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Archive 2015 · Bride didn't pay her balance...

  
 
Michael Beard
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p.3 #1 · p.3 #1 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


morby wrote:
I think that clients should worry about us more than we should worry about them. I rarely hear of clients not paying, but have heard numerous stories of photographers that haven't delivered on what they promised.


Agreed, clients should be paying more attention to "red flags" than photographers.



Sep 22, 2015 at 02:18 PM
MattGruber
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p.3 #2 · p.3 #2 · Bride didn't pay her balance...




morby wrote:
The bride finally got back to me. Looks like Danny, and the other compassionate people had it right.

Turns out that right after they got back from the honeymoon the groom's father went on hospice, and it's been a crazy two weeks with his rapidly declining health and out of town guests. She had issued a check through her bank, but they never sent it. She is going to reissue it today. Looks like my assumptions were incorrect. Thankfully I kept all of the calls and emails respectful.


It's a shame to hear about the father. I'm sure your associate got some beautiful photos of him at the wedding, that they will appreciate so much more now.

In regards to the check: I had a client a few years back who issued a check to me through her bank through the auto payment thing (which it sounds like your bride did). I never knew how long it actually took for that process. It took 2-3 weeks from when the bride told me she sent it until I got it. I have no idea if it usually takes that long, but it's something for us all to keep in mind for the future.



Sep 22, 2015 at 02:28 PM
dmacmillan
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p.3 #3 · p.3 #3 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


Michael Beard wrote:
Not necessarily- we have booked last minute weddings and they have gone great. It's not fair to assume the worst in people- what if their photographer flaked at the last minute?


I realize that wedding photography is handled much differently than when I did it in the dark ages.

Yes, I did last minute weddings that turned out great. Yet, there were a few times that last minute weddings didn't turn out so good.

Maybe it is nomenclature. A red flag is a warning, not a full stop. Maybe I should have said yellow flag - proceed with caution. Back then, the first contact was usually a phone call followed by a face to face meeting at the studio. Short notice weddings would trigger more and different questions. I'm aware of changing conditions, but I am also aware of unorganized people who end up costing more than you make. Sometimes it's cheaper to sit at home or try to schedule a portrait shoot.

If the initial phone call went well, I would schedule a sit down. My booking rate once I met with the client ran ~90%.

I didn't expect the worst from people, I was just realistic. Getting burned a few times teaches you not to be gullible. My suggestion regarding booking policies did not mean a total ban on short term bookings, I was trying to suggest an examination of rules of engagement.

As for how to handle the current situation, I would never recommend sabre rattling. I agree with thorough documentation of contact attempts. I would also caution against contacting mom and dad unless mom and dad signed the contract. I would not proceed with any more work, but I wouldn't destroy or threaten to destroy images. You want to come out of this as the good guy or at least the neutral guy, not the bad guy.



Sep 22, 2015 at 02:33 PM
elkhornsun
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p.3 #4 · p.3 #4 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


Small claims court is your best option. I get the retainer fee of 50% when I book a couple and the remainder is due 30 days before the wedding. If I do not get the balance due then I have a day off.

Important to get the retainer fee. Legally a deposit cannot be kept if work is not performed or goods delivered - as with a wedding.



Sep 22, 2015 at 04:34 PM
Mark_L
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p.3 #5 · p.3 #5 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


Michael Beard wrote:
Agreed, clients should be paying more attention to "red flags" than photographers.


Both should be.

The client can do plenty of due diligence on you as a business looking at past work, reputation, how long you have been in business, asking lots of questions etc. A photographer on the other hard has nothing other than their personal assessment of a clients character at a 1hr meeting.

morby wrote:
The bride finally got back to me. Looks like Danny, and the other compassionate people had it right.

Turns out that right after they got back from the honeymoon the groom's father went on hospice, and it's been a crazy two weeks with his rapidly declining health and out of town guests. She had issued a check through her bank, but they never sent it. She is going to reissue it today. Looks like my assumptions were incorrect. Thankfully I kept all of the calls and emails respectful.


Not to be a downer OP, but shitty people often use this as an excuse for not paying for things or showing up for things. Don't be swayed or believe anything until the money is in your bank or cash is in your hand.



Sep 22, 2015 at 05:02 PM
FrancisK7
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p.3 #6 · p.3 #6 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


MattGruber wrote:
My philosophy on life: Being an asshole gets you nowhere


Donald Trump made a career out of it



Sep 22, 2015 at 08:24 PM
glort
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p.3 #7 · p.3 #7 · Bride didn't pay her balance...



