&quot;Artists Beware&quot;

This...is tricky. While I totally understand you being upset about not getting your commission (and probably being extremely upset about not getting something you paid a helluva lot of money for), I don't know how I feel about the idea of you getting ahold of her cell phone number and calling her about it; especially if she herself did not give it to you or give you permission to call her about your commission. How did you find it? Is it public information? If that's the case, then I retract my comment/concern!

And I realize you're probably desperate to get into some kind of contact with her, but unless she gave you her number or it is her official "business number," I don't think you have a right to give out her personal contact information to anyone who asks. That's a private number and a bit invasive, regardless of her reputation and lack of contact.

I do hope it works out somehow, though, and she actually comes through for all the people she owes fursuit stuff to. :\ I'd be pretty pissed off, myself.

Edited Date: 2010-06-08 10:02 pm (UTC)

From:

growly.livejournal.com

That is indeed a tricky area. But I think that if someone can't get in touch with you over their $1000+ commission after two years, calling them is acceptable. People shouldn't be allowed to steal customer's money and run like that. x_x I dunno about spreading around the contact number though either.

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nurseniknak.livejournal.com

I don't know, those fursuits are -expensive- and if I commission someone for a hunred(s) of dollar(s) fursuit and they steal my money, they're infringing on my rights by not producing the product. Just like if someone paid for a used car and the person never gave the car to the buyer, you bet they should call the seller to retrieve their item.

I can understand the irritation and concern in using any means needed to communicate with the seller.

Keep in mind I'd never do it myself... I never commission expensive things, but if the buyer is collecting their product by any means they can, I think they have the same standing as a seller collecting payment from a buyer. And we all know how bill collectors can call...!

Regardless, it's pretty shitty to avoid everyone and just take money. :\

Edited Date: 2010-06-08 10:15 pm (UTC)

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Yeah, that's the thing, fursuits can be so darn expensive that it's tough NOT to try and get ahold of someone any way you can. That's why I'm not sure if I'm really trying to encourage this person not to contact her via phone, 'cause...she DOES owe him/her something. :\ Tricksy, this one.

I don't really think it's their place to pass the number around, though, unless Valdyr agrees to it.

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Yeaaaah that's why I'm not really trying to scorn the OP or anything for contacting her, since I'm sure the money that was spent was in the hundreds and she WAS trying to run a business. I'm curious to know how they got her number in the first place.

And I guess my concern more or less comes in with them passing the number around to anyone who contacts them. Who's to say some weirdo doesn't contact them for the number, even though they never commissioned her for anything? People can be weird and creepy, and unless I know you, I'm not giving out my number online, lol.

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neolucky.livejournal.com

The idea of being called over and over again by a customer, without knowing the source of the number (phonebook? given by fursuiter? Given by friend?) is sitting wrongly with me. I realize you have a grand invested in this suit, but calling repeatedly feels like it could turn around to bite you in the ass (harassment charges).

I hope they get back to you, but I don't think calling them is the best option, until you explain how you acquired the number in the first place.

Also you're offering to spread her personal contact information to others, please don't do this. It's giving me red flags and making you seem a bit overbearing as a customer. And it's not your right to give her personal contact info to anyone else.

Do you have screenshots or anything like an email showing when a deadline was set between you? So far this is a vague beware to me.

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Actually I found it as a matter of public record. It's easily accessible just by looking up her domain registry. I would only offer it to those that also have commissions with her.

I'm just really really tired of artists/fursuit makers that don't stop to think that those that commission them are customers and they have a reasonable responsibility to fulfill the request or refund the money. It's just as bad if it's a $10, $30 or $1000 commission. It's still stealing from someone, it's violating a contract by not producing the item. It's bad enough that this is the 3rd time I have been ripped off in some form when trying to commission a fursuit. I'm not demanding and give the artist a lot of leeway in producing the item. All I ask is honest communication from the person I commission. I know that real life, muse and inspiration are all part of producing a good item.

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I have multiple emails from her with promises of 6 different deadlines. She disappeared for a year until called here. Suddenly she was all apologetic and was more than happy to keep me updated on progress. Then she once again fails to do what she promises. As I mentioned all I did was look who her domain was through Internic

Being lied to over 3 years and no contact at 6-9 months at a time is not being overbearing. She has my money and pulled a vanishing act. She has done this to more than a few others.

Here is the last email to her including referencing what she has posted on her website
Tabatha,

I have been very patient with the commission I have with you for the
Hyena. I have emailed you multiple times in regards to status.

From your website
Communication must be withheld with me. In other words, if I send you
an e-mail, I expect response within a reasonable amount of time. If
you lose communication for a month, then I will send you a warning
e-mail. If you fail to respond within the next two weeks, then your
commission will be cancelled, you will be refunded all money put into
it but the 35% deposit, and the fursuit will become property of Fenrir
Productions to be sold, kept, or given away.

