I experienced exactly the same situation today. EEL for only $3.00. 

Did you contact support?

I'd love to hear their explanation.

I had my last EEL in September for a lot more than $3. So I wonder if they already changed something.

Ibogden got one too in this thread! 
http://www.microstockgroup.com/123royaltyfree-com/123rf-royalty-cuts-what-will-you-do/msg286039/?topicseen#new

Got a reply this morning...
--

Thank you for your email.

The earnings for the downloaded image with the EEL might be due a bulk credit purchase that was made by the client and also by applying
promotional discounts with the purchase. Yes, we do offer promotional purchase discounts to our loyal customers.

However, we will need to double check this with out technical team to see whether the download can be as low as $3.
Rest assured, as we will definitely get back to you once we find out the calculation for that particular download.

We appreciate your patience on this matter. Thank you.

--

Dunno when they will come back with a "better" answer".

I guess the short answer is they can give away credits for free and the contributor will foot the bill for it.

Just checked my earnings and the $3 EEL turned into a $17.25 but without any notification or apology or something like that. I wonder what would have happened if I didn't notice them the very low EEL commission.
And by the way, $17 is still very low for a 75 credits sale.

What a fantastic business model where your marketing efforts don't actually cost anything (or next to nothing...).

As long as we contributors don't have to get paid for such licenses, 123RF can run a massive advertising campaigns promising ELs at low, low prices.

 

Given the large number of "mistakes" we have noticed in the last couple of weeks - and those are only the ones we happened to identify - it seems to me 123rf needs to take a serious look at what they're doing internally and fix whatever is so sloppy that all these errors have occurred.

"...error on the invoice..."?? You billed the customer too little? Or you just paid the contributors too little?

Perhaps you can understand how you have shaken our faith in the accuracy of your internal procedures with these problems. All I can think of is that we need to watch 123rf like a hawk for a bit to make sure we aren't cheated with more "miscalculations" and "errors" and....

And the buyer paid 46 cents a credit for those licenses - I guess the large order got them a very large discount.

And the buyer paid 46 cents a credit for those licenses - I guess the large order got them a very large discount.

more curious is that the max amount of credits that can be purchased is 99999 credits making � 0.47
per credit which is $ 0.76

what have this multimillionaire got? 1 M credits?

If you search for today's date and click "View" you will often get a different list if sales from the last page in your downloads list. Sometimes more, sometimes fewer. It usually straightens out by the following day

If you search for today's date and click "View" you will often get a different list if sales from the last page in your downloads list. Sometimes more, sometimes fewer. It usually straightens out by the following day

exactly!

Hi Everyone,

We have investigated this issue. It was a big order (180 images in total) and we were rushed to complete the order as the client wanted their images in 6 hours.

The reason for this miscalculation was due to an error on the invoice, we have since corrected the error and have adjusted the downloads to show the correct rate.

Thank you very much for reporting this to us. Our submission email team will be replying to your emails soon.

Alex.

There should be no errors in our pay - ever.  There should be a standard set of royalty payments for the different sizes and licenses and payment should never deviate from those.

Currently we have no idea what you're paying us and for the last few year, everything that was questioned got a reply telling us it was a discount.  Well I look through my records and it seems like there's a discount applied to almost every single sale.  If you want to discount, you wear the discount and if you're going to pass the discount onto us, make us aware of the the deal.

Currently there is no way of knowing if the dogdy amounts had discounts applied to them or if they were errors or if you're just blatantly ripping us off.  Are we supposed to email you and question every single transaction?

Errors should not happen and we have the right to know what exactly it is you're paying us (or what we're paying you).  50% of what?  50% of 80% of a discounted sale?  50% of an error that gave us $3 instead of $17.  What . are you doing with OUR money?  How many of these errors are there?  How do I find them without questioning every transaction?  How do I know your reply will even be true?

I don't even believe that they're errors.  I believe you've been deliberately ripping us off for years and that you're getting more daring by faking bigger 'errors' and 'discounts'.  But of course I will never know.  What I do know is that you lack transparency, that you don't care about the contributors reducing their royalties by up to a massive amount, and that you quickly delete any comments so that the public don't see how sly you really are. 

My trust in you has been completely wiped out and I will have no regrets leaving you - even at level 4. It will be a relief.