Few things come to mind here.....

I disagree with not contacting the parents. I have done very few weddings where they are not intricately involved if they live locally. Even one interview would have made the involvement clear. If the Bride lived at home, for sure I would be contacting someone there. It may not have been applicable in this case but if it had, one call would have explained the problem and saved the angst.

Ringing a parent and saying if the couple aren't interested you'll delete the pics is not a threat, for me it would be fact. I'm not going to waste storage space for nothing. It would be stupid to make threats and I don't think anyone suggested that here. Likewise it is only common sense to be respectful in all communications.

The info given was " The Cheque is in the mail".
To me, that's a hell of a lot different to " I have organised the bank to send you a cheque". Why you would do that is beyond me anyway. The Banking system in Oz is a Hell of a lot easier to deal with than the US system though and I have experience with both to know. Here we would just get the other persons account no. and do a direct deposit and it would be there that night. And no, it is not risky or anything else. Loads of businesses do it and publish their account details for that reason and it is not a source of problems.
Putting money in is a load different to taking it out.

As for the father being sick.... really, ho hum.
I went though the darkest time of my days recently yet my wife and I still found the time to make a call or send a text to let people know what was going on and keep our affairs organised.

I had specialist appointments and while we were going back and forth to the hospital and my wife was able to call or text them as we drove in the car and say I would not be able to make it and I'd get back to them with another time.

On the info given, calls and emails were made by the shooter to the client. If the couple forgot about things, that would have reminded them. It takes nothing to make a return call or send an email. If it was a problem with the family, I would guarantee emails were flying around every day to other family members so I would find it hard to believe that for 2 weeks they didn't look at their email box and couldn't send a Quick " Sorry fred, my father is sick atm, I'll get back to you asap." Message to the shooter.

After letting her know what had happened, One of my doctors must have texted me a dozen times so far, the last one on Friday saying hope you are OK, let me know when you want to come in. She has been terrific and as a busy doctor has managed to find the time to get back to me with these many messages so someone saying they are so busy they can't contact someone to me is not at all logical.
I have never sent as many text messages, made and taken as many calls and put in about 1000 times more facebotched use that I ever had before when we were running back and forth to hospitals and making other arrangements.

You don't spend every waking moment at hospital nor are flat out occupied every moment you are there so having gone through it myself, I say it's an excuse rather than a reason and people can get upset over that if they want to play the soft of heart and head card which is what a lot of slack people rely on. I sent and received loads of messages from the hospital and if anything, I was easier to get hold of than ever before because I was on the phone and email more than usual to stay in touch with people. We spent 34 hours at the hospital in one stint and we were far from uncountable. An hour after we arrived there was a social worker there running through a list of people we might need to contact that they could contact for us.

Sorry to all whom want to make excuses based on sob story's but I find this excuse a complete crock. It does not in any way reflect with reality of what happens in that situation especially over that period of time. I have been there more than once.

Again, the benefit of up front payment is shown here. Had they done that then the way the situation was looked at would have been quite different.
Every time I go to a new Medico or even one I have been to for years, they take a look at my blood test and tell me I have to cut down on drinking. A good month for me would be 2 drinks. The fact is the great majority of people that have a result like I do are alco's. As such, the doctors are naturally going to think that is my problem as well just going buy the look of me.

The same applies here. Based on the info given of the situation, it IS natural to assume the worst because I have numerous occasions I remember when the worst happened with those circumstances but I cannot remember ANY time I didn't get money up front, I didn't hear anything from the people for weeks and there turned out to be a legit reason. ALL the people I have dealt with found the time to make a call and say sorry, got a family emergency, we will be in contact.

And that's the real Red flag for me.
In my overwhelming experience, genuine people do let you know if there is a problem. The ones that burn you don't.
Like dealing with Models. The ones that have a genuine reason they can't make it to a shoot contact you asap and are profoundly apologetic. The Bimbos wait a week or for you to contact them and then always have some excuse about a dying grandmother or other crap you have heard 100 times before.

Some people may want to give everyone the benefit of the doubt but I don't. When I have, it's caused me to be burnt and I do try to avoid that as much as possible.

