Bob J Posted July 31, 2016 Share Posted July 31, 2016 So I sold a couple of photos this month - yay! They were both refunded - booooo How does this work? Is this a regular thing? It's rather disappointing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jill Morgan Posted July 31, 2016 Share Posted July 31, 2016 Most commonly they show up again, but for a lower price. Jill Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Radim Posted July 31, 2016 Share Posted July 31, 2016 This month "refunded" $ 250, without compensation Radim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wiskerke Posted July 31, 2016 Share Posted July 31, 2016 First of all: it is very uncommon that a client rejects an image because it's no good. I suspect a lot of those cases end up here on this Forum, and there are not many posts about it. A common scenario is that a client has bought some images over time, all for one project, but now lumps them all together for the final bill. Either hoping for a discount or just to simplify bookkeeping on his or her end. The fact that these show up in our reports, is that those are almost real time. And that there's not a provision for a running tab on a project scale at Alamy. Other than the shopping cart, but that does not give clients the un-watermarked images they want for the mock-up. (Which is because graphic designers don't make mock ups anymore. They may design several versions, but they would all be final at the click on the publish button.) If you have seen an image sell twice with (near) identical licence details, the chance of a refund is quite high. In the case of a discount, you will see that reflected in the final sale price. There have been cases of a client that liked the image so much, they wanted to use it for more; for a larger edition; or just ended up using it bigger. In that case the final bill will be higher. It has happened to me a couple of times, so they certainly do exist. Then there's the client that falls asleep with a finger on the buy button. Usually a technical glitch though. I had 6 absolutely identical sales last month. Same day; same client; same price; same duration; same starting date. I don't think that there will be 6 identical images in the same UK newspaper. Against better judgement I'm hoping it's just the billing for the use of the same image over a year's time, with the wrong dates. Probably not ;-) wim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlessandraRC Posted August 9, 2016 Share Posted August 9, 2016 Is it worth contributing here, really? My first sale has just been refunded. Now I have zero again. Why work for nothing for so long, I am starting to ask myself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joseph Clemson Posted August 9, 2016 Share Posted August 9, 2016 Is it worth contributing here, really? My first sale has just been refunded. Now I have zero again. Why work for nothing for so long, I am starting to ask myself. Alessandra, you've hardly got going yet. You have maybe 10% of the size of portfolio needed to make regular sales. As has been said many times before, Alamy is not microstock and if your expectations are formed by the microstock experience, you need to make an inward adjustment to work at Alamy. Refunds are not commonplace here, but they do occur because, for one example, clients will sometimes include an image in a draft of their publication which does not make it into the final version. They then get a refund on the unused image. The Alamy business model is not the same as microstock, which is why we wait longer for payments and every sale does not turn into cash in the pocket. In the long run though, I prefer Alamy's way to the microstock way and the contributor is better off. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Betty LaRue Posted August 9, 2016 Share Posted August 9, 2016 Is it worth contributing here, really? My first sale has just been refunded. Now I have zero again. Why work for nothing for so long, I am starting to ask myself. I think I had 500-800 images and over a year before I made my first sale. And that was when Alamy had far fewer millions competition. Granted in those days I didn't much grasp what made good stock, but still.... Keep working, uploading. Sales will come, but you need to get your numbers up of good quality stock. I'm happy I had the patience to keep plugging away. This isn't a place for instant gratification. Think more like the tortoise than the hare. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Kuta Posted August 9, 2016 Share Posted August 9, 2016 I just looked back over all my sales (been here since 2004). About 5% were refunded. The last one was October 2013. And as Wim said, most were put back in as sales, usually for a lesser amount, sometimes for the same amount (rejiggering the terms?), sometimes not put back in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spacecadet Posted August 9, 2016 Share Posted August 9, 2016 Less than 3%, all resold later, commonly for the same amount. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
losdemas Posted August 9, 2016 Share Posted August 9, 2016 Only been selling here since 2013. Been lucky enough to only have had one refund - and that was at my instigation, having queried the dimensions of a used image (sold for 1/16 page - used much larger). The image was subsequently re-invoiced at a higher rate. EDIT: grammar! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lisa Posted August 9, 2016 Share Posted August 9, 2016 Out of my 172 sales so far, four were refunded. All four were later re-sold (re-booked?), three times for higher amounts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
losdemas Posted August 9, 2016 Share Posted August 9, 2016 Out of my 172 sales so far, four were refunded. All four were later re-sold (re-booked?), three times for higher amounts. Excellent! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wiskerke Posted August 9, 2016 Share Posted August 9, 2016 These are all the refunds (10) from 296 sales for the the rolling year (01 September 2015 - 08 August 2016) All subsequently showed up in the summary as lower; the same; or higher sales. Like this: $ 240.00- $ 240.00new $ 180.00= - 60$ 28.47- $ 28.47new $ 28.47= 0$ 100.00- $ 100.00new $ 100.00= 0$ 240.00- $ 240.00new $ 240.00= 0$ 180.00$ -180.00new $ 124.47= - 55.53$ 50.00$ -50.00new $ 50.00= 0$ 35.00$ -35.00new $ 35.00= 0$ 47.52$ -47.52new $ 169.72= + 122.20$ 54.31$ -54.31new $ 54.31= 0$ 39.30$ -39.30new $ 19.19= - 20.11total: - $ 13.44 - On a total of around $16,000, I can live with that. ;-) wim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alamy Posted August 10, 2016 Share Posted August 10, 2016 Is it worth contributing here, really? My first sale has just been refunded. Now I have zero again. Why work for nothing for so long, I am starting to ask myself. Hello Alessandra, Please check your sales report again as posting this in this way is quite misleading. Your image was sold twice and refunded once in order to rectify the customer error. This is one of the disadvantages of use reporting 'live', as sometimes customer errors can cause confusion. If you set your sales history to "All" you will see the two sales. Congrats on your first sale, lets hope it's the first of many. Cheers, Alamy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dov makabaw Posted August 10, 2016 Share Posted August 10, 2016 I've also had a refund this month. So far not resold. Part of the game I guess. dov Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlessandraRC Posted August 13, 2016 Share Posted August 13, 2016 I clearly don't know how to read sales reports. Alamy has correctly noted to me that I have made a mistake reading mine, and I apologize for the confusion. I am happy to see that Alamy is attentive to the forum and has straightened this out. I wish, however, I could give an advice about how to read a sales report, it is a little confusing. Going to be away for a number of days so I won't be reading sales reports or this forum, will be unable to reply to comments. Crater Lake there is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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