By the way we shouldn't be calling these "clawbacks".  A "clawback" implies that the person being clawed has been convicted of a crime.  We're not the perps here. 

But we are treated like the criminal; we are the only ones being punished.  The purchaser has the image for free, no penalty; the agency only looses the sale that never should have been approved in the first place and the contributor is charge for the loss and looses his property.  See, we are the guilt ones because we are the punished party.

I was thinking you were talking about removing pictures.. that clawback doesn�t worry me to, I got a few all around even on the low earner like DP

Yes, I have gotten a few over the past few years, too. Nothing I am worried about. Not like the grand scale "clawback" from istock.

I have accidentally purchased the wrong size before on DT. The radio button was in the wrong place and I was too quick on the download button before I realized my error. Fortunately, I had purchased a smaller size than I actually needed so the contributor ended up better off.

Never mind, if it's not from istock it's always ok, isn't tha so?

We're talking about a couple of bucks here, not the hundreds some of us saw taken back from istock. Or thousands in some cases.

I feel if the customer downloaded the image, it is theirs, even if they made a mistake, it is not like they can un-download it.  They should eat the loss, not us

My only beef with it is I'd like to know the credit card fraud ones from the other causes.  I have no problem with a buyer that buys the wrong image, wrong size or finds the image doesn't work for them getting their money back.

If I actually knew that most were fraud then I'd probably get more worked up about it, but the pattern of which ones are refunded and so on have never led me to believe they were someone stealing my work...  Just the other day I had a refund that was clearly someone who bought too small a size and came back for the larger one.

The wording in the refund email  -

Possible refund reasons:
- Accidental download;
- Credit card fraud with mandatory refund issued at request to real card holder;
- Duplicate download;
- Incorrect size/format/license purchased;
- License update;
- Performance issues (misspellings in texts, quality);

Due to the high volume of daily transactions, we cannot provide additional clarification on the refund performed. Measures are always taken for the licenses to be withdrawn and images deleted. Any subsequent unlicensed usage is liable to legal action and penalties.

I think it is utter nonsense to claim that you can't provide specifics on the refund performed. I don't believe they do so many refunds in a day that they can't check one box out of less than 10 reasons.

Transparency in reporting transactions - for all the sites, not just DT - is important, and by and large missing across the board. I knew when I posted something in IS's suggestions forum that I was tossing the request into a black hole, but the suggestion here about detailed sales and refund data, in a downloadable form so we can use it if we wish, is something I'd like to see all the sites implement.

Once upon a time, royalties were pretty simple. Over time, the number of prices, royalty rates, credit prices and license types has mushroomed. Often (certainly at IS) it has been contributors who noticed something and then kept on and on about it until a discrepancy was fixed.

If I saw a rise in refunds, it'd be nice to know if it was fraud or someone returning a file because they didn't like it. When these things are rare, it perhaps isn't an urgent matter. But then if they're rare, DT can certainly spare the time to be specific about why the refund occurred.