It's hard to know what transpired here because clearly a lot of people have a lot less to do with their clients in person than I do. Even if this had been a short notice wedding, I would have had an idea how long the honeymoon was, if the couple, either one, lived at home I would have the parents number, and I would not have been at the wedding unless I was handed an envelope of cash as I walked through the door.

I don't know what the arrangement the OP has here but it would not surprise me in the least if there is problems with this deal yet. I hope I'm wrong but if we are getting a realistic account of the situation, I'd be waiting till the fat lady sung before breathing too easy.



Sep 22, 2015 at 09:31 PM
mjgphotoz
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p.3 #8 · p.3 #8 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


I too hope the OP is treated properly and all works out. I will say this. I had an older, wiser friend in another industry years past that would often give me similar advice. Sounded like glort's twin. After many years, life experiences and clients later, I can assure you that glort is 99.9% right just about 99.9% of the time in what he states. You don't have to like it, but you just might want to listen.


Sep 23, 2015 at 08:44 AM
FrancisK7
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p.3 #9 · p.3 #9 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


Glort for president. He'd easily beat all the GOP candidates

"Here I am, The Aussie, bringing you the facts to your faces."



Sep 23, 2015 at 09:06 AM
jasonpatrick
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p.3 #10 · p.3 #10 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


Up your deposit to 50%. If it happens again, your associate makes their money and you're up 250 for doing nothing. No paid balance, no edits/images.



morby wrote:
Thanks for the replies! A few other things to add...

The cost of my associate is $3000 for a shoot and burn, so it's not expensive, but also not cheap. They seemed to value photography.

My associate said that the wedding planner pulled the bride aside at the beginning of the day asking for payment. They went into another room and talked about something.

During the first look the groom had no reaction and she stormed off angry.

During the pre-wedding consult she said her and her family aren't close, so she didn't want formals. There wasn't even a father/daughter dance.

My guess is that
...Show more



Sep 23, 2015 at 10:44 AM
morby
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p.3 #11 · p.3 #11 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


Well said and I completely agree with you. Time will tell. I do know that some people are terrible at communicating and wait for ever to respond, even with important stuff. In August they found cancer in my wife's thyroid and she had two surgeries within 10 days. She received an overwhelming amount of calls, texts and emails. She still hasn't responded to most of them. She sees something and let's it sit.

glort wrote:
Few things come to mind here.....

I disagree with not contacting the parents. I have done very few weddings where they are not intricately involved if they live locally. Even one interview would have made the involvement clear. If the Bride lived at home, for sure I would be contacting someone there. It may not have been applicable in this case but if it had, one call would have explained the problem and saved the angst.

Ringing a parent and saying if the couple aren't interested you'll delete the pics is not a threat, for me it would be fact. I'm
...Show more



Sep 24, 2015 at 03:05 PM
morby
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p.3 #12 · p.3 #12 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


Good call.

jasonpatrick wrote:
Up your deposit to 50%. If it happens again, your associate makes their money and you're up 250 for doing nothing. No paid balance, no edits/images.






Sep 24, 2015 at 03:05 PM
nolaguy
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p.3 #13 · p.3 #13 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


morby wrote:
In August they found cancer in my wife's thyroid and she had two surgeries within 10 days. She received an overwhelming amount of calls, texts and emails. She still hasn't responded to most of them. She sees something and let's it sit.


Mike... prayers for Kari, you and yours for a full recovery for Kari and strength to you as you guide her and your little ones through this.

Chuck




Sep 24, 2015 at 09:38 PM
morby
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p.3 #14 · p.3 #14 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


Thanks Chuck! Thankfully thyroid cancer is easily treatable, and they believe they got everything by removing her entire thyroid. In January she will have to take a radio active iodine pill and be quarantined for a few days, but that should get anything that might be remaining.

nolaguy wrote:
Mike... prayers for Kari, you and yours for a full recovery for Kari and strength to you as you guide her and your little ones through this.

Chuck





Sep 24, 2015 at 10:25 PM
glort
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p.3 #15 · p.3 #15 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


morby wrote:
Well said and I completely agree with you. Time will tell. I do know that some people are terrible at communicating and wait for ever to respond, even with important stuff. In August they found cancer in my wife's thyroid and she had two surgeries within 10 days. She received an overwhelming amount of calls, texts and emails. She still hasn't responded to most of them. She sees something and let's it sit.



I hope your good wife makes a speedy and full recovery. There is too much we have to endure in this world these days that is just not fair. I hope you and your kids are not suffering with it too badly either. These things affect sooo many people which I think often gets over looked.

