Hi everyone, I hope that just as few cake decorators have gone through a bad experience. 

I specialize in 3 leches cake (3 milk cake). Well I have a customer that bought me often these type of cake. she then asked me to do a sample cake for a quinceañera (15 th bday celebration) I said sure, I'll have your cake ready in a couple of weeks. Well she called and called and called to see if I had the cake. I just told her that a cake takes time. She wanted a fondant cake with raspberry filling. I don't usually carry these ingredients. I went out to buy the satin ice fondant and raspberries. 

I delivered cake the day I said. The customer said I'll take the payment to your house. Customer never came do pay me. I am

Never do one without a deposit to cover your costs... And don't leave it without your balance. Even my friends have to "pay by the rules". :)

I can't give you advice on how to get paid..but can tell you never, ever give out a cake without money. There are always people who will try to get something for free in this world. I once had a lady pick up a cake and said she didn't bring her wallet; "blah, blah, blah..I'll bring money/debit/credit card later etc.." I said ok well go get your wallet and come back to pick up your cake. It was as if a miracle had happened right before my eyes, because that wallet magically appeared in her car. You can't let people try to take advantage of you...no money, no cake. 

Never turn on your oven until the cake has been paid for IN FULL. A deposit isn't enough unless you enjoy only covering your costs in the case of no-shows. When you order a custom anything people usually make you pay in full ahead of time, cake should be no different.

Unless you know the person in advance, you should always get payment up front to cover getting your ingredients etc.  I just make wedding cakes but in the old days, I would collect payment at the time of delivery which was always a pain because everyone was running around trying to get ready for the wedding and I always had to hunt down the person responsible for payment.  No more.  A deposit is required at the time of the order and payment in full 2 weeks before the wedding.  The same should apply to your situation as well.

Thanks for all your advice. 

Before I made the cake I had a bad  feeling about it. 

Well bad news for her no more of my cakes. Sad to say this but I thought she was a good costumer. 

Yes I recommend from now on you require a deposit to hold the date and balance before they get the cake. I get the final payment 15 days prior to the event for my larger cakes. Now on some of my smaller orders I have done payment on delivery, but nothing I will get stuck with a huge out of pocket cost if they don't pay. If she wouldn't have given me cash payment then, I would have taken the cake back home with me. It would have been her problem.

     You could try emailing, or leaving her a voicemail. (or both) You could call to say you are needing payment no later than Friday (or whatever) and you could even threaten that if need be you will look into taking legal action over this. hth. On a final note, even if she ended up paying. I don't think I would take her back as a client again, even paid in full ahead of the event!

I make tres leche cakes too. I do love them!! They are so moist and I love the fruit in the middle and on top of them. I think that is one of my favorite cakes. 

So sorry that you had to learn the hard way with this customer. As gingerlocks said, you should not have given her the cake until she came up with the money.  You say you had a bad feeling about making the cake. Sometimes we should always go with our first gut feeling!!  Oh well at least you will not make that mistake again!! Hang in there!!!

So true, remnant3333. You just have to go by what you feel. I just began to make 3 leches cake, pecan I my favorite

Maybe she thought it was free because it was called a sample cake? Long shot. How did it turn out though, I thought you couldn't cover a tres leche cake in fondant because it is too runny?

Oh no, the cake was white with raspberry filling. Tres leches with fondant