beware of art commission clients fraud
Greetings
I just want to share my bad experience about accepting art commissions on tiktok. Beware guys.
My heart fluttered as soon as I opened the message button on tiktok. You guys know what I saw? A lot of message requests asking for a commission.
I felt excited and nervous at the same time because that was my first time to have more than one consecutive clients whom are interested in my artwork.
Without even giving a thought I immediately replied and told them I am open for a commission and asked them to send their photo references so I can tell them about the pricing.
Most of them commissioned for their daughter/ son's photo. That made me doubt a little, wondering why they almost have the same format of asking commission and they have the same terms.
One of them told me they're willing to pay me 300 dollars that's when I was shocked after converting it into Philippine peso.
It is my first time to encounter a client from another country and I have it in my thoughts that their economy might be good and most people might had higher wages and they are able to give higher payments but this one is suspicious because 300 dollars is 17k in Philippine peso. My usual price for my art style is only 200-300 PHP per head.
But I wanted to know, I still replied though. I played along but still making sure I am alert and wary about it. We're just going to see and be familiar about their tactics.
The other one seemed fine but my only doubt is that he asked to move on WhatsApp. I have a scam history on WhatsApp.
His payment seem fair so I gave it a try. He insisted to pay already so I started painting the portrait. He asked to pay on skrill so I made an account on skrill. He asked my gmail account registered on skrill and I gave him my username. Until a fake skrill email showed in my spam messages saying they encountered a little problem crediting my account, that's when I saw his username was different from the original skrill that messaged my account verification.
At first I got excited to begin😩
I stopped texting them, I stopped the transaction immediately, I stopped painting their photo. That time I am traumatized. I am so conscious now and I can't accept the rest commissions from another country because I'm doubting they are all the same fraud.
These are my warnings as a concerned digital artist doing commissions⚠️
• Beware if they ask you to move on WhatsApp for better communication.
• Beware if they keep insisting to pay in advance even if you haven't started painting yet.
• Beware of the skrill fraud from skrill imposter on your email. If you created an account on skrill for payment transactions, don't believe the spam message on your email that says 'you need to expand your account' or 'we will credit your skrill account...'
• Beware accepting commissions from other countries on tiktok. It is not safe.
Create your Terms Of Service before accepting a commission🖤