Making Custom Products

[Roy]

I am thinking about halting making customs due to many people abusing my trust. I may take recolors or something I would like to make, but only public.

One of my lastest issues is someone has an existing custom, and gets disabled and contacts me from an "alt" wanting their custom once more. I usually just charged them the fees of sending it over again, but I had one today come to me saying their account was disabled...so I charged them the usual and I sent them one of their customs..and realised the original account was NOT disabled.

(They may have got their account back or maybe I just sent a custom to another person..I think they said that was their alt before...I have to check with them oml, I don't want to deal with this while I am recovering)

I am thinking of maybe halting sending old customs to people that had their account disabled too...but that does seem a bit harsh.

I do not really like hiding customs since I do like to show my work...some of my customs I feel are my best work. (tho some I do not like but they do)

I have had a few people not pay for customs after. Their credits always seem to go away somehow. (I only do credits after for eyes....if they do not pay, they just go on public so no work wasted...for something bigger, I like some upfront as good faith)

So, for the tldr; Do you think I should take customs (I like making people happy). Do you take customs or not? And why?

[ChocolateCookie]

I personally love doing customs, but I do it mostly because I enjoy the challenge. I've gotten a lot of cool ideas from people in the past and doing those has been the best part of being a creator for me. But most of the requests have been public requests, so I have been able to avoid most of the problems that you've been dealing with. Some people have paid me without me asking for anything, which is always nice. The biggest problem for me has been rudeness and people being angry at me for not making them free exclusive items, or other things such as free homepage designs that I never offered. But that is a part of the job I guess.

I can understand your concern but if you enjoy making customs, I do not think you should give up on that. If you don't want to hide your customs then just don't. Tell them that you do not offer hidden customs and if they want it to be exclusive then Display Only is the best you can do for them and explain that it is because you want people to be able to see your work. There in no reason why you need to offer hidden customs and bend over backwards for people. If they want a custom from you then they can respect what you want and are comfortable with as well. Similarly, if you have issues with people not paying you, you can ask them to send some of the payment up front. Many developers do this, some even ask full payment. You could, for example, have them first pay you the amount that you would charge for a public item, if they later refuse to pay the rest of the agreed price of the custom then you can just turn it into a public item and remove any names and such if needed.

As for the alts, you should charge extra for sending a custom product to another account and be clear about that. Them getting disabled is not your fault and if they want ten of their alts to have the item as well then they can pay extra. And to make people send you the product to multiple people at the very beginning as opposed to later, you could ask for more for sending the custom to someone else at a later time. Something like "Sending the custom to an extra account upon finishing the order: 2.5K. Sending the custom to an extra account at a later time: 5k." That will at least either give you something extra for the annoyance and motivate people to list their alts at the very start and you do not need to make any exceptions about this as them getting disabled is usually on them.

Your work is great, you don't need to take crap from people or do anything that makes you unhappy or uncomfortable.

[Extinction]

I've had a few people get disabled ane wanted their customs on their new accounts... I always.. I mean always make them prove to me who they are.

In most cases, them being able to provide the original reference to me for their custom is good enough, but sometimes I need them to message me on their deviantart or furaffinity.
If you keep your prices private, having them restate what they paid for it, can help reconfirm.
Even if they mention a paypal e-mail (if you do that) - and it was kept private between you and the buyer - to me thats a big confirmation of who they say they are.

But if what they say, doesn't seem to match, or it feels fishy, by all means you can DENY them. You don't have to return something, even with a small fee, because the transaction has been done. Thats out of your own kindness.

I've had to do that to one person.. they were not a happy person, but I gave them the complete reason why and they seemed to understand; I mean they still weren't completely happy but at least they understood why I wanted to cautious.

[Cracker]

Ive somehow luckily never encountered this problem of disabled users, but I do get people messaging me all the time to lower prices of customs Ive done for other people. Be sure to line out all your terms before agreeing to do someone's custom, say next time if you dont want to give out to disabled accounts (I wouldn't) at the time of ordering, this transaction is final and with any loss of account you arent responsible for reimbursement of previously ordered customs.
Its really not your responsibility to maintain their account and items.

