I had a cuddler collect money before meeting and I had already hung out with them numerous times now she ghosted me wnd took my money.
No recourse. It's on you to use a payment method like PayPal where you can file a dispute. Chalk it up as a learning experience, report cuddler to mods, leave karma and move on
Caveat emptor..
@LookNforcuddles I see you have reported her, which is good. CC can only ban her, since she is an independent contractor. We don't have any legal way of forcing her to refund you. Banning is all we can do as long as there is enough evidence.
I REPORT IT TO cc so they can block the person from using the site again.
Perhaps it was a family emergency? If it was done on purpose, through no fault of your own, I'm very sorry that happened. Women have to worry about being lulled into a false sense of safety by men who premeditate these things and build up good Karma to prove their platonic intentions, while men have to watch out for the same method, applied financially.
I am curious how she ghosted you, when payment is supposed to be made upon arrival at the start of a session, not "before". If you sent her money without being in the cuddle space with her already, that is definitely something to avoid. (Unless putting down a deposit for a new cuddler, a requirement of some Pro's...which some clients choose to avoid altogether by booking with someone who doesn't require it.)
It is also always useful practice to ask yourself if there is any reason she would have to not feel safe with you. If for some reason that were the case, she still handled it wrong. But it never hurts to look inward and ask if we could have contributed to a situation.
If you already left Karma for her, you can go back now and edit it. If the Edit button does not appear, you can ask a mod to help you.
~ Sunset Snuggles
Whack 'em with your broom.
@LookNforcuddles Same thing happened to me early on in my CC journey. I have never done deposits since then. Read @BlueIris’s post. She speaks the truth. There is absolutely nothing they can do.
I don't really think the takeaway from someone being scammed should be that deposits themselves are the problem. There is risk on both sides of meeting a stranger, and deposits are one of the ways professionals protect themselves from taking on financial loss before an appointment even begins.
A professional may need to arrange childcare, pay for transportation, travel a significant distance, reserve a hotel, or turn down another appointment in order to hold that time. Expecting them to take on all of those costs while the client has nothing invested in actually showing up isn't necessarily reasonable either.
Of course, clients should do their due diligence before sending money. Look at the person's profile history, Karma and reviews, communicate clearly, and make sure the deposit and cancellation terms are agreed upon beforehand. If someone does behave dishonestly, Karma also provides a way to document that experience for future members — blocking someone doesn't simply erase their ability to leave Karma.
Nobody has to be comfortable paying a deposit, just like no professional has to be comfortable accepting an appointment without one. If a client's boundary is “I don't send deposits” and a pro's boundary is “I don't reserve my time without one,” then they're probably just not a good match. 🤷♀️
But I don't think asking professionals to absorb all of the financial and logistical risk is the solution to protecting clients from scammers.
There are deposits and scams surrounding many things in the world. Honestly, if you can't afford a deposit, with a small chance of losing it, then you can't afford the service either, and you'd be better off investing the money.
I was confused for a moment
The issue here is that the OP said he had “hung out” with the Pro “numerous times”, suggesting he was a regular. Which means he trusted the pro with his money the final time they had planned to meet.
What I don’t get is why the pro didn’t trust him and asked for a deposit if he’s a regular. If the deposit was a rule for all clients regardless of whether regular or not, the risk is in the client’s hands, knowing that there is a chance the pro could take your money and never show.
So far I haven’t had that happen, but I did have one Pro go thru my medicine cabinet in my bathroom and stole a bunch of pain pills I had left over from a broken leg. I didn’t notice for several days and by the she deleted her account.
It's those pesky curlers at it again. I would report them to International Olympic Committee
See that sucks, because it makes it harder to get deposits from first time clients. I’ve had soooo many men set up something, then cancel last minute, and I rely on the income I’m expecting to make. It’s bad business to do something like that, and I hope it’s an exception. Because I absolutely want to be honest and forthright in business matters. I’m sorry that happened to you, for many reasons.
@VibeSeeker
🤣🤣🤣 I came here to say the same thing.
@VibeSeeker and here I was thinking this kind
Honestly, if you can't afford a deposit, with a small chance of losing it, then you can't afford the service either, and you'd be better off investing the money.
@jdev25 Honestly you are wrong. It’s not that I can’t afford it, it’s that I hate being taken advantage of by a crook. I had it happen twice. After that, if I see a deposit requirement, I move on because there is always an honest pro willing to operate ethically. Quite frankly, the number of pros asking for a deposit is small, so it’s not exactly contracting the number of options I have.