You need to provide the same level of communication with your
customers. It's been months since I have heard anything after my
multiple emails to you

From one of the many "promise" emails
> On Wed, Aug 20, 2008 at 5:40 PM, <valdyr@fenrirproductions.com> wrote:
>> I am not yet sure. It will likely take me one or two months after I get
>> the
>> fur to get everything going right. I will happily contact you when things
>> are furthered along... I'd say, though, definitely no later than
>> Christmas.
>>
>> Valdyr

If you want more proof than that I would happy provide

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all I have to do is look back at those that have posted other Artists Beware posts because of her and they provide proof of a commission and I would offer the info.

It's public information from internic/godaddy domain registration

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She won't respond to regular mail (would not accept certified letter) won't return emails, won't return texts, won't return calls. This is AFTER promising that should would give me updates every few weeks even if it was an email saying "hey head carved and will send pics" or "still waiting on fur"

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That's still not necessarily "public record," since if you pay a bit more for your domain, you can have the information set to "private" so random people can't get to it. I pay for that service because I don't want people spamming me or getting my personal info if they plug in my site. I know what you're saying, but it took a bit of digging that the general public more than likely wouldn't think to do, you know?

The fact remains that I totally agree with you and understand where you're coming from. You have every right to feel frustrated and angry with her, and I can see why you did go digging for some way to contact her beyond e-mails. Personally, I would be extremely upset with a commissioner if they somehow found my phone number and called me to ask about their commission repeatedly. However, I can say with confidence that I would never give someone a reason to do so, as this situation has escalated to.

I still don't think it's your place to give out her private contact info to other people, regardless of their situation and its similarities to your own. The method of communication you have with her now (which I'm sure she's not happy with) is between you and her. Getting a group of people together and having them calling her constantly and harassing her is only going to cause problems. YOU may not be overwhelming with your phone calls to her, but who's to say the person you gave her number to doesn't call her every few minutes at all hours of the night? Or they threaten her? I don't think that's going to get you guys your stuff any faster, but that's my opinion. :\

Still hoping it all works out and I'm sorry to hear you've had such rotten luck! :C

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Just an FYI....even you have made your address public information in a LJ entry. It's not tough to track someone down in this technology age

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Excuse me? Tell me right now if you have our personal information. I'm not sure your statement that you can "track us down" is sitting right with me, and I need to know what the purpose of your comment is. If you have our address, you need to tell me right now when and how you acquired it, because that is DAMN creepy.

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anonymity on the internet is one thing, but when you have a business on the internet, that is something else entirely... especially a crooked business. I don't do business with anyone without having such necessary information exchanged firsthand, and considering the amount of money fursuits cost nowadays, and the amount of dodgey business practices performed by so many shifty, would-be entrepreneurs out there today, I think a little bit of culpability in this market is a good thing. Burn me on a fursuit, hells yeah i want your address! That way i don't have to pay my lawyer so much to find you.

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But do you keep in contact with those who have commissioned you? Do you promise them deadlines and then blow them off time and time again, especially when you know that a fursuit is being counted on for a specific even and you have 9 months (after over a year already) to complete a partial suit? Yet she still blows that off and now it's almost another year later. Yes that's right I have given her time after time after time after time to make things right. I can understand that real life can suck I know that a lot can happen out of the blue....for me I was riding from from work on my motorcycle and was hit from behind by a drunk driver and tossed into the next lane with my motorcycle on top of me and my legs.

She won't respond to any normal communications means.....All she has to do is drop me an email, send me a text and let me know WTF is going on.

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See the private message just sent

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And that is exactly the reason that so many in this business have P.O. boxes. Because, let's face it, some furries just have really strange ideas about what is proper when it comes to personal space and privacy. Having known at least one maker who has had a customer unexpectedly drop by their house late at night, I think it's more important to me that the public does not know my home address. I'd rather be safe than have your business, I'm sorry to say. This is along the same principle as why storefronts don't hand out their employee's names, phone numbers, and addresses. You have a problem with the business, you keep it professional--you don't go stalking people.

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If that is a problem for you, you may ask your roomate not to post your address publicly to LJ...

/just sayin'

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And the business is expected to in turn be professional. If you order something lets say from Amazon.com and you don't receive it in a timely manner, you will def contact customer service via email....if you don't get a replay via email I can almost guarantee most people would start looking for a phone number. If you are going to have a business and sell items you need to then in turn provide customer service and that includes providing communication and the final product in a timely manner

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Yes, thank you for that. She's my wife, by the way. The entry was found, and it was a mistake--she thought she had made the entry private/friends-only. I'm happy to say that the information has been removed.

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true, some furs are crazy. but that goes both ways... I once had a customer try to pay for a fursuit by dropping off a busted down sea foam green windstar with blown heads as payment for a fursuit...not to mention that the interior was apparently used as a dumpster for some time before it was dropped in my lap. I was not amused. For me, you would get my address if you commissioned me, but try and drop by to be all creepy stalker like, well, lets just say this isn't my first rodeo.

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This is true, and I do agree. It gets a little iffy when the person you're doing business with is a single person without a customer service telephone number, though. But I get what you're saying.

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Crikey, More personal info... you gonna tell me your SS# now too?

(kidding, and no problem btw)

From:

leahtaur.livejournal.com

Oh wow, I can't believe her hypocrisy. o_o Pretty impressive.

