Reversed royalties?

Tomi Haaparanta

I went to my royalties page on MyFonts, and noticed that there had been a fraudulent purchase of my font, and I'm been charged for that, even though I have no control over what happens in MyFonts:

It's only $17.50, but it could have been thousands of dollars. Anyone else have had this kind of thing happening to them?

Ramiro Espinoza

It happens from time to time.

Tomi Haaparanta

Okay, bu why should I be paying for a mistake they made, and I have no control over?

Theunis de Jong

I don't think that's what they mean with this. The font was apparently bought with a bad credit card. You have to reimburse your 50% commission, just as MyFonts has to do with their part – the full $35.00, not only your $17.50. Those nickles and dimes do not end up in MyFont's pockets.

Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian

It's quite touching to see such a fraudulent purchase though!

Oliver Weiss (Walden Font Co.)

I'm not selling through myfonts, but I usually get one or two of these chargebacks per year. This year had a few more, as I mentioned my website in a popular reddit post and got a good number of people purchasing with stolen cards. It's all part of doing business. 

Thomas Phinney

Just to be clear about what happened here:

1. MyFonts took a sale that was supposed to be for $35 on a credit card.
2. MyFonts previously paid you (Tomi) $17.50 for your share of the original sale.
3. The $35 charge was reversed by the credit card company, because it was fraudulent. They actually charged MyFonts even more, $37.89.
4. So, MyFonts is asking/telling you to re-pay what they paid you, the $17.50 part of the charge-back they are getting from the credit card company. I assume this is just a line on a royalty statement, so they are still paying you something in the end. It still sucks, of course.

That said, this is a totally normal thing and a reasonable way for the reseller to handle it. IF they really get paid, they pay you your cut. But they don’t want to be responsible for paying you your share in a case like this. It is the equivalent of MyFonts telling you that you get a share of actual money, but they don’t have to pay you if the customer steals the font, instead of paying them.

(Yes, as these are digital goods it is not exactly theft. Fraud, perhaps.)

Dave Rowland

I get one of these probably every few months. You've done well for this to be your first time! Here's a recent one of mine - if only there was some way of telling it probably wasn't a legit order...