Single post in About Deposits; Important Information Regarding Payment

Pre-paying would be paying for the full thing from the on-set, which is not acceptable. Paying half up-front and then half upon completion is... More like a deposit. The way it works is that if the buyer doesn't give the rest of the payment then, at the very worst, the artist got 50% for their work. And if the artist fails to finish the work - at least the buyer didn't spend the full amount. It's the closest to a middle ground in this kind of situation that you can really get... If either side fails, at least it's not as bad as it could've been and - more importantly - it's fair on both sides.