You are scrolling, and there are your hands.
Same kitchen, same product, same shot you framed. A voice you have never heard is speaking over it, in a language you do not speak, for a campaign you were never told about. Nothing was stolen and nobody lied to you. Eight months ago, at the end of a friendly project, someone asked for the raw files and you sent them.
Three reasons brands ask, and only one is about quality
The request always arrives in the same neutral wording. The motives behind it are not neutral at all.
They want the other language
In Belgium this is the most common reason and it is almost never stated. A brand with your French footage can have a Dutch voice laid over it in an afternoon, in house, for the cost of an afternoon.
That is the second market you were going to sell them. It is not unreasonable of them to want it cheaply. It is unreasonable for you to hand it over as a file transfer and call it good client service.
They want to keep cutting after you are gone
Six edits from one shoot, a version for each product line, a cutdown next season. Perfectly legitimate, genuinely valuable, and worth exactly as much as the videos it will replace.
They actually need something specific
A square version for a marketplace listing, a shorter cut for a pre roll, a shot without the caption burned in. This is the honest minority of requests, and it usually does not need the raw files at all. It needs one more export, which you can do in twenty minutes.
| What the request sounds like | What it is usually for | What that should cost |
|---|---|---|
| Can you send the raw files | The other language version | A second deliverable, priced as one |
| For our archive | Recutting for a year without you | More than the original video |
| Our editor just needs the clean shots | A specific export | Nothing, do the export yourself |
| Standard for our supplier files | A policy that was never priced | Ask what the policy pays |
The fourth row is the Belgian agency version, and it is worth a calm question rather than a refusal. A supplier policy that requires raw files was written by someone who never asked what raw files are worth, and asking is often enough for a line to appear in the budget.
The edit is the thing you were paid for
Handing over the raw material makes the edit retroactively optional, and the edit was the work.
Anyone can hold a phone near a product. The value you added is the twenty takes you rejected, the four seconds you cut from the opening, the order you put things in. Sending the whole card says that all of that was a rendering preference, and the next brief will be priced accordingly.
That is the real cost, and it is not about one campaign. It is about what the client believes they are buying next time.
Saying yes properly
The answer is not no. It is yes, on terms, and the terms take three lines.
Price it as its own deliverable rather than as a favour attached to the invoice, and size it by what it lets them do: they are buying the ability to make more videos without you, which is worth more than one video with you. Deliver selected takes rather than the entire card, so what you send is material and not an archive of your mistakes. And name the language question directly, because in Belgium it is the whole point: state whether the footage may be re voiced or subtitled into another language, and if it may, that is a second market and it is priced.
None of that is aggressive. It is the same conversation a photographer has had for fifty years, and clients recognise it immediately.
What goes on the quote
One line, written before the shoot rather than negotiated after it.
Say that the delivery is the finished video in the agreed formats, that raw files are available as a separate item, and that any re voicing or translation of the footage is a separate licence. A client who intended to ask will ask now, at quoting time, which is the moment when it costs them a budget line instead of costing you a market.
Keep reading
- The advice stops right before the useful part
- "You Said You Were Bilingual"
- They are sending the box instead of the money
- Somewhere in Your Company There Are Two Briefs
- The complete UGC guide for Belgium
Frequently asked questions
Is it rude to refuse?
No, and framing it as a refusal is the mistake. Offer it as a priced option and the conversation stops being about trust.
What if they already have the files from an earlier job?
Then the next quote is where you set the terms, and you can say plainly that footage from the previous project was delivered for that project. Most brands accept that without argument because it is how every other supplier works.
Do I have to keep the raw files at all?
Keep them for as long as your agreement runs, then decide. Storage is cheap and the request often arrives late, but you are not a permanent archive for a client who paid for one video.
Does this apply to a small brand with no editor?
Even more so. A small brand asking for raw files usually intends to have a friend or a freelancer cut them, which is the same second market with a smaller budget attached.