Why is my designer payment delayed or being held?

Payments to designers may be due the the following reasons:

No source files have been provided by the designer. Payment will only be released when source files are provided.

Forbidden stock usage on the winning submission. Our Quality Team will need to investigate these reports before we are satisfied.

One or more copyright reports have been made about the winning design. Our Quality Team will need to investigate these reports before we are satisfied.

Use of generic design on the winning submission. See FAQ: How to avoid using generic design concepts.

Chargeback initiated on the project payment. This may be related to the unauthorized use of the credit card for the purchase and our Accounts Team is investigating to determine the legitimacy of the project. This may take some time to investigate and resolve.

Client selected the wrong design. Our Designer Service Team will contact both designer and customer to resolve the case.

Unfinished project. Should there be any pending changes requested by the customer on a project, payment will be held until these changes are completed.

Client requested a refund. Our customer service team will mediate the situation to understand and resolve it in a fair manner.

Other issues including Infringement Cases, Fraud and Chargeback. We only release payments once any issues have been resolved. There is no standard period for resolving these issues and the duration of delay may vary depending on the issue. Resolving these issues could take a minimum of 5 days to a few weeks. Cases like chargeback and possible fraud may require a longer period.

We typically communicate with designers via email and phone regarding payment delays.

The time frame for resolving each situation varies from case to case, but designers can rest assure that our team is moving as fast as possible to sort these out.