As far as your wife's response to messages etc, I don't know if that's her normal pattern to take her time but I sure wouldn't hold it against her in this circumstance. After all, SHE is the one that has been sick and going through the trauma, not someone else.

There are loads of people I haven't responded to that sent us well wishes and I am just starting on now. I haven't done it before because frankly I just didn't feel up to dealing with the feelings it brings on.
Even I don't know what to say to a lot of people and sometimes I just don't feel like getting out another keyboard after drowning the one I have with tears that come from getting back to people and upsetting myself with the thought of what has happened.
I would find it surprising if your wife wasn't the same. No doubt this was terribly traumatic for her and she may just want a bit of rest from thinking about. it.

If your wife is normally slow to respond to things, that's different. In this case she has no excuse, she has an unquestionable reason and that's a whole different thing. She has paid a high price, no one cares if she gets back to them or not straight away, they just want her better and to see her back to normal. I'll bet she is not one to not keep appointments or commitments ordinarily so that is another thing altogether as well. Her physical and mental health is the important thing atm and if she doesn't' feel like returning messages for any reason, it's REASON not excuse enough I say.

In any case, I regard this as totally different. A get well wish is not a commitment or something someone else is relying on a response for. Added to that, in this case, the person themselves is sick, not someone else. If I sent someone a well wish or condolences, I would not be waiting for a response or have my nose out of joint if I didn't get one. That said, I do like to say thank you to people but the reality is some just seem too hard and upsetting to do. It's easy for me to sit and type shit on here to distract myself from things, a lot harder to actually confront reality and write messages that deal with that.

The other thing that comes to mind is that perhaps while your wife is very humbled and grateful for the well wishes, she doesn't like dealing with the attention being sick brings. She very well may not want to be thought of, let alone be sick and just want everything as normal.
I feel for her greatly.

There is no comparison to your wife and your clients in my book I'm afraid.

In my experience with slack people, Sickness/ hospitals/ dying are very popular excuses because it's an area they know most people are going to shy away from and not question their lies or give them the benefit of the doubt on less they be seen as bastards for daring to question it. All I can say is god help the next one that lays crap like this on me.

It would take a lot of convincing me that your clients were not just slack and unreliable whether the father was sick or not. That pisses me off because it's bad enough being slack and untrustworthy in the first place, it's doubly poor to lie using sympathy and peoples compassion as a means to get away with both wrong doings.



Sep 24, 2015 at 11:12 PM
J Knight
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p.3 #16 · p.3 #16 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


Glort, I am sad for your troubled times. Re responding to well wishers, I am sure most people do not expect contact in return or only minimal acknowledgement as they are aware that creating long communications is far easier for them than for you.

Personally I would not be concerned about receiving an acknowledgement at all in difficult times, but even for those more bothered a simple "thanks for your support message, appreciated" would be more than enough. People understand, they will not think of short responses as ungrateful or rude in any way.

All the best.



Sep 25, 2015 at 09:27 AM
glort
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p.3 #17 · p.3 #17 · Bride didn't pay her balance...



Came across this thread again and was wondering how things went with the MIA clients and how it all panned out?

I'd be interested to hear an update and what the end result was.



Oct 18, 2015 at 08:34 AM
morby
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p.3 #18 · p.3 #18 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


Looks like glort was right. The bride still hasn't paid her balance and has no intentions of paying. I reached out to the photographer that sent me the referral, and he gave me an alternate phone number to call. I called and the bride's grandmother picked up. The grandmother wasn't surprised when I told her the balance wasn't paid. She offered to pay the balance, because she wants to see the photos. I feel bad having the grandmother take responsibility for her granddaughter, but it's the only way I'll get paid and she'll see the photos.


Nov 19, 2015 at 08:38 AM
WiredMike
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p.3 #19 · p.3 #19 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


My 23 cents into all this.
I do not know Morby personally, but from what I have read here he seems to be a good person.
I hate seeing good people get burnt. Far too common these days.
If grandma wants to see the pictures then she should pay the amount owed to you. Soon as grandma has them, then your client has them also.
Just my take.



Nov 19, 2015 at 09:16 AM
glort
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p.3 #20 · p.3 #20 · Bride didn't pay her balance...


morby wrote:
Looks like glort was right.


Sorry about that. For your sake I would have much preferred to have been wrong. No skin off my nose but would be a significant thing to you.
Given years of experience and the behavior and excuses you were given, it wasn't exactly hard to foresee though.

