A little rant

So, I am a content writer and I find most of my clients through Facebook.

I found a new one two weeks ago and she ordered her first article. As someone who offer 500 words for free for anyone to test, I immediately accepted without thinking about what may come next.

She said that the test was OK, and she ordered 4 others articles. We agreed on the pricing and the payment plan. We decided that she will pay me after those 4 articles and it was fine by me.

Well, I finished the 4 articles Friday and sent her the invoice as planned.

Saturday night, after seeing the invoice, she got pissed that I didn't take her proofreading into account and I counted every special character as I just put the number of words that LibreOffice gave to me in each article (as I always do). I said it was OK, and I was just going to change the number of words on the invoice tomorrow. But the day after this discussion was not Monday yet, but Sunday and I really can't do anything work related on Sunday because of my toddler. So I waited for Monday to redo the invoice and send it to her. But when I was about to do so, she blocked me everywhere. I can't access her website anymore to check the number of words.

At that point, what I did was just eliminating 50 words per article in the invoice and send it to her on Facebook. But it seemed that she is ignoring me there too.

I didn't know what to do, and I threatened her to publish all of the four articles on one of my website if she didn't pay me by noon today. I wrote that just on the comment section on the post she made when she searched for a writer two weeks ago. People reacted to it but not her.

So I am a little bit disappointed because I counted on this money for my holidays. And I have already checked if she was going to be a good client or not. I didn't see any red flags when I made my research about her.

Thanks for reading this

PS 1: I'm not a native English speaker so this may be confusing to you but I needed to tell it to someone and I thought BHW was the best place for that.
PS 2: Yes, I have other clients, but they are regular ones who only pay me monthly each start of the month. So my next pay will be in January.
PS 3: I'm asking you to not judge my work based on what I wrote here. My heart just aches a little, and I don't write in English for my job.

I like that you can post it to your own site.

Unfortunately, she probably just wanted an excuse to get free articles because so many content writers are quick to capitulate to their demands. It happens here too. Some people will find anything to pick at just to have an excuse to get a refund or get free articles.

Best thing to do is to get the word count the client wants in advance. If they want 500 words, send an invoice for 500 words and wait for them to pay. Then, give them 525 words or slightly more. I always give clients words over without counting the title. If the title is 10 words, I'll give them 520 or 530 just to make sure it is enough.

Sometimes you have to realize though that the client was just after a freebie. If they don't pay, post the article on your site. You might as well get something for your time. It is a shame that service providers get taken advantage of so much too, but there are bad service providers as well.

No one seems to trust anyone on anymore as a result of crooked clients and writers, link builders, ect. The shit list is a good start even if it doesn't stop anyone. That unfortunately isn't available if you're not selling here. Too bad a few bad apples can ruin things for service providers and clients.

Good luck! Always get pay upfront and exact details. I think you'll have fewer problems this way, but you'll still run into people just wanting freebies. Happened to me the other day too even though I've been doing for this a long time. It is unavoidable sometimes. Times are rough so you can't afford these problems. If you have any questions, contact me because I might be able to help. Cheers and good luck!

cobaltblue87 said:

Unfortunately, she probably just wanted an excuse to get free articles because so many content writers are quick to capitulate to their demands. It happens here too. Some people will find anything to pick at just to have an excuse to get a refund or get free articles.

Best thing to do is to get the word count the client wants in advance. If they want 500 words, send an invoice for 500 words and wait for them to pay. Then, give them 525 words or slightly more. I always give clients words over without counting the title. If the title is 10 words, I'll give them 520 or 530 just to make sure it is enough.

Sometimes you have to realize though that the client was just after a freebie. If they don't pay, post the article on your site. You might as well get something for your time. It is a shame that service providers get taken advantage of so much too, but there are bad service providers as well.

No one seems to trust anyone on anymore as a result of crooked clients and writers, link builders, ect. The shit list is a good start even if it doesn't stop anyone. That unfortunately isn't available if you're not selling here. Too bad a few bad apples can ruin things for service providers and clients.

Good luck! Always get pay upfront and exact details. I think you'll have fewer problems this way, but you'll still run into people just wanting freebies. Happened to me the other day too even though I've been doing for this a long time. It is unavoidable sometimes. Times are rough so you can't afford these problems. If you have any questions, contact me because I might be able to help. Cheers and good luck!

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A sad truth indeed

Sweetrevenge said:

A sad truth indeed

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If you found her through a FB group, name and shame the scammer.

Also because she has not paid, the copyright is not here's, so openly offer the content for sale. EG; I have 4 articles in XYZ niche each is on average xxx words first buyer at $100 gets all 4 articles and the copyright.

Take this as a lesson learnt. You initially provided her a test content (article) for free. After that : The fact that she placed an order for 4 more articles, means that she approved the quality of your writing (content). So, ideally you would have asked her for a FULL upfront payment. That is how things work in trade, commerce and business (any business).
Sorry to say, it was YOUR fault and I hope that you have learnt a lesson from your mistake.