Is it typical for authors to request a subscription in lieu of payment from the magazine that will be publishing the author's work (assuming the payment amount is close to the subscription amount)? Or would this be viewed by an editor as something that creates more hassle?
Requesting subscription in lieu of payment?
- Thread starter Smirkin
- Start date
I've actually done this on several occasions, and no editor has had a problem with it. Why should they? It saves the publisher money, and gets one more magazine into circulation. It's cheaper than sending you the money, and then having you send the money back to them for a subscription.
But I will say nearly all the magazines I've sold to paid a lot more than the price of a subscription. Still, it seems to me that the smaller the magazine, the happier they would be if you took a subscription, rather than money. Cash is always in short supply at small magazines, which is why many of them actually pay with subscriptions.
But I will say nearly all the magazines I've sold to paid a lot more than the price of a subscription. Still, it seems to me that the smaller the magazine, the happier they would be if you took a subscription, rather than money. Cash is always in short supply at small magazines, which is why many of them actually pay with subscriptions.
It's not necessarily a pain. I've done it several times and it's all worked very well. I've only asked when the payment due to me was about half the cost of an annual subscription. If the payment was the same as a year's subscription I'd take the money.
I've done that in the past with non-UK mags when the cost of processsing the check was likely to be a large percentage of the fee. Paypal makes things a lot easier.
I've done it once. The payment was a token amount, not consequential, the mag was an e-zine, and I figured it would be a good way to support the fledgling enterprise, whose editor had requested my story after reading it here in SYW. It was also based in a nation halfway around the world, and the token payment would have required currency conversion; just didn't seem worth it.
The editor kindly agreed.
The e-zine folded immediately after the issue in which the story appeared. I don't know if it's still available or not.
Is this a form of success? Having little experience with that, I'm not good at recognizing it.
caw
The editor kindly agreed.
The e-zine folded immediately after the issue in which the story appeared. I don't know if it's still available or not.
Is this a form of success? Having little experience with that, I'm not good at recognizing it.
caw