@TheFunCartel Not wanting to be taken advantage of is something entirely different from being able to afford it happening. I didn't say anything of the sort about what you're speaking of. My comment stands as I made it, not how you adjusted it to be.
@TheFunCartel Are we really saying that pros asking for a deposit are unethical now?
@AngelNextDoor Did I say that? I am saying that the two times I paid a deposit I was ripped off. That’s unethical. I was saying most pros are ethical. I am just not going to pay a deposit. I never said pros requesting a deposit are unethical.
@jdev25 You seemed to be making a sweeping generalization of people who won’t pay a deposit are simply broke and that is far from the case. Most of us, like anyone who gets robbed, simply don’t appreciate being a victim of crime. But the first sentence of your post before making the generalization was this:
There are deposits and scams surrounding many things in the world.
Then you made your statement, which characterizes someone who gets upset about losing the money as someone who shouldn’t be hiring a pro. First off, it’s victim blaming. Kind of like blaming someone who is out late at night and is a victim of any crime and someone says “Well you shouldn’t be out that late.” Someone’s economics has nothing to do with being the victim of a crime. And if someone was poor but touch starved and lonely, but they saved up their money for a few moments of tenderness, you are really going to say that to them because they were a victim of a predatory crime?
Go ahead if you are standing behind that statement. I am never judging anyone who is a victim of a crime. I am only going to blame the perpetrator of the crime.
@TheFunCartel No, i never said anything about anyone getting upset about losing the money. I did not make a sweeping generalization. I did not say anything about people being broke. I don't know why you're adding these things to my statement. I didn't even talk about anyone being a victim of losing the deposit, nor did I say anything about anyone who won't pay a deposit. Please, just read what I said for what it said, nothing more. There's no need to bring all this extra stuff that I never said into it.
You begin by making a statement mentioning deposits and scams. Scams where a deposit is lost is the implication. You then say if you can’t afford to lose a deposit then you can’t afford the service. It is a statement that implies if you can’t afford to be ripped off you shouldn’t be hiring a pro. That’s victim blaming. I can read and I quoted what you said. You say you didn’t talk about anyone being a victim of losing the deposit, then you need to rephrase the part about “with a small chance of losing it (deposit)”. Because within the context of the thread where we are discussing the OP losing his deposit to someone who stole it, the implication is you are talking about someone who has their deposit stolen. Context matters.
@TheFunCartel No, it does NOT at ALL imply that. That is YOU choosing to fill in things as YOU see fit. I don't need to rephrase anything. You need to stop adding to it. You seem to be filling in blanks based off of your own context, life experience, or whatever else. I'm asking you to please stick to the words I wrote, and not seek to attach further meaning to them.
@jdev25 You definitely do not understand the context of a discussion. The context of the thread does provide meaning to your words no matter how many words you type in caps out of anger. That’s all I am going to say.
@TheFunCartel See, you're not even understanding my caps. You think I'm angry. I'm not even remotely angry. And you're telling me I don't understand context? You very obviously don't, because you just assume that every time you interpret something, your way is automatically the right way, and woah let me tell you it most certainly is not.
I say that every time? People who are angered are often inclined to hyperbole so again, I do not debate with emotionally charged individuals because they only want to be told they are right and I am not going to be your rhetorical wet nurse.
I choose to disagree with your statement no matter how much you stamp your feet. It is my prerogative.
@TheFunCartel Yeah, I'm sure you don't do it every time. It wasn't an intentional usage of hyperbole. You're too fixated on the anger thing, and I feel that's fairly disingenuous. I honestly think that after you have brough it up this many times now, that I'm justified in suggesting that you may be projecting your own feelings onto my text. I am honestly quite jovial over here, and I am very far from being angry lol.
Hmmm, I am not the one using all caps. So if you are not shouting or angry, are you using a tertiary meaning of caps?
I use caps primarily for emphasis and for the pacing of text. There's no vocal element here, so it adds a bit of inflection and emphasis.
Anyway, to go back to my original comment, which was just me stating that if someone can't afford a deposit with a small chance of losing it, then they can't afford the service to begin with. That's just math. Nothing against poor people. No blame against anyone who has fallen victim to losing a deposit. Just math. Let's break it down. If a pro is charging $100, and they require a 20% deposit, that's $20. Now, I don't think people getting scammed out of deposits is THAT common. Let's be generous and say it happens 1 out of 10 times. That means your expected cost per session is moved up to $102 per session instead of $100. So yeah, if you can't afford $102, then you can't really afford $100 either, and that was my point.