Re: How do freelance technical writers deal with the thorny issue of payment?

["Bill Swallow" <techcommdood -at- gmail -dot- com>]

>    - How do you decide whether to quote a fixed price, or a daily rate
>    for projects?

Nature of the work. If it's a canned job like training someone, flat
rate (either per day or per training period - the timeline defines the
scope of involvement in this case). On fuzzier things like project
work, agree on a rate with a weekly hour target, but in the contract
state that the rate is hourly for actual hours worked. You can provide
an estimate (10 walnuts per hour X 40 hours per week X 5 weeks = 2000
walnuts as an estimate for them to budget around, but you may work 45
hours a week for 6 weeks to get the job done, in which case they owe
you 2700 walnuts).

>    - For a large project that could span two or three months, is it
>    reasonable to ask for a percentage of the final payment 'up front' ? I've
>    looked at various websites and opinions vary from none, right up to 50%.

It never hurts to ask for it as part of the contract.

>    - Again, for long projects, is it the norm to stagger payments across
>    agreed milestones?

I've always agreed on regular payments, and have twice halted work
until payment was made. Note though that I've only contracted on the
side or between periods of full-time employment, and haven't
contracted at all over the past 5 years. But I find it hard to believe
practices have changed much in that time frame.

-- 
Bill Swallow
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http://techcommdood.blogspot.com
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