Patreon Fee Changes

Is there another or better way that we can support your work? I'd love to find a way to support you directly as opposed to staying with this platform. This entire situation just makes me sick to the stomach.

I just received the second blandly condescending response from Patreon. So I just PayPal-ed you an amount = at least some of my pledge for 2018 would have been. So when I drop my pledge to you, know that I'm still supporting you. I'm still going to support all my creators; I'll use alternatives for those who present them, and grit my teeth and use Patreon for those who don't.

Hugh Eckert

I did "contact Patreon", as you suggested, and even got a response. Aside from the "here's how this is going to work" stuff (not really addressing my comment), the message included a link to a blog post that provides a more detailed explanation of the reasons: <a href="https://blog.patreon.com/updating-patreons-fee-structure/">https://blog.patreon.com/updating-patreons-fee-structure/</a>

Chris Abele

I'll miss the behind the scenes talk and everything, but what I most care about is getting you money without me being stiffed. I'm already severely pissed off about Patreon's treatment of adult content creators, so for me this is just the final straw. As such, I'll be shutting down as much of my pledges as I can, and possibly closing my account. That said, I don't want to hurt the artists, which is why I want to find other ways of financing all of them. So which service other than Patreon gets you the most cut? Paypal? Kofi?

Quacky

Agreed. I love Erica's work, but if this goes through, I'll be moving to Paypal or Kofi.

Quacky

Hiya Erika, Thank you very much for providing your PayPal donation link: <a href="https://www.paypal.me/ErikaMoen." rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://www.paypal.me/ErikaMoen.</a> If Patreon ultimately does make the icky fee changes, I plan to move use your PayPal link to continue to support your work. Seems that as long as your supporters both: (a) don’t tick the “Paying for goods or a service” box, and (b) use a checking account or PayPal balance (that is, not a credit card) ...there would be no fee associated with donations made through your PayPal link. Sad that this is such an unpleasant distraction for you and for your supporters. Glad that there are OJST comics to cheer us up! Hugs, Brillan (he/him)

brillan

I have currently six montly $1 pledges. As I live in Germany, with 19% VAT, after December 18 my monthly Patreon bill will amount to $ 9.85. Or rather, $ 0 in my case... :-(

Bernhard

I'm hoping more people would use <a href="https://liberapay.com/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://liberapay.com/</a> - it's a small platform coming from free software world, but it avoids the dodgy fees.

Kornel

I was shocked to see how much of my meager pledge will be going to Patreon instead of to you. I won't be using Patreon anymore but I will definitely sign up for your newsletter and buy comics/coffees instead. I don't like the thought that every $1/comic pledge racks up almost half its value in fees before trickling down to you.

fred

Even if it's not their plan it may end up being the result; one of the guys I used to pledge to is currently away and noticed something is up because there was a large drop in the number of patrons at the same time. Some people are going to see how it turns out after the first billing cycle after the changes come in - assuming they do - so it's possible there may be an avalanche of cancelled pledges in the new year.

Chris Crowther

I honestly think this is a sign that Patreon's owners are grabbing as much cash as possible before folding the company up and doing a runner. It's idiocy otherwise. We'd *all* better make other plans, because I doubt Patreon will be operating long into 2018.

Marc Pengryffyn

Honestly I'm OK with them making the transaction fees transparent to us as users, adding them on top of what we contribute to the creators we're patronizing. I'm less OK with the way they structured it. They should process a single fee for all of a patron's monthly contribs, and then distribute that to the creators. It's not like computers have trouble doing the math to sum things up appropriately.

Auros Harman

feh! I'm not a fan of this. I might switch to Paypal donations or...something. Definitely going to decrease my # of monthly donations, though, which is probably one of Patreon's goals.

Tania Darnton

Oooh, good idea. I've been trying to figure out what the hell to do.

Erica Lindquist

What I've done is, instead of pledging $1 per comic up to 5 times a month is pledging $5 per comic up to once per month (at the $1 pledge level). Should be the same amount per month, maybe more, but fewer transactions for them to charge fees on. Of course, if Erica decides to go elsewhere, I'll happily follow.

Liz and Karl

That would definitely be a good option.

Laurens

I've sent Patreon an irate (but polite) email about the changes. I'll continue to support you, but if they don't roll back the changes, I'd prefer to support you in some other way.

Hugh Eckert

Can you add options for per-month contributions? I'm happy to keep going, and per month will avoid the majority of the stupid for a lot of us. :D

Brian Haberer

I've submitted feedback to Patreon. This situation is so bad it's almost humorous for my unique pledge here. I've got 20+ $1/month pledges so I'm the classic worst case. The fun part is that when I signed up, Patreon didn't seem to have a minimum so I pledged 20 cents per creation of OJST to match the $1 I was giving the rest of the cool kids. I know it's not much, but wanted to show support. If nothing changes it's looking like I would be pledging 20 cents around 50 times per year and Erika would get $9.50. I would be paying 50 of these new transaction fees ($17.79) for a total of $27.79. I'll figure out some way to keep showing my support and appreciation, but it won't be what Patreon currently has planned.

John Ashcraft

People always have to find a way to ruin a damn good thing, am I right?

Lee-ann Dunton

I won't stop supporting the creators I currently support, but this truly is a bummer. People are giving money out of pocket to creators to help art get made, and now we have to pay the fees to do this as well? Luckily I know that I have enough money to cover the fees of the monthly pledges I make, but honestly I'd rather just up my pledges than have Patreon get that extra cash. And if they're charging per transaction, they *will* get extra cash. I'm sure there are plenty of folks out there that may *not* be able to justify these extra fees, and that truly sucks. I'm sorry you, and every other creator, are having to deal with this mess. But seriously, THANK YOU for sharing this info with us, along with links to those other articles... they were extremely helpful.

Lee-ann Dunton

If they really do a per comic transaction fee of $0.38, that tallies out to an additional $1.90 in a five-comic month..that's a 27% markup. As someone who has to limit my spending overall, this is like the kiss of death to my ability to support my favorite artists. I'd have to withdraw from at least a few creators. This is going to hurt so many artists :(

Leah Webber

It's disappointing, the entire purpose of a monthly pledge cycle is to avoid the transaction fees eating a huge portion of the cost. That's why a dollar or two is a feasible donation amount to support creators. I carry so many small pledges that my costs are going to go up around 20% and you'll see none of it. That's not acceptable.

Barmp

Small pledges are hit the worst. If you change to a monthly pledge, like Jeph Jacques , that would help.

Lars Josephsen

Just wanted to let you know that if you decide to stick with Patreon, I intend to stick around, too. If some other company was to have a Patreon-like solution that ends up being better *cough*Drip*cough*, I'll happily follow you (and everybody else I patreonize) over there.

Steven St Clair

Sent a message to patreon! Let’s hope they change this.

Rainy