This morning, I read this blog post from food writer, Lizzie Mabbot.
Go on, go read that and come back here, I’ll wait.
Finished? Good.
As both readers of this blog will know (hi mom), I, like Lizzie, have written for Mark Garner in the past and as some of you who know me personally, i.e. the poor souls who exist within my tortured little whinge-sphere, Manchester Confidential were late in paying me as well. Very late.
I’d written an article on Labour’s failed ID card scheme and after numerous, polite, attempts at extracting payment from ManCon, I sent this email to their accounts department, cc’ing the big guy himself:
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Hi X,
Have I done something to piss you Manchester Confidential folks off? Was it the dissing of one of Mark’s food photos on Twitter? Maybe you don’t like my tie.
Your refusal to pay me has to be a personal thing. It can’t be standard practice for ManCon to take over 6 months to pay a contributor. I’ve written for many publications in the UK, most (who are we kidding, ALL) are much smaller than ManCon, and I have never had to wait this long.
I know what you owe me is a pittance and a low priority, but I’m a stubborn bastard and I won’t go away. If you think I won’t pursue this because it’s such a small amount, think again. I will sue on principle, it’s what we colonials do. Although, I will probably write a couple more nasty emails (and maybe even a letter on PAPER) before I go that far. I am also half British, you see.
If I’ve hurt someone’s feelings over there, kicked someone’s dog, pissed in someone’s Shreddies then please accept my apology. Accept a hundred of them.
Just pay me.
Yours,
Rob Cutforth
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Now, I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, “Holy crap, Rob, you sound like a whiny little asshole like Lizzie”. And you’d be half-right, especially if you read that letter without irony. Mark Garner didn’t read it without irony, He gets irony. He likes a bit of spiky humour; anyone who has ever read anything he’s ever published will know this.
You’re probably also thinking “Six months without getting paid?! Jesus, I thought this post was supposed to be in support of Mark Garner” and you’d be half-right again. Six months is an unacceptable amount of time to go without getting paid for an article, especially when you factor in the fact that I had to acquire one of those fucking Labour Big Brother ID cards in the process.
What you don’t know about the above response is that this bit, while true, is a tad misleading: “I’ve written for many publications in the UK … and I have never had to wait this long.” I have indeed written for quite a few publications in this country, some of which have enormous readerships and yes, while it is true I have never had to wait six months for payment, the reason is not as obvious as it might appear.
The fact is, the sum total I’ve been offered for the dozens of articles I’ve had published in magazines, newspapers and websites in this country is a big, fat, zero. Bupkiss. Nada, nothing, zip, zilch.
I’m not excusing these publications for not paying their writers, but I know for a fact that paying writers is something many independent publishers who aren’t lucky enough to receive lottery money can afford to do. Every single issue that goes to print is a struggle and many publications operate at a loss. I have since made a conscious decision to stop wasting my time writing for free (except for my LeftLion column), which is why you no longer see published articles on this, or my other blogs anymore.
It is entirely possible that my writing is worthless and Lizzie should be paid in gold bullion, lord knows a quick comparison of the number of comments Lizzie gets on her blog and at the comments I get will tell you that there is little to compare between the two of us. Lizzie probably isn’t a massive celebrity in Nottingham like I am (irony), but still, it has to be said, she is obviously much better at this business than I am. I hope she gets more paid work, I really do, but I can tell you right now that if I were a small publisher reading her post whinging about a payment that was a mere 10 days late, I would be asking her to shove things where the sun doesn’t shine as well. Ok, well, perhaps I wouldn’t go that far.
Oh yeah, and if you want proof that Mark Garner responds better to irony than moaning and browbeating, here is his response to my email (the spelling mistakes have been corrected):
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X,
Please confirm that we owe Mr Cutforth this money.
Mr Cutforth, to short circuit the whole thing, send me a copy invoice with your bank details and I will make a payment tomorrow.
I am unsure as to whether I should apologise, we may well be able to get another of your emails which made me smile, in the nicest possible way…
Mark Garner
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The first cheque I ever received for writing in the UK followed shortly thereafter.
