There’s been a lot of talk lately about publications charging small fees for online submissions. In the States, for example, both Ploughshares and the Missouri Review charge US$3 per submission. The idea is that the fee is set at about the level of printing and buying stamps for a posted submission, and helps to contribute to the costs of processing the submissions.
Opinions are divided on these fees: some people think it’s a good way to help raise money for publishing projects, while others feel that it’s an unfair burden on the writers.
Personally, I agree with many of the points made on both sides of the argument, and I’d certainly feel very uncomfortable about setting a fixed submission fee for The Fiction Desk. However, we do need the revenue: right now, only around one in three hundred of the people who submit actually purchase a single copy of our books, let alone a subscription. Even with other sales coming in from elsewhere, the figures just don’t add up. What this ultimately means is that there’s less time available for us to spend going through the submissions.
I’ve decided therefore to set up a voluntary submission fee, of £2 per story (about US$3). There’s now an option to pay the fee on our submissions form. You don’t have to pay it—writers who’d rather not can simply leave the box unchecked—but if you do, you’ll be helping to contribute to our running costs, which in turn will help us to promote the short story form.
There’s a side benefit too: our usual response time is three months, but where a submission fee is paid, we’ll make sure we reply within two weeks.
I think this voluntary system may be the best compromise between having an open submissions policy, and the need to raise money.
Let’s see how it goes.
November 17th, 2011 at 2:47 pm
I don’t mind the idea of nominal submission fees.
I think writers understand (or they should) the volume of submissions that journals tend to receive and the amount of work involved in giving them all a decent read.
If it’s a choice between paying a few pounds to submit somewhere or having more journals that only accept agented/invited submissions, I think it’s reasonable to ask for a contribution. (Especially, as you say, you get writers who’ll submit to a journal without contributing by buying it.) I can also see that even a small charge might help remove a lot of submissions made thoughtlessly – submissions that just aren’t suitable and have been submitted without any knowledge or attempt to establish what sort of thing the publication does. If someone has to invest even a couple of quid they’d be more likely to pay better attention to submission guidelines, or even to a back issue.
But I’m not sure I like the idea of a voluntary system because it raises the idea that those choosing to pay the money would get a writer preferential treatment. I’m sure you’d never prefer one story over another because it was paid for, but the possibility’s there and it feels awkward, and all the more so because you’ve already introduced a two-tier approach by having response time dependant on payment.
I can see you’re trying to do the good, nice and proper thing, but it seems like it would be more comfortable just to make it a small but compulsory fee. (Obviously this is all opinion and taste and nonsense.)
November 17th, 2011 at 2:53 pm
Sounds eminently sensible to me, Rob. And a £2 fee seems very reasonable for a faster turnaround.
November 17th, 2011 at 2:54 pm
Hi Alan,
Thank you for the very thoughtful comment.
I’m glad that you don’t disagree with the idea of a fee in general, and I think you make some very good points about the problems with a voluntary fee.
I should point out that the ‘standard’ free submission is exactly as it’s always been, with a three-month deadline; the fee-paid submission has been sped up, rather than the other hobbled. (I know that’s not the point you’re making, but it’s worth stating anyway.)
I wanted the fee to be voluntary because I didn’t want to limit submissions only to those who feel comfortable paying a fee; I want people who disapprove of a fee to feel able to submit too.
As for preferential treatment, as I’m sure you know, the last thing an editor is thinking when they assess a story is whether they’ve got a couple of quid out of receiving it, but it’s really a matter of perception. Over time, if there is a perception that fee-paid submissions get preferential treatment in terms of selection (rather than just faster consideration), I’ll have to take another look at the system; either making it compulsory, or replacing it with something different altogether.
In the meantime, thank you again for your comments. They’ll certainly be something to chew over.
November 17th, 2011 at 2:57 pm
Hi Paul,
Thank you for the comment! I’m glad you approve of the system. It will be interesting to see what other responses it gets, and how many people choose to use it.
November 17th, 2011 at 2:57 pm
I think £2 per submission is perfectly reasonable. I consider it an elementary principle of professionalism in writing that appraising submissions takes time, and anything that takes time costs money. I am in favour of any fee which contributes to the running of the organisation taking the submission, and is sufficiently low that it does not feature as a factor in the decision whether to submit or not.
November 17th, 2011 at 3:13 pm
Hi William,
Many thanks for your comment, and your support.
November 17th, 2011 at 4:44 pm
Fees of any kind imply a service returned– and if publications want to impose fees, it should be with the understanding that rejections are not form letters. I think most writers would feel comfortable with a reading fee if they were assured of such feedback.