People can talk about being compassionate and create all the excuses they like to protect wrong doer's and try to convince themselves they haven't made a mistake but I have been burned too many times to keep going down that road over and over again. To not learn the lesson, as slow as I was anyway, would call ones intelligence into question severely.

The important thing is to learn and not get burned again.

We are in business and in THIS type of scenario, compassion and excuses have no place.
As small business people we are very vulnerable to the financial cost and effects of having this happen to us. Unlike big business, we don't have the buffer they do to loose time and money on those who have none of the compassion or concern we are supposed to have for them.

It is important we minimise the risk we are exposed to and limit them wherever possible. The best way I know to do this is get your money up front.
That done, There is no reason for compassion or creating far fetched unlikely excuses that come back 99.9% of the time to bite you squarely in the arse.
If someone comes along and says " I really want to book you but can only afford to pay 1/2 now but I'll give you a post dated cheque for the rest" that's something that is deserving of compassion. If you have any people skills you can see that the people are genuine because they are making an effort to work with you.

People who say " Money is on the way" when you chase them in my costly experience are rarely creditable and have the poorest record possible with my dealings.

I much rather walk away from a job and take the risk they may have been OK and loose some income than take the risk my time, efforts, materials and good faith will be wasted not to mention the adding of insult to injury I'll be out of pocket as well.
Loosing a job that -MAY- have been OK won't play on my mind or keep me awake at night feeling pissed off, cheated and taken advantage of. The other one will.
Sleeping at night is hard enough for me, I don't need this rubbing adding to my frustrations and certainly not for the amount of money involved. If the risk was the potential loss of a Million bux income, I might be prepared to roll the dice but for a couple of Grand?, I'll pass thanks.
Aside from everything else, my dignity is worth more to me in not beiong played for and feeling like a sucker.

I didn't come to the politically, soft of heart and head INcorrect attitude without reason. I too gave people the benefit of the doubt and took a " compassionate" attitude once but after you keep getting burned on the arse, you have to wake up and protect yourself from being taken advantage of and your good nature abused.

When people pay me up front and show me they are fair dinkum and honest, then they will get all the compassion and good will I can muster thrown at them. Those with excuses, can basically bugger off.
Some people seem so hell bent on doing the right thing by others, they forget about doing the right thing by the most important people of all, their families and themselves. My family always came first and if anyone tried taking money I could spend on them away, my reaction was definite and without remorse. To not put your own family first in my book seriously undermines my respect for someone.

As I said, You don't have to trust honest people because they don't ask you to. They show they are trustworthy and understand your side of things as well. I have never been burnt by anyone willing to pony up the cash as specified. The ones that have made excuses have burnt my backside each and every time. I have been doing this a longer than some here and I'm sad to say, My impression of peoples honesty and credibility is going down not up. It seems people are less trustworthy and honorable all the time. That makes the chances of getting burned Higher rather than lower than before but increases the need for shooters ( and all small business people) to think through their payment structures with a view to risk reversal with non and slow payment from clients.


Morby,
Just in case I put this badly, please don't take the criticisms as being directed specifically at you. My views are general in the context of the subject of the thread.

My Directed comment to you is we all get burnt sooner or later, the idea is to learn quicker than I did and preferably learn the lesson the first time.

As far as the grandmother paying, she's been around the block, she's not likely stupid.
There are other things besides money as well. I can relate to her with my father. He knows his years are limited, he's well cashed up, he knows he can't take it with him and he wants to enjoy himself as much as possible while he can. What makes him happiest now is seeing us happy. Taken me a bit to come to terms with that myself but he's not an idiot and in the last months I have realised how valueless money can be as well.
He's bugging me atm to buy a new car for my Daughter. He says he wants the pleasure of seeing her happy and enjoying herself while he still can. He has the money and the value to him is in the happiness seeing my daughter being happy will bring him. He's told me that straight out more than once.

The grandmother may will have the same idea. It may not be a bail out as much as she wants To enjoy the pics and probably see the granddaughter happy and do something nice for her.
I'll make the excuse that there may be something you don't know she does and even if the granddaughter is at fault or has done the wrong thing, she may not give a ship, she has the resources to fix it and that's all she cares about.

Take the money, give them the pics and be a lot smarter in learning your lesson that I was.






Nov 20, 2015 at 10:48 PM
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