by Rachel Smith
04 March 2015
I have a little issue I hope you can help with. Last May I wrote an article for a lifestyle magazine and was told by the editor it would be published but not for 6-7 months. When the article didn’t appear I asked would it be published in the next issue and received no reply. I then pitched it elsewhere and was successful. But to be ethical I asked the lifestyle magazine to withdraw it. They did a copy and paste of an early email and said they had never confirmed it so basically what was I on about. There’s more, but that’s the gist of it and my question is, don’t editors abide by a code of conduct? Because she accepted the work and now denies it. During that time that it was on hold I could have earned money from it being published elsewhere. I thought once an article is accepted with a date given aren’t they obliged to publish? Not Happy
If you have an email trail of correspondence confirming they had accepted the piece, then you’re entitled to payment, but they’re not obliged to publish. I’ve known a couple of editors who were well-known in the industry to commission willy-nilly, have piles of copy in their coffers but pieces would often not see the light of day. It’s disappointing when you’ve done all that work on a piece to not see it in print or be able to use it for your portfolio, but if you get paid for it – well, you learn to let it go. That’s part of life as a freelancer.
What can also happen is an editor agrees to take a piece but doesn’t want to run it for some reason. They might feel the piece is poor quality, they might not like how you tackled the subject, the mag might have gone in a new direction and the piece no longer fits or maybe the editor just doesn’t want it anymore. In such cases you might be asked to rewrite the piece (or do multiple re-writes) until the editor is satisfied – and it’s within your best interests to do this, annoying as it is, to get paid the fee you deserve. In other cases, you might be offered a kill fee – a percentage of the agreed fee (which can be as high as 50 percent but is usually more like 20 percent), which essentially means they get the copy, probably won’t use it, and you can’t re-sell it. Kill fees can also apply mid-piece when you’ve already started working on something and the editor ‘kills’ it, for whatever reason.
I’ve had a piece killed because a rival mag ran something similar prior to my piece coming out – not my fault, but I was lucky to negotiate for the full fee. I’ve also been in a situation where I wrote and filed a piece that had been commissioned, and it was liked by one editor but killed by another. In that case I didn’t get a kill fee even though I asked several times for one. It was tricky because I had a number of pieces in the works for the editor and more were being commissioned all the time. In the end I let it go – they were a huge client and I couldn’t afford to lose them – but it still irks me!
In your case, you opted to pull the piece yourself from one mag and sell it to another so your costs were covered (eventually) and you were no longer owed any payment from the first mag. But I understand your frustration that the editor chose to sit on the piece for so long then not publish and not communicate to you about it. This is why it’s important to have a contract (which may mention kill fees but with vague conditions – not helpful!) or at least lay out the terms of the commission clearly in email so you cover your butt. You should also invoice as soon as or soon after you file copy and chase it with the accounts department so you get paid for your piece – even if they drag their feet on publishing it.
Ever been in a situation like this or had to fight for a kill fee? Or have you written pieces that have never been published? We’d love to hear your story in the comments.
Hi Rachel,
This is such an interesting topic. I didn’t realise you couldn’t sell an article elsewhere if you had accepted a kill fee. Is that true? I had my first kill fee recently and I received about 30% of the agreed commission. I was hoping to pitch it elsewhere as I think it has potential. Can I do this or…..???
Thanks!
Hi Michaela,
Yep, kill fees are a minefield! It’s always been my understanding that if you received a kill fee for a piece the mag then owned that copy, even if they decided not to ever run it. But I just talked to Leo (who’s worked as an editor on several titles) and I stand corrected. She feels if you have a good relationship with an editor, it’s at his or her discretion as to whether you can take the kill fee (no matter what it is) and on-sell the piece. It’s something you should definitely try to negotiate if you feel the piece has legs and would be suited to another title. Just be savvy about it – ie, if Woman’s Day gave you a kill fee for a piece and then you went off and sold the piece to New Idea, that might be awkward for getting future work at WD, if you know what I mean. You’d be better off going to a monthly health mag or a title that’s not in direct competition.
Hope that helps!
Cheers
Rachel
PS. Another editor I know just told me kill fees are a grey area and depend on whether the mag came to you with a story or you pitched them. For eg, if you were sent to interview a celeb and they then killed the story, you couldn’t write it up and on-sell it to anyone else. But if you pitched them a lifestyle piece, wrote it up and they killed it, you could probably negotiate on-selling it.
Hi Rachel,
I’ve had to deal with similar situations from the editor’s chair, the incoming editor’s in-tray and the freelancer side, and it does boil down to the initial agreement made between both parties.
I’ve had freelancers try and ‘muscle up’ to claim full payment for pieces not good enough for print (commissioned by a previous editor, I might add!), and others who, when offered a choice of a kill fee for a poor story and a chance to do more work or a full payment and no more work, took the latter option.
Re the interview example, as a freelancer I hold the view that if I’ve done the work, I’m going to try and get an earn for it. I’m not sure why an editor thinks he/she could enforce such a condition, given that you (most likely) covered the expenses to get to the interview and it’s content you created on your time. If he/she doesn’t want it… next!
I should’ve included something about new editors taking over and not wanting pieces commissioned before their time – that crops up a fair bit.
The interview thing is a hard one. I know I’d be itching to shop it around if the initial mag killed the story and I had wicked quotes etc. But having worked on entertainment mags for years I know doing so would be the quickest way to burn your bridges 😀
Hardly seems fair though, does it, if they don’t want it!?
Very useful, thanks Rachel and Leo. In my case, I pitched the idea and delivered according to my commissioned pitch. The editor changed during that time and after asking me to rework it, decided it wasn’t working. I feel it has legs elsewhere and my intention was to re-pitch to a non-competitor. Do I need to clear it first or perhaps a courtesy email if it gets picked up elsewhere?
I guess if you want to still pitch to the new editor of the mag, it’s good practice to let them know. I would drop them a line saying you’re sorry it didn’t work out with the story this time and you hope you can work with them in the future. Then mention that you’d love the story you wrote to get a run elsewhere and you wanted to touch base to check they didn’t have any objections to you shopping it around to a couple of non-competitor titles. I really doubt they’d say no if they’re not interested in it.
You could also add a couple of new pitches at the bottom of your email – so you might land some new stories at the same time with any luck 🙂
Another useful piece Rachel. One thing no one has mentioned is that lead time of 6-7 months. Maybe it’s usual with some magazines but if an editor said to me six or seven months and I thought the piece had legs, I’d say thanks but no thanks, I’ll take it somewhere else. Cash flow is hard enough to manage these days with more and more publishers pushing payment terms out as far as they can get away with.
Fortunately for me, the only time I’ve ever had an issue with a piece being put off into the never-never was once when a newbie editor overcommissioned for a relaunch issue of an established title but the discussion on kill fees has been very illuminating.
It has hasn’t it Darren – I’ve certainly learned a few things too! 🙂
Good point re lead times. I agree that would give me pause as well, but that said, a lot of articles I write take months to see the light of day, even on monthlies – simply because the editorial calendar is planned so far in advance. I get paid soon after I file though which is all I really care about! It’s the mags that pay on publication and are quarterlies (I think we’ve written about this before) that can wreck havoc on your cash flow.
I recently had an editor “cancel” a commission because the publication had changed hands and she was leaving. I had done significant research before pitching but hadn’t done much more work since receiving the commission.
I let it go, and as I do want to see it published elsewhere (though it’s a pretty niche topic), based on these comments I probably wouldn’t be pushing for a kill fee.
That is hugely annoying Louise. Very tricky to get anything if you’ve not filed any copy I reckon. Hope you find a home for it.