November 17th, 2011 at 4:58 pm
Hi Carla,
Thank you for your comment. You make a very interesting point about feedback. It’s something that I’ve thought about several times over the last year. The main problem is that, if you’re going to give feedback, you need to do it well. A couple of hasty lines can often do more harm than good.
Giving good feedback, however, takes time, and as a result, it’s just not practical to do cheaply. Instead, I have in mind to do some more blog posts, and maybe other projects, that look at some of the common problems that come up in the stories we see, so that the information can benefit everybody. However, all of this takes time, and of course the priority must be to work on the anthology series. Part of the benefit of this token fee will hopefully be to free up more time for all sorts of useful projects like the above, as well as providing more resources for the publishing.
November 17th, 2011 at 6:42 pm
The sum of £2 is commensurate with the service of receiving the submission and appraising it for the publisher’s purposes. Individual criticism I would expect to be more expensive than that.
November 17th, 2011 at 9:06 pm
I have mixed feelings about this. First I understand that it takes money to run any kind of publication. But couldn’t you get advertisers?
The fee itself is small and doable, but it’s my idea of writers giving you a service/product and then having to pay for it that rubs me wrong.
If, however, as said above, you gave feedback, then I, the writer would be happy to pay. I also think, if that were the case, you could ask for more money, as two or three dollars would hardly be worth your time.
Right now there are thousands of lit mags not charging, but I would be willing to pay as much as ten dollars for feedback to any one of them.
November 18th, 2011 at 2:24 am
Consider what writers are paid by most small venues (next to nothing should sum that up). All venues are about the writing–without it, there would be no venue. If you charge everybody three bucks a pop, you’ll be making much more than the writers. How is this fair? Generate revenue, but not on the backs of artists.
November 18th, 2011 at 2:53 am
I don’t believe that writers anticipate a full critique [regardless of whether the publication charges a reading fee.] But the prospect of a personal response would, I believe, provide an incentive for the voluntary reading fee.
November 18th, 2011 at 10:33 am
Hi Tricia,
Many thanks for your comments.
Regarding advertising, the problem is that advertising revenue depends on how large an audience you’re reaching: if we were reaching a massive audience through these books, we wouldn’t be having this conversation at all. I also think that the lack of advertising in the books helps to give credibility to the writers involved. Regardless, right now advertising wouldn’t really be a solution for us, though I’m sure it’s something that we’ll reconsider from time to time.
Regarding feedback—and I’m responding here to Carla as well—I do very much understand the frustration of not getting feedback, and the feeling that even just a couple of lines from the editor would make all the difference.
In practice, though, in order for feedback to be useful, it has to go into some detail, explaining the reasons behind comments, looking at other ways of solving the problems, and so on. It’s also a dialogue: any feedback is then followed up with requests for clarification, all of which takes time. For even a short story, I’d say that to provide worthwhile feedback would take several hours altogether, which would cost far more than £2 – or even $10. It would also distract from working on the books themselves, which is already a full-time job. So right now, giving feedback or critique isn’t an option.
I also take your point about giving a product/service: however, I’d say that this only takes place if we accept the story—and in that case, we do pay the author. (In that respect, one could see this as a similar dynamic to a writing competition, except with an entry fee that’s much lower than usual, even optional, and more winners than a usual competition, although perhaps also with less prize money per winner.)
I’ll certainly take your comments on board—along with those of the other commenters—and they will be very helpful when it comes to reassessing the situation in due course.
November 18th, 2011 at 10:48 am
J. Michael, thanks also for your comment.
We aren’t charging everybody. It’s an optional fee, and those who feel it’s inappropriate can simply not pay it. This way, those who are ideologically opposed to the fee can still take part and submit work without having to compromise on their beliefs.
For the record, though, even if every person who submitted did pay the fee, our published authors would still be the only ones to ‘profit’, as all the money that comes in is ploughed back into the project.
The ideal situation is for a publication to pay for itself entirely through sales of books and subscriptions. That’s still our goal, but it’s a long and difficult process: most publications never manage it, but I think we do stand a chance. This voluntary fee will help to support us while we work towards that.
November 18th, 2011 at 8:28 pm
Rob,
I think your points are good ones. It does seem unfair to charge writers to pay…and yet, lit mags need revenue!
Charging writers on a voluntary basis does seem like a good compromise. I believe PANK magazine does this by having what they call a tip jar, so writers donate as they see fit.
It will be interesting to see how/when/if and what people donate!
Best of luck!
Becky
Editor,
The Review Review