Recently I was contacted by a client who emailed me with a straightforward request - produce a piece of artwork showing the City of Manchester stadium amongst a montage of famous Mancunian buildings.
I made the mistake of failing to ask for any payment upfront. Because the deadline was looming and there probably wouldn't be time for a cheque to reach me in the post before I would have to complete the designs, I figured that just this once it'd work out okay. This was my first mistake.
We went through a couple of revisions - nothing hugely complex, but in total I probably spent about 3 hours on it. I stated that £40 ought to be a good fee for my services - I figured this was a bargain, as a studio would have probably charged 5 times that - and it was agreed upon. Basically I thought it'd make a great addition to my portfolio as well as being a source of a bit of pocket money.
Now, the deadline that was originally mooted was "end of November". I had crazy things going on during the last couple of weeks of November including trips to london and so on, so there were a few days where I failed to check my hotmail in the evenings. I had sent one or two draft versions over to the client as the project progressed and I had kept up to date with the amendment requests.
The second mistake I made was failing to get a proper postal address for the client.
On something like the 28th - as I type this I can't be bothered to check back on my hotmail as to when the actual date was - I found an email from a couple of days previous, asking how it was progressing. I polished off the final changes, sent off the finished design and, within about 2 hours, I got back the following email:
Hi Mike
As I hadn't heard from you I had organise an alternative as time scales were tight, so apologies
Thanks
I knew I'd taken a silly risk commercially speaking, but I didn't expect to be so blatantly ripped off. In response I wrote stating the work had been completed to the originally specification, on deadline and for a minimal fee. I even suggested that the finished work would be ideal as a Christmas present
if the birthday date had mysteriously jumped forward, so I would expect at least partial payment immediately. I've since heard absolutely nothing and obviously I've no way of hunting down the client.
A little reminder to any designers out there: When starting work with a client, get them to clearly state a deadline - in writing - (even down to the time of day), and always get somekind of financial commitment from the client before commencing work.
So...
In order to ensure that the robbing so-and-so hasn't received a unique piece of artwork for free, any Manchester City fans are welcome to download the picture above and to distribute it with no strings attached. It's my little present to you. Oh yes... and if your girlfriend gives you a framed copy of this for your birthday and claims it's a one of a kind commission, just give her a slap for me would you? Alternatively, if you do like the attached artwork, please send a quick email to elainewood24@hotmail.com thank her and say Mike says "hi".