[MandaMarie]

Ive somehow luckily never encountered this problem of disabled users, but I do get people messaging me all the time to lower prices of customs Ive done for other people. Be sure to line out all your terms before agreeing to do someone's custom, say next time if you dont want to give out to disabled accounts (I wouldn't) at the time of ordering, this transaction is final and with any loss of account you arent responsible for reimbursement of previously ordered customs.
Its really not your responsibility to maintain their account and items.

Well said Cracker. I do something like this, where I tell them the only way I can make any modifications or sales to any other accounts or people, that, their main account they ordered from has to be present. If someone loses that account, I have to find another way to deal with any redelivery to a new account for them. I don't have anything like that set up for people so the only option they have is to have the main account present. If someone loses that account, well then we could work out some deal with getting them what they want. But as for the first item they purchased, well, that is linked to their first account. It costs me extra to send these items, so these are things that need to be taken care of by the original person.

With the new daily spin, this creates an issue with display only items being handed out like candy. I am willing to work around that if someone else's items get handed out by IMVU to other random people, and getting them back into their rightful property. But again, original account must be present.

So if you ever order from me, know that your items I work on for you, belong only to the account I first send it to. Kinda all you can do to ensure the customs people order, are kept just that, custom to them.

(Edit) Roy, let me know what you decide as I do have a need for someone to make me a set of eyes. As for custom, well, I wouldn't mind them set for sale to everyone, but I have a unique type of eye I need to be done.

[LuvableVenus]

I am thinking about halting making customs due to many people abusing my trust. I may take recolors or something I would like to make, but only public.

One of my lastest issues is someone has an existing custom, and gets disabled and contacts me from an "alt" wanting their custom once more. I usually just charged them the fees of sending it over again, but I had one today come to me saying their account was disabled...so I charged them the usual and I sent them one of their customs..and realised the original account was NOT disabled.

(They may have got their account back or maybe I just sent a custom to another person..I think they said that was their alt before...I have to check with them oml, I don't want to deal with this while I am recovering)

I am thinking of maybe halting sending old customs to people that had their account disabled too...but that does seem a bit harsh.

I do not really like hiding customs since I do like to show my work...some of my customs I feel are my best work. (tho some I do not like but they do)

I have had a few people not pay for customs after. Their credits always seem to go away somehow. (I only do credits after for eyes....if they do not pay, they just go on public so no work wasted...for something bigger, I like some upfront as good faith)

So, for the tldr; Do you think I should take customs (I like making people happy). Do you take customs or not? And why?

This is your virtual/real business, therefore you run it as you deem fit, within the TOS of IMVU. There are a ton of content creators out there earning a living or partial living from their work that they have submitted in virtual catalogues regardless if it's a public or custom work. Even if their just working it for creds. It's a virtual business, as far as I am concerned, regardless. I don't think you are being harsh about halting sending old customs to customers who have had their accounts disabled. I completely agree with you about NOT sending them to them.

My opinion is if you have done a custom item for a customer, and their account becomes disabled. This is NOT your fault. So why should you have to re-send an item to them and loose out on something that you worked tirelessly at? Some might not agree with me here with what I am about to say. Though it's like this in the real world if you went out, for say example, and bought a dress. Then you moved house and left that dress at the last house. You CAN NOT walk back into the shop and demand for it to be given to you at a lower cost or say if you didn't go into the shop, though purchased it online, you can't expect to have the dress sent to you just for the cost of the shipping. It would be absolutely ludicrous to expect the shop to do that.

Comes down to whether or not YOU are prepared to sacrifice.

V

[Roy]

Ive somehow luckily never encountered this problem of disabled users, but I do get people messaging me all the time to lower prices of customs Ive done for other people. Be sure to line out all your terms before agreeing to do someone's custom, say next time if you dont want to give out to disabled accounts (I wouldn't) at the time of ordering, this transaction is final and with any loss of account you arent responsible for reimbursement of previously ordered customs.
Its really not your responsibility to maintain their account and items.

True, I never had those terms included before because I never encountered it before either...it sort of happened all at once. I thought the first was a fluke, but then I had like 3 in a row message me XD

I should probably write out a proper terms. Maybe make a shop on here to direct people to I like when it makes people happy.