Hi Rob
I wasn’t asking to be paid for my writing; that was never the agreement. The agreement was for me to write reviews on the meals, pay the bill, and then be reimbursed the cost of the meal. That’s all I was after.
Thanks,
Whiny Little Asshole
Hi Rob
A very even-handed post, and clearly you’ve been able to deal with Mr. Gordo better than either of us. But two points:
1. Lizzie had been waiting two months (and then some), not two days. In fact we both have, and I’ve STILL not been paid.
2. We are not waiting for freelance paid writing invoices, we are waiting for reimbursement of meals that we have written about for free for London Confidential. In fact, because they’ve been so late and the debt has sat on our credit cards, we have in effect paid to write for THEM.
3. Lizzie was at best, as you and she say “a whiny little asshole”, although in the context of what had happened, quite justifiably so in my opinion. What she wasn’t was aggressive, abusive or nasty, which Mark Garner was.
In short, just because you happen to be one of perhaps one or two people in the world Mark Garner has actually (eventually) paid to write for him, doesn’t mean you can justify his hideous behaviour towards anyone else.
Chris
I did of course mean ‘three points’… maths has never been my strongest suit.
And I also meant Lizzie was whiny “at worst”, not best! Blame the wine I had for lunch.
You both make good points.
Just a quick thing:
You say that the payment was two months late, but the first line of Lizzie’s article says: “Finally, I have been paid, a full 10 days after it should have been”. That’s a bit confusing. I read that as she was paid 10 days late. :shrug:
I am certainly not excusing his behaviour, in a perfect world, we’d all get paid on time. Also, his “shove it up your arse” comment was well offside. Hence the “(sorta)” in my title.
I suppose you could say my “asshole” comment was below the belt as well, but hey, I’m not a publisher, I run a tiny little blog that no one reads. Plus I’m just naturally sweary. Blame my hick upbringing.
Two months without getting paid is (I hate to say it) not a long time when you are contracting. Certainly not in my experience, shit, try getting money out of an ad agency. Like pulling teeth from a stone!
My point is that I felt Lizzie was a bit off the mark whinging about being paid 10 days late and that small publishers who pay anything at all need to be cut a bit of slack when the vast majority of them pay fuck all.
(Again, sorry for the swearing, I can’t help it. Really.) 🙂
Hi Rob
Cheers for the reply. In the 2nd paragraph Lizzie starts “I went two months without payment which was rightfully due to me;” – I guess one of the problems here is that this is an email which is the latest in a trail that has gone backwards and forwards for quite a while beforehand and the backstory isn’t immediately obvious.
And yes even two months without getting paid is not a long time when you are contracting, but we weren’t contracting, all we wanted was to not lose anything on credit card interest for the meals we’d written about for them for free. And in the end, we both did.
Take your point on ad agencies haha.
I think Lizzie is due credit for publishing just her latest email in full, unedited, and not making any apologies for it. She was annoyed, rightly so, but she was never abusive.
Chris
P.S. Fuck me, don’t worry about swearing, Christ.
Ok, so perhaps I was impatient, Rob; but being told repeatedly that I had been paid when I wasn’t, riled me. Had they said “sorry, we’re having cashflow problems, you’ll be paid at x date” rather than “payment was made today” when it wasn’t, is the problem here.
Out of interest how many meals did the 600 quid cover? Seems like some very expensive meals…
I used to work in the same building as ManCon. They were not a very nice bunch IMHO. Which is, of course, just MHO. I have no relationship with them, this was just day to day observation.
ManCon have a right cheek to not pay up on expenses for so long; it’s taking advantage of writers trying to break into the field. All he had to do was apologise for being crap & pay up. Instead he’s gone a bit viral because people have picked up on the pompous tone of his reply.
“Difficult few weeks” is not Lizzie’s problem either. Personally I would have insisted they pay the interest.
How dare she expect to be paid as promised. HOW DARE SHE!!!