They said they already paid me

they hadn’t

Jul 04, 2026

My hopeless collab

A couple of months ago, I was approached by a company whose name I will generously withhold (let’s call them Let’s-Not-Point-the-Finger Inc.) to create a video for my account.They work in message automation. You know the pitch: comments, replies, DMs, everything answered instantly, because speed is apparently the last remaining virtue.

We discussed the details. They agreed to everything. Everything, that is, except they deeply insisted I include one particular line in the video:

“It happened to all of us — you lose a customer because you replied too late.”

I was told, with great seriousness, that this was crucial. A cornerstone. A moral truth. Practically a proverb.

No problem, I said. I illustrated it. I filmed the video. I sent it.

Their first reaction? They loved it. “Super duper,” even. Just one tiny adjustment. I did it immediately. Efficiency is my love language.

A few hours later, they came back saying the team had discussed things and decided the video should be extended so their service could be shown in a more… expansive way. Fine. At that point, the woman coordinating this assured me that half of the agreed payment had already been sent to my bank account.

Reader, it had not.

I asked a few clarifying questions. Then they disappeared. A full week. No replies. No money. Radio silence.

So I did what any reasonable person would do: I interpreted their notes myself, remade the video, edited it again, and went on my winter vacation.

A week later, they reappeared, announcing they now wanted to see a script first.

Still no money.

I politely asked whether everything was okay with the payment they said they’d sent. That’s when I was informed — very calmly — that nothing had been sent at all, because the team hadn’t approved everything yet.

This was surprising, mostly because I had been explicitly told the opposite.

Nevertheless, vacation or not, I sent a new script immediately. The manager approved it, sent it to the team, and promised to get back to me “in a jiffy.”

A week passed.

Then they wrote to say they didn’t like the new scripts at all. This was interesting, because it was essentially the same script they loved initially, just modified according to their requests.

At this stage, they insisted:

the company name should be mentioned earlier,
more than once
include more details than originally planned

And with their endless tweaks they somehow managed to turn what was meant to be a collaborative, blogger‑style video into something that looked suspiciously like a

formal brand video.

I started feeling a little hesitation and discontent, but I tried to stay practical, so I assumed there would be some choices to make anyway. Here’s what they offered:

Use their service myself, get impressed, and create a new video based on the actual experience
Let them write the script, and I’d just film it.
Accept $100 for the time I’d already spent creating the video they currently possess.

It has now been over a month since this began.

I don’t particularly mind what happens to the video. I have options. What I do mind — or rather, what I can’t help but admire — is the irony.

This is a company built entirely around the idea that you lose customers when you reply too late, while their own replies arrive weekly, if at all, and their promises move at a glacial pace.

Which brings us to the moral, because there is always one, even when no one asked for it:

Technology doesn’t fix bad communication.

Automation doesn’t replace respect.

And no amount of instant replies will save you if you forget that real people are waiting on the other side.

Sometimes, the message answers itself.