Photographer Contracts

Has anyone negotiated photographer contracts where the final payment is not made until the final copies of the pictures are received (rather than providing full payment by the day of the wedding)?

It seems this is more common practice in the US but it makes more sense to me 1) to ensure final/timely delivery of your pictures and 2) to see the quality of the work beforehand so you can assess how much (if any) tip to provide.

What do people think?

I would ask that the final payment be made when the photos are available for viewing (usually through an online proofing gallery). That way you know that the pictures are finished and just need to be sent and the photographer knows that they won't have a case of "dine & dash".

Yeah, I don't really see this working too too well. I'm no photographer but I feel like brides would find something wrong with the pictures and then try to get out of paying a full amount. You can get the delivery time in the contract to ensure timely delivery if that something you're worried about and I would just do good research to ensure the quality...talk to past clients, see portfolio, blog, etc.

Also, we tipped at the wedding because we recognized they worked hard but if the work if above what you expected after delivery then maybe you could tip more??

Hmm, yes I could see your point about brides being cheap/overly picky. Especially with a destination wedding, photographers have more limited recourse to collect their payments.

Ok I will consider this when we finally negotiate w/ our photographer!

Maybe you can PM one of the photographers on this site and ask them about this. Or perhaps one will see this thread and come give their input

Our photographer requested the final payment the day of the wedding. And everyone have have requested quotes from said the same thing. If a couple didn't pay then the photographer would be screwed because of the distance and so it is a regular thing for DW from what I gather.

Yeah, ours wants final payment on the day of the wedding also

From a photographer's POV, I ask for all fees to be paid prior to travel. I usually request a deposit to pay for the airfair/hotel deposit and the remaining balance is due at the time when my travel agent requests finial payment. I do this because (as someone previously mentioned) that I travel from the states to the DW, so a lot of time is already invested prior to the wedding, (IE travel) I also have it clearly written out in the contract how long it will take to edit photos.

I think the main issue you will run into with asking your photographer to pay after you see the photos, is that the photographer puts in several hours (sometimes several weeks) of editing into your photos at the risk of not receiving final payment. Not saying you would do that, but I have heard from many photographers where they work with the B&G and this happened. Which is the reason why it's usually always paid prior to departure.

Long time ago I used to ask for payment on the day the images are delivered. Now I ask for final payment 2 weeks prior to the wedding.

I only work with select number of couples per year and they all trust me to provide the absolute best photos possible. Never had an issue.

I changed the policy because a number of times when the images were ready, sometimes it would take an extra month to get paid(too busy,honeymoon,not enough funds,etc).

There are a ton of scammers out there so do your research before making your selection. Just last year alone I've caught 15 local photographers using some of my images in their own website. I can only imagine there are many more.