Submission Fees: Which are Valid and Which are Scams

From speaking to new writers to reading comments left on poetry contest announcements, I’ve discovered that there are a lot of writers who think they understand submission fees and when they are a scam. And through this casual observation, I can tell you many writers do not understand when submission fees are appropriate and when they are not.

And since I think people warm up to being corrected about their knowledge of fees in an online forum about as well as they do to you correcting their grammar on social media, I decided I’d write this post instead. For those who genuinely are seeking to find out when to pay fees and when fees are a bright neon sign saying this is a scam, they can find the answers here.

The unfortunate truth is that writing is an underpaid endeavor, where writers tend to get paid through the “exposure” of their work (like that will pay the bills). Writers are also known to be a group who are desperately waiting to get noticed, discovered, and published. Don’t take that as an insult, we’re passionate about writing and we want our words to be meaningful for other people and to maybe be acknowledged for scraping our hearts onto a page and get paid for doing what we love.

The worst part, I see writers preying on other writers all the time so they can make a little money in this rat race to support their dreams of writing by selling “helpful hints.” I’ve come to discover that there’s a large pool of writers wanting to get paid for their wisdom, but their good at branding and marketing and their writing knowledge is almost non-existent. But let’s save that for another day.

Let me break down submission fees.

Poetry and Writing Contests

This is one of the places I see writers complain the most about fees, often saying they know it’s a scam and they won’t pay fees to enter a contest.

So is it a scam? No. The entry fees for poetry and writing contests are how those running the contest can afford to pay out money to the winners. As writers, we have to use our discretion. After all, is it worth paying a $20 entry fee to win a year subscription to a literary magazine? Maybe not, unless you were planning on paying for the subscription anyway. But fees for poetry and writing contests are standard. Those who charge a fee may get more money than they need to pay the winners, but it usually goes into something else like supporting their writing organizations or their literary magazine.

Literary Magazines

This is another place where writers sound the alarm when charged a “reading fee” or “submission fee” for having their work considered for publication.

So is it a scam? Probably not. Although I strongly suggest looking into any publication you’re submitting your work to before sending them your money or your work, there are still some magazines that charge a fee for submissions. It is standard for literary magazines to have no fee for submissions, but there are still a few that have a fee.

Let me tell you a little about literary magazines. Most are run by either a university where they’ve received a grant or some other funding to operate the magazine. Then there are tons that are run by people who are volunteering their time or getting paid very little. This is why so many literary magazines pay with a contributor’s copy, a tiny honorarium, or their only incentive is “exposure” for your work. They don’t have the funding and are paying to print or produce the magazines out of their own pockets. It really is a labor of love. It’s also why so many magazines go under each year.

Editor

Sometimes you’ll get an editor after you sign on with a publisher. It can be kind of a package deal depending on who publishes your book. For new authors though, you may want an editor before you ever start submitting your work to literary agents or publishers. Or, you may want to self-publish and hiring an editor before you publish is an excellent idea.

In the cases where the editor isn’t provided by your publisher, there will be fees associated with the editor’s services. To be clear, there will be fees for the editors anywhere, but it depends on whether you pay for it out of your pocket, or it comes out of the sales from your books.

Literary Agents

Spoiler alert: we’ve reached the scam portion of the program. Literary agents evaluate the work of a writer to determine whether they feel they can sell the book to a publisher. If they don’t think they can sell it in today’s market, they’ll pass on representing you even if they think the story is great. This means all the work they do upfront relies on them selling your book to a publisher. Once it’s printed, then they get paid. Not before then.

Publishers

This area is a little trickier with so many people switching to self-publishing/independent publishing. If you go the traditional route of publishing using a literary agent and going through a larger publishing house, publisher’s fees come out of the sales of your books. If you’re going the self-publishing/independent publishing route, you will have fees associated with getting your book’s ISBN, cover art, printing, etc. So there will be fees. Vanity publishers are considered to be a little more scammy. They charge higher fees and will take care of all the items you’d pay to self-publish, and then they charge you to print so many copies (like 100) of your book, which you buy and then try to sell. Now if you think you’re going through a traditional publishing route but skipping over the literary agent and soliciting small presses and they want to charge you a fee, that’s another red flag for a scam.

In the end, you should always look into who you’re planning to submit your work. While the desire to be published can be overwhelming, you need to research these places and make sure they will be a good fit for you and your work. You’ve dedicated a lot of your time and your heart to these pieces and now that they’re ready to go out into the world, you don’t want to send them to just anyone.