Man. I'm getting screwed.

[Veronica Hdz]

I worked as a freelance Creative Director for a company a little over 2 months totaling approx. 175 hours. I was to be paid per event (either 10%-15%) but as events went by many of them got canceled or I was not informed of the outcome. I did all work for events. I created all of the fliers, collateral, print pieces and promotion material for each and every event given. The fact that they could not follow through on events is not the Creative Directors' responsibility. As a Creative Director I did my job, which did not only include "per event" projects. I also designed the landing page for the web site, business cards, letter heads, MySpace profile and other collateral for the magazine itself.
Since I had not been paid by any event (for whatever reason) I finally had to resign. I sent the invoice fixed at an hourly rate for a Creative Director and multiplied it by the hours I spent working for them. The invoice outlines all of my work, down to the minute including descriptions and other detailed information. I gave them 7 business days to respond (as I am willing to negotiate) or to send payment and Tuesday June 9th marks the final day of the grace period.
Here's the problem: no one signed any agreements. Some may suggest a verbal agreement is enough. But what can I do at this point to get some kind of compensation? Any suggestions?

other links where i've posted this: yahoo answers and helpmesue

[Veronica Hdz]

The Immortal Group. That's who it is.

[Katrina Neufeld]

I came across this article on AIGA's website and thought about you: The State of our Contracts.

[Floyd Sanchez]

Who is it?

[Katrina Neufeld]

This is so sad. Another illustration of the importance of contracts in business.

[Layne Lev]

Yeah, small claims may be your best option if you want to try to recover the full amount, especially if you have a detailed accounting of the work performed. Otherwise, you could send it to a collection agency.

Care to share the name of the company?

[Jorge Castillo]

You can take them to small claims. In lieu of signed contracts. Verbal is just as good in small claims, make sure you take any emails to the client, any responses, receipts (for business cards, flyers, etc... and anything else that shows that the client requested your service and accepted your service. That should be good enough for the judge.

The only problem in all of this... though the judge may grant you award, it doesn't necessarily mean the client will ever pay! Then you have to go into hiring a collection company, and if the amount is not enough, then it just may be a waste of time. But judging by the amount of work you did, you should well be in the $4k - $8k dollar amounts.

Lesson to be learned in all of this? Request they sign a contract and get at least 50% down prior to any work.

Good luck.