Cover My Shoot is a marketplace, not an agency — and the money works the way that sounds.
You pay the professional directly. Cover My Shoot never takes, holds or processes assignment pay, and charges no commission on what a professional earns. What you agree with the professional is what they receive.
The terms are stated before anyone commits. Every assignment posting shows the total rate and the pay date up front, and the posting form asks you to confirm both are real before your assignment can be sent. If a professional responds, they do so knowing those terms.
You and the professional arrange the payment itself — the method, any deposit, and the timing are agreed between the two of you, in writing, in your platform conversation, before the job. Deliverables and usage are agreed the same way. (There's an optional written agreement on the site that both sides can sign to record what you agreed — using it is your choice, never a requirement.) Because the platform isn't part of the payment, there's nothing to wait for us to release and no platform fee deducted from either side.
Professionals participate free — no membership fee to browse and respond, no pay-per-lead charges — which is why the rate you offer goes to the person doing the work, not to layers in between.
One honest limit: because payment runs directly between you and the professional, Cover My Shoot can't guarantee that a payment will be made — that obligation is between the two of you, under your own arrangement. Agreeing everything in writing up front is how both sides protect themselves, and it's how this marketplace is designed to work.