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Ask HN: If you're an independent contractor, how do you charge clients?

8 points by mlLK ↗ HN
I'm still a student and while I'm not professionally employed I do a lot of work as an independent contractor/freelancer. The work is pretty straight-forward; Photoshop this, clean up this page, make this form work, layout this like that etc. I'm on to my third client-project (I've managed to complete a project per month) and am at a complete loss in how to reassure that I'm amply getting compensated for the work I do. Most of the time the client will want a quote up-front, which is fine, but I feel like most of the work I do happens about mid-way through the project once they've decided upon a layout and I manage to get their layout working in a browser. This is when they nit-pick away and I spend more time in Thunderbird than in my editor. If I were to write up a formal-contract for the type of work I do what is the best way to go about this?

9 comments

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davidw
Sounds like you should charge per hour rather than on a fixed-bid basis.
mlLK
Right of which I was considering, so opposed to quoting a price quote an amount of time at an hourly rate. . .while most of the work is pretty easy ussually in Photoshop, CSS, XHTML, PHP, or Javascript. . .could you suggest how much a Senior in college should be charging for these services on an hourly basis?

I'm guessing somewhere in between $10-$30/hr

davidw
You charge "what the market will bear". Definitely towards the higher end of that range, maybe more depending on where you live.
mlLK
I guess I should note that given my last two projects I would be coming out around $12,000+ a year, which is hardly survivable.
thinkcomp
I would think it depends on the project. If it's estimated to be above $1,000.00 I would typically require a contract and a fixed fee. Otherwise, it's probably best to do things by the hour.
jhickner
If you're going to do an up-front quote, it's important to have an agreed-upon task list with your client. You don't have to go overboard on it, but if you don't have anything written down it's too easy for the client to sneak work onto your plate.

The case you mentioned where the client nitpicks the design once it's built is pretty common. It's a natural thing to do when there are no constraints on the project.

I find it helpful to have an agreed-upon maximum period of time that will be spent on a design review, to be conducted at the end of the project. If the client asks for too many tweaks and you go over that agreed-upon chunk of time, you start billing hourly.

turtle3
$X to make website match a given layout/image in FF and IE, where X is based on your approximation of difficulty after reviewing the provided material. $Y/hour for each modification after the initial layout is complete, where $Y is 2 or 3 times what seems a reasonable rate to you.

This will do a few things: 1) Cause the customer to get their act together up front, because they would rather only pay $X. 2) Minimize your annoyance at the back and forth, because you are making what you feel like is a lot.

Mostly you want to avoid getting into the $Y/hour area, because it just sucks, mostly. Don't be afraid to set $Y to $50 or $75. You -want- it to be a deterent as much as a way of making money. Also, if you don't set that rate high, they won't value your work. If you are willing to do it for $10/hour, you are barely a step above a fast food worker, and will be treated as such. By setting a high rate, you say: 1) You know you have skills that not everyone does. 2) You value your time, which implies you will value theirs. 3) They better take requests seriously, or they will pay for it.

If you really want to work for $10 an hour, go ahead, but you are undervaluing your work, and it won't be maintainable.

(Note: My comment takes into account the current $10-$30 range the poster mentions in a comment below.)

mlLK
Thank you very much. . .you reminded me how I used to approach this when I was younger but not on my hands and knees begging for an extra addition in my portfolio. Your tone has inspired enough confidence in my to write up a strong selling-point given Web2.0 ever extending lexicon. I should just define my rate according to the technology I use and the trends they're making into the business sector. Thank you.
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