvakolibri.livejournal.com]

Agreeing more with fenris, they've had and missed lots of chances to do their part, so if your prices haven't increased exponentially, I'd see it fair to ask for the current price.
Though, personally when the artist originally asked to pay for the art, I would have taken it out of courtesy, because I see that (and in commissions, refund questions) as a more subtle way for them to indicate that they're really not feeling up to doing the image and rather have it off their plate this way.
Not that its right for them to not finish it, but just to keep it in mind if similar thing happens later.

[teekchan.livejournal.com]

Im going to disagree with the people above, maybe.

When I joined FA about 4 years ago, I only charged $5-$10 for what I now charge $100 for. The quality, obviously, improved ten fold (My old art was utter crap). If your situation is the same, charge the old price.

If your art skills (and price I guess) haven't improved tons, stick with the current pricing.

[viciousgoldmoon.livejournal.com]

^ Absolutely this.

[silv3x.livejournal.com]

I'm kinda glad to see your opinion, because I agree with it, but previous commentators said the different. I think that OP drew their part of trade several years ago, when their drawing level was lower, so they might ask for an old price.

[tock-fast.livejournal.com]

Placing my vote here.

Though it sucks they blew you off for so long, it's only fair to charge for the services they received. If your art has increased in price, it's likely due to the quality increasing.

I'll keep an eye on this to see if it becomes a full beware. I do a lot of trades, and I would like to avoid this person.

[wolf-goat.livejournal.com]

I'm going to say that price can increase for far more reasons than just a quality increase (indeed, some artists don't increase hugely in quality over a 4 year period). Becoming more popular and just being able to charge more is one, or indeed scarcity of time. Maybe the artist now has a full time job and can only devote 6 hours a week to artwork where before they could devote 40. That could also lead to a price increase.

It's difficult to make a call on this one really because we don't know how much the price has increased. If it's went from $30 to $40 it's a different story from the price going from $30 to $100.

[tock-fast.livejournal.com]

Even if the price increase was only by $1, I'd still think it was only fair to charge for what the art was worth back then. They agreed to that level of traded goods and to charge anything more, seems like a bait and switch.

[silv3x.livejournal.com]

I understand why you don't like to wait for art anymore, but in some situations, changing character/theme helps. Artist may just not feel comfortable drawing asked theme, but is afraid or shy to ask for a change.

[kadaria.livejournal.com]

Then the artist really needs to say something instead of dragging this out for years.

[silv3x.livejournal.com]

Ugh... that's true. I'm not white knighting, but personally I had cases when artist delayed drawing for weeks and months, and finished it pretty quickly when I changed the character. Anyway, the artist contacted me and sent sketches, I liked them but artist wasn't safistfied with them and wanted to draw something better.

[starcharmer.livejournal.com]

I worked out who it is and [despite not knowing them super well] I think it's probably a combo of them being really busy and you not being very active on FA/in furry stuff in general for the past while. Not placing any blame on you, obviously, since it's not something that should matter, but sometimes people end up factoring that in when they prioritize artwork. Then if you push something back long enough, you end up forgetting about it again. :/

It's really lame that they haven't come forward with their part and I'm absolutely not defending it, but I can at least understand the reason, I guess. I'm guilty of similar things sometimes, unfortunately. I wouldn't blacklist this person from trades for this, but I would probably wait for them to do their half before I worked on mine if we ever did a trade in the future.

Anyway, hopefully this reminds them to either pay you or do their part [assuming you're still interested in the artwork at all]!

And to actually answer the question, I would charge probably somewhere in between my prices before and my prices now. I charged $12 for ACEOs 4 years ago and now charge about $25-35 depending on complexity, so maybe I'd ask them for $18 or so. I think that would be a good middle ground between charging them twice the skill level they actually got and not getting anything for the time I spent waiting. It's really up to you, though!

[thaily.livejournal.com]

I have the same problem, "popufur" with whom I agreed on a trade with ages ago, delivered my half and never got theirs. I'm considering just telling them to either give me their half or pay me, or post an AB about them if they don't, which I'd rather not do because I'm sure I'll catch lots of flak for it.

It's been over a decade, which makes it tricky to set a price. But I'm considering charging my current full price; we agreed to do the trade when I was at that skill level, he didn't do it for ages which is not my fault.
If I wait to pay my bills I have to pay interest too, so. *shrug*

[catwithpen.livejournal.com]

>Which leads to my question: do I ask for the price that I charge for ACEOs now? Or what I charged then?

>The last time I inquired about when they might finish my part of the trade, the artist mentioned that they might like to just pay me for the value of the ACEO... This was on May 16, 2013.

I would charge the price you would have charged at the time when they offered to pay for it. They wanted to pay then, but you decided not to take that offer, so I don't think it's fair to charge more than that.

[likeshine.livejournal.com]

i've got someone myself who has waffled on a trade for 6 years. now i find they're leaving, i left a comment about it, but they didn't respond. boooooo

[zillabean.livejournal.com]

I've been skimped out of their half of trades by quite a few extremely talented and popular artists, some of them dating back to 2003 at this point. It's extremely frustrating and leaves a bad taste in my mouth for trading anymore these days, but I'm just thankful that it's not incredible amounts of $$$ that I've lost in the deal.

It just makes me sad, because these folks are SUPER talented and incredibly skilled people. I can absolutely understand being so over-worked with paid projects that trades slip their mind, because priorities and all, but I honestly think a lot of folks who skimp out on their half of trades just simply lose interest and are too embarrassed to say so. So they keep putting you off until it's just not something they ever want to think about again.

Which, again, I can understand on an emotional level, but is still very irresponsible and disrespectful to the person you engaged in the trade with, especially when they've delivered their half fair and square.

Though... are art trade concerns allowed on A_B? I was never sure, it always felt like a very gray area and I just assumed this community was primarily for paid works.

Regardless, banrai, I'm really sorry to hear this happened to you. I hope you find some sort of resolution for this sort of problem because so far I've certainly not XD

[celestinaketzia.livejournal.com]

Trades are absolutely allowed on A_B. While no money has changed hands, an exchange for services is still a transaction.

[zillabean.livejournal.com]

Oh that's good to know! Thank you for informing me :)

[ramthedragon.livejournal.com]

I suggest for the payment, to be 150% the price you charged back then. Consider that the original ACEO you made took you X amount of time and effort and represented a type of quality that may or may not reflect your current one. It'd be the quivalent of them having bought the art back then. I say you should add maybe a 50% of that price because of the waiting and general insatisfaction they caused you. But I think it should be based on the previous price rather than the newer one.

Its really sad when people can't complete their trades, I know I'm a bit guilty of leaving them in the back burner a lot. But it's a sign of responsibility and time management to complete work that's owed, paid or not.

[spiffystuff.livejournal.com]

... I don't think it's right to tack on an arbitrary amount of money unless there was a trade TOS specifying such that everyone agreed to in the first place.