From:

wolf-goat.livejournal.com

I don't think there's anything up with calling someone who has taken that much money from you over a commission. If they set themselves up as a business they should be treated like one.

Never seen those TV shows about the rogue builders and that shit? They go through many means to track them down and try to get a refund, including cell phones, showing up at their addresses etc. It's not illegal or "harassment" in a situation like this.

From:

kadaria.livejournal.com

It's not tricky at all.

If I bought a saddle (A used saddle goes for about the same as a high end fur-suit) from these guys: http://www.harrisleather.com/
and for some reason it never showed up at my door, you can bet your ass I would be calling them. Other people would encourage me to call them and either get a refund or a saddle.
That is too much money to drop to not get a product. And if a business isn't putting out the products they are selling we call that stealing and it's a matter for BBB.
Artists do not get a free pass when they set up as a business. If the seller here didn't set up a business phone number then she should expect calls at home or to her cell. Especially if she has so much trouble checking her email and replying to her customers. If she wanted to avoid these kinds of phone calls or trouble then she probably should not have scammed people in the first place.

From:

kadaria.livejournal.com

>It gets a little iffy when the person you're doing business with is a single person without a customer service telephone number, though. <

Then she should not be doing business or taking thousands of dollars for commissions.

This shop is run by one person: http://www.shanalogic.com/
And not only is her customer service excellent (4 years buying from her with no incidents) but her turn around time for email questions is less than 24 hours.

From:

murdercrow.livejournal.com

What *I* wanna know is why you haven't called the police/contacted a lawyer. Nearly three years after you spent a grand on something and you haven't gotten anything? That's fraud.

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I have talked to a lawyer and have sent a certified letter that was returned. I have tried to be patient with her because she did have health issues and gave her the benefit of the doubt...I know....being nice bit me in the ass. My next move is filing in small claims court which I'm about to do, the issue is if she has no money it's still trying to get blood out of a turnip

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Most makers are single people with no customer service line.

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I don't see why you keep linking to other peoples' products as an example. We know what the situation is.

I don't think it's that the OP is calling the maker, so much as he has her personal cell phone number and is saying "let me know if you want it." At least he's being discrete and not passing that information around publicly, but I think it's what some people are having trouble with. There's also the issue of the fact that it's her personal, private cell number and not a dedicated business number. If you didn't get your saddle from those guys, I'd hope you wouldn't track down the home phone number of the site owners and start haranguing them about it.

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jakejynx let me ask you this......and I want you to think about this....

You have had to sell the majority of your fursuits because of a bad situation where you are suddenly forced to buy things like a new bed and such and you save and save and are finally able to get a new fursuit to replace the ones you dearly loved but had to sell then anyway, you commission someone that you think is a reputable fursuit builder, they have a good portfolio of their work and you like their style so you commission them. All is well for the first few months with communication and what seems like good progress then suddenly things start getting weird. The head they supposedly made for you is the wrong size...so they say and they are starting from scratch. The companies they are getting fur from doesn't ship orders 3,4,5 times like they were supposed to have. Suddenly contact stops. You try emailing time and time again with no answer. Suddenly you discover they have a new LJ/FA account with a new email address and you email them there. You get a sad tale of all the problems they have been having. At that point I reply that if they can't complete the suit to just refund the money they inform you that there is no way they can because they don't have the money but do have enough fur of a different color to complete your project and give you a new timeline. You tell them you have an even you really need to the suit for and they say no problem....event comes and goes and no suit and no communication....you email and email and finally get a reply back that more issues have come up but they will have it for the next event you have coming up, they still don't have the money for a refund....you wait....event comes and goes.....no response....no response in fact for 6 months. Then suddenly you see this http://valdyrfenris.livejournal.com/ (top entry) about their revelation and you see them on googletalk...once again they apologize about your commission and more missed deadlines but they will make it up to you and complete the commission along with a piece of 3d art of your character and things will progress quickly.....suddenly it's 6 months with no contact....more emails and suddenly the emails start to bounce as "email box full" and the contact email link on their site no long works. You look up their name in google and this comes up with thier full contact information http://www.artwanted.com/artist.cfm?artid=4313 Do you then try and contact them or do you just write off your dream of a new suit and all the money you scraped to save? Honestly...what would you do?

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Well honestly, I never said for you to not call her. Though I'm not sure it's a good thing for you to pass her information around, I can't begrudge you the right to calling her. You did what you felt was necessary.

I can't say I'd know what to do in your situation, and I'm very sorry that you apparently got scammed. I'm also pretty angry because having fursuit makers behave in this way makes all of us look bad. You may want a fursuit in the future, but I'm sure you're going to have a lot of trepidation about it, as will others who have read this entry. Once again, I'm sorry for what has happened to you.

In the future, if you're ever in a situation to pay for a big ticket item like this, please do it safely--pay only the deposit until you're sure that work has been done and will be completed. That way if you do end up getting scammed, you're at least not out as much money. :\ I hope in the end it all works out for you.

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kayla-la.livejournal.com

Anything new with this?

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