This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Hey there, what's up? Welcome to Sidus Hill School. Thanks for tuning in today. This is episode 2001. That's right, yesterday we crossed over episode 2000.
And surprise, surprise, here we are still going. Episode 2001, thank you so much for your support. Thank you for listening. Thanks for being awesome and amazing. I continue to be so excited to make this podcast for you every single day.
And so without further ado, let's jump into today's episode. That's right, we get to it quickly because I respect your time. And the episode today follows our Failure Friday segment. This is a collection of short stories about mistakes, missteps, disasters, all the things that go wrong. Now of course we're talking about lots of success stories as we go along week by week.
But I also want you to understand that things go wrong too. Right, and it's all part of it. So these stories have varied quite a lot, but they often begin with an idea or an assumption, and then that assumption meets reality. And then what does the person do? How do they navigate that and choose to move forward?
So today's short story features Jessica Bonner. She is the owner of Four Other Prizes. Four Other Prizes is a tutoring business based in Birmingham, Alabama. Jessica had gotten off to a good start. All was going well until she received a frustrating chargeback after what she thought was a successful tutoring session with services rendered in full.
So just imagine you perform a service, you give a lot of your time and energy, your expertise, you get paid, which is how it's supposed to work. But then a few days later, or sometimes a few weeks later, you realize you haven't actually been paid. Your money has been taken away by the credit card company in response to a chargeback request. So that's no fun. Let's hear from Jessica about how the whole thing went down as well as what she learned.
I'll come back at the end with a quick wrap-up. [Music]
Hello, my name is Jessica Bonner and my side hustle is named Four Other Prizes Consulting, which is a tutoring and a sound prep coaching business specializing in tutoring in the areas of English, reading math up into pre-calculus, as well as ACT, SAT, GRE, GED, ASFAP, and Praxis Prep. So my story involves a non-traditional college client that I had tutored for about five years. When the pandemic arrived, she decided we would no longer meet in person and I agreed with that. And we would instead meet over the phone because she did not trust platforms like Zoom.
We agreed that she would text or email assignment details to me and that she would pay either by check or debit or credit card. So all of those things were set up. Everyone was good with it and I didn't have any worry about any checks bouncing because she and her husband ran a business and the checks were written from that business. So the situation occurred in December, 2021. She was getting ready to graduate from college and she had made her last charge with me.
We had done it over the phone like we normally did whenever she decided to pay by debit or credit card. And a few days later, the payment processing company approached me via email and let me know a chargeback had taken place on that most recent purchase. And I was kind of surprised by it. So I sent her a text and let her know, hey, this was regarding the tutoring session we last had with one another. I'm a bit confused about why this is happening, why I'm receiving a chargeback email about it.
And so maybe about two or three hours later, she texted me some type of excuse about her accountant. I wasn't aware of my address. And that was why the chargeback took place and just saying, just sorry. And I wrote back something along the lines of that's weird because my address has been the same for years. And she basically responded back, sorry, and I'll be mailing you out a check this week.
I noticed that the way she spoke through texts, although we cannot pick up intonation through texts, there was a typical jovial way she would speak through texts in the past that she had not used when talking with me at this particular time, which made me really think to herself that she honestly thought I was trying to steal from her. And at that time of the school year, she had been exhausted running her business and being in school. So she could have potentially forgotten and made this error and assumed that I stolen. And so, and was not ready to apologize for the error. Anyway, I received a check about two weeks later after the time of the appointment, which was very annoying and stressful for me, given that I had already rendered the services and I had to sit up there when I received a chargeback email and turn in all of this paperwork to prove that I indeed had not stolen from her.
And the funds that the payment processing company took out of my account, not only included the payment of the service that was rendered, but it included the fees that the company had already taken from the original sale. So I had actually lost more money and the woman had not fully compensated me for my entire loss. Anyway, the lesson I picked up from this is to not allow customers to pay after the service is about to be rendered, have customers pay for the service before the service is rendered, because some mess like that may happen later on. They may act like they have amnesia and like suddenly a charge that was there is no longer there. So for this client, unfortunately for her, she came back about six months later and she found that her price to work with me went up by four figures and that she has to pay me upfront if she wants to work with me.
But lesson learned, charge them ahead of time, do not allow them to pay after a service is rendered. [Music]
Never confuse a single defeat with a final defeat. That is the theme of failure Friday. And now we can add don't allow customers to pay after services have been rendered. Try to get that money upfront.
I respect that and good job as well, Jessica. Raising the price when that client sheepishly, I assume came back to you many months later and wanted to hire you again. Again, thanks so much Jessica for sharing this transparent candid story. Check out her website at forotherprizes.com, forotherprizes.com. She's also on most social media, including Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, all under that name for other prizes.
If you've got a question or an update for us about your hustle, come to sidehustleschool.com/questions. Once again, this has been episode 2001. Thanks so much for being out there. I hope you'll continue to join me every morning or afternoon or evening. You know, you can listen to whatever's good for you 'cause I'll be here.
My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is Side Hustle School. [Music]
From the Onward Project.
